This movie was recently screened at a local theater and being a fan of old horror movies, I went to see it based on the title alone, not knowing what I was in for. I didn't find the movie all that engaging for the first twenty or so minutes and thought I might've made a mistake in going. Boy was I wrong! It turned out to be one of the best movies I've seen. The first 20 minutes couldn't have prepared me for the insanity that would subsequently erupt on the screen.
The person I was with kept snickering at what she perceived as plot holes or moments that she found over the top, but if you're concerned about the plot or expect this to be a faithful rendition of Robert Louis Stevenson's novel, you're missing the point. The coherence of the story doesn't really matter; what makes this movie amazing are the mesmerizing dream-like images and atmosphere, enhanced with excellent photography and lighting (some of the best lighting I've seen in a color movie) and set to a soundtrack of piano and hypnotic, minimalist electronic music (from the days when "electronic music" meant analog technology, not Casio keyboards), occasionally punctuated with silence. There were parts where I almost felt like I was watching a silent film, except with music and in color.
The photography reminded me somewhat of Andrei Tarkovsky's boring but visually beautiful film Stalker.
There were scenes in this movie, like one that took place in a bathtub, which played with the viewer's sense of time in a manner that I've only encountered in some of David Lynch's work. I have to wonder if Lynch might not have picked up a few tricks from this movie.
The closest thing I can compare it to in terms of "feel" would be to Carnival of Souls or perhaps more appropriately, to the 1964 "pink film" Hakujitsumu (Day-Dream).
Even though there is a realistic, and hence viscerally unsettling, quality to much of the brutality in this film, Docteur Jekyll et les femmes is not a gorefest. It might be best to think of it as more of an "arthouse" film than as standard horror, kinda like a Russian Ark that won't put you to sleep. If you go into it expecting Friday the 13th or something like that, you're going to be disappointed.
My only real complaint is the gratuitous sleaze, in particular the quasi-pornographic homosexual rape, the father flogging his daughter's bare buttocks, and the close-up on the dead maid's crotch, parts which needlessly drag the movie into sexploitation territory, making it less effective. I might've considered this a masterpiece if it hadn't been trashed up with what I can only assume were the director's pet perversions. I guess he just couldn't help throwing a couple of turds in the punch bowl.
Here's hoping that this unique film gets a proper release on DVD sometime, since as of this review, it appears to be unavailable on home video. I suppose I should count myself lucky that I got to see it at all.
The person I was with kept snickering at what she perceived as plot holes or moments that she found over the top, but if you're concerned about the plot or expect this to be a faithful rendition of Robert Louis Stevenson's novel, you're missing the point. The coherence of the story doesn't really matter; what makes this movie amazing are the mesmerizing dream-like images and atmosphere, enhanced with excellent photography and lighting (some of the best lighting I've seen in a color movie) and set to a soundtrack of piano and hypnotic, minimalist electronic music (from the days when "electronic music" meant analog technology, not Casio keyboards), occasionally punctuated with silence. There were parts where I almost felt like I was watching a silent film, except with music and in color.
The photography reminded me somewhat of Andrei Tarkovsky's boring but visually beautiful film Stalker.
There were scenes in this movie, like one that took place in a bathtub, which played with the viewer's sense of time in a manner that I've only encountered in some of David Lynch's work. I have to wonder if Lynch might not have picked up a few tricks from this movie.
The closest thing I can compare it to in terms of "feel" would be to Carnival of Souls or perhaps more appropriately, to the 1964 "pink film" Hakujitsumu (Day-Dream).
Even though there is a realistic, and hence viscerally unsettling, quality to much of the brutality in this film, Docteur Jekyll et les femmes is not a gorefest. It might be best to think of it as more of an "arthouse" film than as standard horror, kinda like a Russian Ark that won't put you to sleep. If you go into it expecting Friday the 13th or something like that, you're going to be disappointed.
My only real complaint is the gratuitous sleaze, in particular the quasi-pornographic homosexual rape, the father flogging his daughter's bare buttocks, and the close-up on the dead maid's crotch, parts which needlessly drag the movie into sexploitation territory, making it less effective. I might've considered this a masterpiece if it hadn't been trashed up with what I can only assume were the director's pet perversions. I guess he just couldn't help throwing a couple of turds in the punch bowl.
Here's hoping that this unique film gets a proper release on DVD sometime, since as of this review, it appears to be unavailable on home video. I suppose I should count myself lucky that I got to see it at all.