Brilliant and touching

Admirable film.

Absolutely Brilliant!

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

Joining in on a poll on ICM for the best movies of 1981,I started looking round for titles to view from the year. During this search,I found that ICM were starting a French viewing challenge,where you have to watch as many French flicks as possible. Feeling that this was the perfect time to cross the two,I took a look at French cinema from 1981,and happily stumbled on a chance for some strange kinky Kinski.The plot:Going to Japan with her older lover Sir Stephen, "O" starts trying to figure out how to fulfil all of Stephen's sexual needs. Wanting to "educate" "O",Stephen decides to be a true gentlemen,and get O a job working in an elite Japanese brothel (!) While she receives an education,Stephen starts peeping,at the fruits of passion.View on the film:Crossing East meets West,co-writer/(with Rio Kishida and Dominique Aury) director Shûji Terayama dollops French smut..err, erotica with Japanese fetishism. Unloading non-simulated sex scenes, Terayama & cinematographer Tatsuo Suzuki brew the title with a peculiar atmosphere of sensual red dust and striking symbolism of childhood flashbacks and a dead bird,which is balanced by weird S&M sequences involving torture,and Stephen turning into a peeping tom who checks on O's time with clients. Undressing a book from The Story of O creator Dominique Aury, (who co-wrote the script) the screenplay by Aury/Terayama and Kishida send Stephen and O on a quirky erotic adventure,that ropes in unique punishments for women who fail to meet the needs of clients, (no food for 100 days) with a cool erotica vibe of O opening her sexuality. Joined by a fragile Isabelle Illiers as O, Klaus Kinski (who take part in a full-on sex scene) gives a great,drooling performance as Sir Stephen,who begins peeling the fruits of passion.

I never had a chance to watch Kinski much, but I think what he had given to us with 'Aguirre - The Wrath of God', 'Woyzeck', 'Fitzcarraldo', 'Nosferatu' and 'Cobra Verde' is something that makes him matchless. His cadaver looks may haunt any mainstream viewer for weeks together. Now, I praise Kinski for his artistic abilities and menacing performance, but I never intended to see him in this trash called 'Les Fruits de la Passion'. I think that the frequent run-ins with director Werner Herzog spoiled Kinski's career. Herzog knew to redeem Kinski's talent, while the other directors didn't. Shuji Terayama tries to copy Pauline Reage's erotic fantasy novel called 'The Story of O', but has needlessly added his own style and symbolism for the sake of making this soft core porn film a piece of art. Direction wise this is an okay flick but mistreats the audience with lame sequences that either don't mean much or are entirely awry.The film begins with a wealthy western Sir Stephen (Klaus Kinski), who comes to Shanghai with his mistress (or lover?) 'O' (Isabelle Illiers). Sir Stephen is an aging businessman, who has an insatiable hunger for sex. Since he himself is engaged physically with numerous women, he wants 'O' to serve herself at a local Chinese brothel to strange customers. The brothel owner 'Madam' (Pîtâ) is a transvestite or at least this appears the way she dresses herself and speaks with the prostitutes. Sir Stephen wants to test 'O''s love for him by watching her make love with several intolerable men. Someone is a butcher who reeks blood while the other wants to make love cuckooing like a bird! Sir Stephen hopes that 'O' will completely surrender herself to make her partner (Sir Stephen) happy. But you see, there is a condition here. Sir Stephen thinks that 'O' will only physically belong to some man at a point of time, but will mentally remain involved with him every time. After testing 'O' with several men, Sir Stephen decides to retest 'O' and makes love right before her eyes with his another french girlfriend Nathalie (Arielle Dombasle) while 'O' is leashed in chains! While Sir Stephen is engaged in sick games, the peasants and labors are uniting for a revolution. Unfortunately, Sir Stephen goes in the bad books of the revolutionaries, when he decides not to aid the revolution. While Sir Stephen feels himself torn between Nathalie and 'O', the kindhearted 'O' finds solace in the arms of a young Chinese revolutionary, who secretly loves her. The film ends with Nathalie leaving Sir Stephen and heading to Europe and 'O' fainting when a fortune-teller tells that Sir Stephen killed the very revolutionary who made her feel true love and was trying to kill himself when he was fortunately saved. The fortune-teller hands 'O' a note that says 'She is free to go wherever she wants.' While the film teems with heavy symbolism and vivid imagery, some of the sequences are hard to perceive. For instance, there is a story associated with almost every prostitute of the brothel. Also, Shuji Terayama must have been nuts to show the lovers as fathers as in one of the scenes we see baby O's father magically transforming to Sir Stephen who encircles (and thus limits) her and walks out. In another scene a prostitute dominates his client with lashes. Soon we see him transforming into prostitute's own father. Then there is a drowned piano and floating dead bird which are uselessly and forcibly included. This was rather an unnecessary film that came in 1981. Shuji Terayama could have excelled had he invested into horror, which was at its zenith during the early 80s. Kinski surely degrades himself posing his tuberculous body but is effective as an actor. Illiers has one of the most innocent faces I've ever come across while Dombasle looks like a failed-actress-clung-to-a-millionaire. Personally I don't think Kinski's chemistry works out as good with the other directors as it works with Werner Herzog. So this berated film of a berated actor fetches 4 on 10. Once again Kinski proved that he didn't mind selling himself 'For A Few Dollars More'.

