Sylvia Kristel: From Emmanuelle to Chabrol

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The character of Emmanuelle is also featured in a video game of the same name, released by Coktel Vision in 1989. SOM: You write a lot about her physicality, and you connect it early on to dance. I loved the connection you made with silent film actresses, and how they had to communicate everything with their bodies. Could you talk a little bit more about that in terms of Sylvia’s approach? Forgotten the title or the author of a book? Our BookSleuth is specially designed for you. Visit BookSleuth It was important to me to draw comparisons to the silent cinema you mentioned, as Sylvia shared so much in common with some of these earliest cinematic trailblazers. Of all of her directors, I think Claude Chabrol understood these qualities the best. JR: While I hate gossip in general, I’m honestly not sure why I have never had much interest in the type of salacious-driven biographies that so many seem to gravitate towards. I recall as a child being so disturbed by Albert Goldman’s criminal book on Elvis that it still angers me to this day. I was so turned off by the invasiveness of that book and honestly so many other similar hatchet jobs that I read growing up. I don’t care about people’s sex-lives or relationships in general unless they had an obvious impact on the artist’s work, like the relationship Sylvia had with the brilliant writer Hugo Claus. I will probably go to my grave not appreciating how who slept with who offers any understanding to an artist’s life and that applies to anyone I am interested in.

La Marge (1976) ( The Streetwalker, also released as Emmanuelle 77), directed by Walerian Borowczyk. JR: Pialat was very vocal at the time about how disappointed he was and even had Huppert and Depardieu watching Sylvia onscreen in the film, so in a way he got her in his film anyway. Funnily enough, he had also put her image in his earlier Passe ton bac d’abord. Pialat was just one of a number of truly masterful filmmakers inspired by Sylvia, who sadly never got to work with her. Polanski was another, and of course Bergman. I look upon these missed opportunities as just adding to the richness of her story, although looking at the films she could have made in the eighties if she hadn’t mistakenly come to America and became saddled with such outfits as Cannon does leave a lump in my throat. PLAYING WITH FIRE (France, 1975) Alain Robbe-Grillet. Bonus features: 2K Transfer, Audio Commentary by Tim Lucas, Interview with Catherine Robbe-Grillet and more tba. Bonus features for Juliaare headlined by Jeremy Richey himself, who provides commentary.Though his delivery can be a tad stilted and his mic could do with a pop filter, he proves to be the easiest listen of the set’s three commentaries.Such accessibility goes a long way in encouraging the viewer to stay with it.Obviously, Richey has done extensive research on all of Kristel’s films; here as he deep-dives on Juliascene by scene, one could be forgiven for assuming his interest centers on this title.He talks with friendly authority about all the talent involved, as well as the film’s context within the “Bavarian Sex Comedy” niche as well as the broader emerging “coming of age sex comedy.”Aside from Richey’s fine commentary, bonuses include a poster & image gallery, as well as Julia’s trailer.Her favourite film was Borowczyk's The Streetwalker (La Marge, 1976), in which she is touching as a mysterious and proud prostitute who has an affair with a happily married man (Joe Dallesandro). Alice or the Last Escapade (Alice ou la Dernière Fugue, 1977) was a surprising departure into fantasy for Chabrol. In this homage to Lewis Carroll and "old dark house" movies, Kristel does her best with the passive character.

Emmanuelle 5 (1987), directed by Walerian Borowczyk, was released in two versions: one with softcore love scenes, and a French home video version that extended several scenes with hardcore sex directed by Borowczyk (apparently [ citation needed] Borowczyk said that he had not directed them). The scenes are the Love Express and dance studio segments, embellished with penetration, ejaculation and a woman urinating. This VHS version omits several minutes of footage seen in the public version (including dialogue and plot). Well, we went in with a phoney script called something like Memories of the Heart, and filmed most of the sex scenes in secure locations. However we did get caught once. Myself and another woman were being filmed nude under a waterfall and the police turned up. We were thrown in jail for a night while the producers sorted everything out.The Bardot comparisons made more sense, as they were both European and they had similar career trajectories. In fact, an early chapter in the book details how Sylvia was essentially discovered by Bardot’s partner at the time, Jaccques Charrier, and would end up making one of her great films with Roger Vadim. Despite the differences, Sylvia, of course, didn’t mind these comparisons, as she greatly admired both Monroe and Bardot.
I couldn’t say how she felt about her own persona onscreen other than I think she was much more aware of what she was doing than she’s ever been given credit for.
JR: I did want to make sure, as a critic, that I was honest in my approach to each film and performance so I didn’t shy away from pointing out problems with some of the lesser work in the book, like the “blonde bombshell” role you mentioned. I write in the book that for me Sylvia absolutely personifies the period that she came of age in, and you can see the hopes of the sixties, the liberation of the seventies to the ultimate disappointment of the eighties in Sylvia’s career like no other. Her career also coincided with both the sexual revolution along with the Feminist movement. I was so happy the day I found the quote by her from the mid-seventies defiantly describing herself as a feminist who believed in equal pay and rights for all women. That was key, as she was ridiculed by so many for Emmanuelle and her general openness towards nudity in film. Corry, John (30 August 1981). "Private Lessons (1980) RISQUE COMEDY, 'PRIVATE LESSONS' ". The New York Times.