Did you people see the same film I saw?

Crappy film

Captivating movie !

Best movie of this year hands down!

Wish I'd seen this 33 years ago when it came out. At the time I was a college student studying photography and I rather liked the work of David Hamilton and even tried to emulate his soft focus look.Today it all just looks like a poor excuse for some titillation. I'm not so interested in school girls any more. It's just soft porn masquerading as art. It makes me wonder what Hamilton was up to at the time. Was he trying to recapture an idealised youth? In all honesty I must confess to only having the patience to watch about 45 minutes of it. I'd never seen it but it had been tagged in my mind as something to make time for if I ever got the opportunity. It is horribly sweetly sickly soft porn. God what a fool I was at 17!

When it was released this film caused a sensation. I watched it and was thrilled. Beautiful, usually young, naked women filmed in the classy style we knew so well from director Hamiltons photography. His photographs never become porn and the same is true for this movie. Today I saw it again and was bitterly disappointed. The soft core in extremely slow paced scenes, all filmed with some Vaseline on the lenses, actually is all there is. There is no real story, the characters remain beautiful and beautifully filmed bodies, but they are not real creatures with a soul. Actually nothing happens. It is like Hamilton is photographing using moving pictures rather than stills. And this gets so boring after a while. I even didn't watch the whole thing the second time, for I fell vast asleep. That is all that remains of this masterpiece: it is a very good sleeping pill. And you will never become addicted to it!Back then 7 out of 10, now 3 out of 10

This 1977 colored version is the same film made in France in 1959. The original is long out of print & is not listed. I can remember vividly seeing this movie at 16 Y.O. & enjoying it immensely. The music is wonderful, the plot is ok but nothing fabulous. The French actresses are very sexy & I rate this movie as to being very sensual.

It is not generally my practice to review movies that I dislike to any great degree. However, one or two times a year, I temporarily set aside my rule to only comment on things I like to give a word of warning. I find it more enjoyable to comment on something I like and boost it than I do shooting at bad movies. But some "movies" cry out for the razor.Bilitis is one of them. The cinematography isn't the only aspect that is blurry and out of focus here. An almost indiscernible plot (certainly incoherent, if there even is one) bad acting, cheesy script and awful pacing. Those are its major problems.Understand, I firmly believe that not all movies are created equal and films should be judged according to their category. It is not reasonable to judge, say, Beach Blanket Bingo against Gone With the Wind. I judge Bilitis against other movies in its weight class. Measured against movies like Emmanuelle or Secrets of a Chambermaid, it comes off very badly indeed. Even eye-candy has to be entertaining and Bilitis most definitely is not.