This will not be a positive experience for everyone. Several things would be offputting. Most would be offended that it is based on a book with trivial sensibilities. There is explicit sex. The nature of the thing slips often into visual symbolism. Many languages are spoken. Some of the text is sophomoric. Obsession, perversion, sexual quest, caste and political struggle are mixed up with no apparent coherence. Advertised as erotic, it is anything but.And yet. It is deliciously placed between Breilliat and Resnais and is better than most from them. If you watch a lot of movies and deeply, like I do, the better ones form a sort of tapestry that reinforce each other. Two of my "must-see" films are "Pillow Book" and "Fitzcarraldo," which this lean up against. Not of the same caliber of course, but there's a resonance.There are some marvelous experiences here. For instance, the young girl is newly established in her sparse cell at the brothel. She has put on the bottom of her dress and stands at the night window, pining for Kinski (who is with another lover). Across the screen on the wall is her shadow, a lovely, lonely pose, breasts alert. She moves away from the window in impatience. The shadow remains unmoved.Another: flashback to O as a girl, imprisoned by her father in a chalk square while he walks away and a clown rolls a flaming hoop about. The receding man turns into Kinski. Flash forward to the prostituted O, sewing the torn photo of Kinski, just before she is placed in a flying swan device to be sodomized by an aging client.Another prostitute in the brothel is an aging actress. To get her to "perform," they set up a camera to pretend they are shooting, "Sunset Blvd." wise. We see this a couple times, then it shifts from the pretend movie to a (presumed) past, real movie. This raises an issue that leads to her suicide in the fashion of Ophelia. Her body in the pond is lifted by a rising piano.The story (the parts that don't matter to me) is influenced by Kinski, partly autobiographical and right before we see the same character (in a similar white suit) in "Fitzcarraldo." The madness matters.Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.

I bought this film on DVD despite the "stale" review and that was idiotic... That review was completely accurate and I have never seen any worse "erotic" film in my long life! Even if it partly was lovely filmed and had interesting surroundings, plus a nice cover... But my own Extreme Erotica (c) films are over 100 times more erotic (just in the soft delicious aspect) with probably less than 100 times of this films budget! The story have no logical connection with the first film or the famous book... Or any new (exciting) element of slave training, except some very strange and sad developments... Then did the main male character - Klaus Kinski - not look a bit like the second Master of "O" he try to play... And not even lovely Arielle Dombasle, did look delicious in any scene!