Laura Antonelli strikes a pose for her lover's pleasure -- and agony -- in Massimo Dallamano's VENUS IN FURS (1969). With frosted sand-colored hair and a cocoa-butter complexion, Laura Antonelli is at her most delectable in Massimo Dallamano's VENUS IN FURS, a contemporary adaptation of Leopold von Sacher-Masoch's definitive S&M novel. The Velvet Underground captured the spirit of the book better; in Dallamano's hands, it's the Salem cigarette ad-looking story of Severin (Régis Vallée), a perverse would-be philosopher about sexual matters who is happy for reasons buried deep in his childhood only when he's made to feel miserable... up to a point. He meets his match in Wanda (Antonelli), a former stripper and erotic exhibitionist whom he meets at a Spanish resort. Once they discover they're... er, compatible, they marry, move into an Italian villa, enter into a cosplay game of mistress and chauffeur, hire a couple of lesbian maids, and -- this being a product of macho Spain and Italy -- Severin eventually learns the hard way that man was not meant to serve as his woman's bitch. At times it seems more like a writ of bitterness from someone who hasn't quite gotten over a bad divorce, rather than something based on the gospel of whips and leather. It's not great, but there are various delights to be found here, including Gian Franco Reverberi's infectious Eurotrash score (it sounds like the sitarist was imported from the VAMPYROS LESBOS sessions), a classic beauty in its prime, and scads of the most deliriously quotable dialogue you've ever heard. To wit:
1. "If deep pleasure is born most of all from suffering, then this is the woman of whom I've always dreamed!"
2. "It's very difficult to act like a prostitute when one is in love."
3. "You're all the same, you men! When you love a woman, you want to lock her up in the most secret cell of the Pyramid of Chaos."
4. "Women are always forbidden the most amusing things."
5. "Wanda, will you marry me?" "Yes, yes, I will marry you, because I want to betray you, bring you to desperation! I will make you unhappy, you'll see!"
6. "Such happiness as this... almost makes me unhappy."
7. "Sometimes women are whores uselessly, and the vulgar side of this is its uselessness."
8. "You're too beautiful to belong to just one man." (Did I hear an "amen" in the house?)
9. "All I can say is, after two months, you've become like any other husband!"
10. "I must resign myself to being normal."
Need I say more? VENUS IN FURS is available from Xploited Cinema in two different editions: the preferable 16:9 Shameless Screen Entertainment PAL Region 0 import for $24.95 (82m 3s -- trimmed of roughly 55s of a red-tinted scene by the BBFC), and the fullscreen IVC's Japanese NTSC Region 2 import (83m 26s, unmatted fullscreen and reportedly uncut, but if so from the wrong projection speed, with one instance of optical fogging) for $39.95. The material missing from the Shameless disc has been posted on the label's website for free viewing by those claiming to be 18 years of age or older, and involves an extension of a non-explicit rape scene in which the violation becomes pleasurable to the victim. (The tinting on the scene emphasizes that it's a fantasy of Severin's, rather than something that actually happens, making the cut seem particularly gratuitous and ill-considered.) The Shameless disc includes a widescreen trailer featuring alternative takes and shots, some including nudity, not found in the feature version itself.
