Colibel Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.

Tetrady not as good as all the hype

Reptileenbu Did you people see the same film I saw?

Dynamixor The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

morrison-dylan-fan Talking to a fellow IMDber about Robert Hossein movies,I found out that Hossein had appeared in an all-star S & M flick by Roger Vadim.Due to this sounding like a rather unique flick,I decided that it was time to whip up a storm.The plot-WWII:Witnessing her lover get killed for treason, Justine Morand decides to become the lover of his assassin: SS Colonel Erik Schörndorf.As Morand and Schörndorf's antics start to heat up,Justine's sister Juliette discovers that her Resistance fighter husband has been arrested.Pressing for Schörndorf to free him,Justine and Juliette soon find themselves experiencing the last days of WWII by indulging in vice and virtue. View on the film:Kicking off with an air raid siren,co-writer/(along with Claude Choublier & Roger Vailland) director Roger Vadim and cinematographer Marcel Grignon leap over the word "subtle" with robust bombast,with Vadim looking into the eyes of the vicious SS in dazzling,reflecting mirror shots,and rolled out,vast tracking shots pulling up the last days of the Nazis.Giving the title an unexpected poetic quality with a deep black and white canvas soaked in shadows,Vadim disappointingly shows a timid side in taking on de Sade,with the amount of flesh and blood vice & virtue on show being minimal.Slipping de Sade into WWII,the screenplay by Vadim/Choublier and Vailland spreads a slick Melodrama over the depravity,by melting the sex games inside the brothel with bubbling romance,with SS Colonel Erik Schörndorf standing Juliette as they drown in the unfolding liberation. Showing that he can still look super cool even when playing a psychotic Nazi,Robert Hossein gives a terrific performance as Schörndorf,whose stubborn refusal to seeing the end of his beloved SS on the horizon Hossein delivers with a real relish.Given different fates to de Sade's tale,the beautiful Annie Girardot and Catherine Deneuve both give excellent performances as Juliette,and Justine Morand,thanks to Girlardot wrapping Juliette in a breezy lightness,which is torn by the clinical,cold edges that Deneuve cuts Justine with,as Justine and Juliette explore their vice and virtues.

Adrienna Zsakay Roger Vadim opens this movie with a short introduction. He explains to viewers that this story uses history as a backdrop to explore human themes, and with that places himself with the likes of Shakespeare, who used the same method to explore the human condition.This movie is much than the superficial elements of keeping sex slaves. It is a story of power, survival, opportunity, greed, lust, and love. WWII provides an ample setting for these human emotions to play itself out. Some viewers may not believe there is much love, yet this deserves more attention.Love has many faces and is an emotion that bares its soul in a variety of ways, using broken and bitter people who, through circumstances from WWII, find themselves expressing love that is both crippled and heart wrenching.Finally this movie questions other concepts, so important in war, such as camaraderie, patriotism, losing and winning, and how soldiers manage these additional pressures when confronted on a daily basis.This is an intense movie, and although it can be confusing at times with so much Roger Vadim wants to say, he has shown considerable skill in trying to tie all these elements together.

dbdumonteil Outside the fact that both works ("le vice et la vertu" and "salo' ) take place during WW2,it's absolutely impossible to compare an auteur like Pasolini to a mediocre third-rate drudge whose works have not worn well at all:"And God created woman" and the first version of "les liaisons dangereuses" are dated old hat stuff.Vadim's movie is entertaining,if it's not taken literally:it's a farce which recalls erotic comics of the sixties,particularly the scenes in the baroque castle where Hossein and Girardot give the victims (including the latter's clueless sister Justine-Deneuve- and the future Bond villainess Luciana Paluzzi) a rough time .Pasolini's work will hurt you,shock you,leave you completely depressed and exhausted .Vadim's will make you laugh ,and wonder why all these talented actors got lost is this masquerade.

Rod Evan Anybody who has seen Pasolini's 'Salo' will realise that Pasolini owed a debt to Vadim as the similarities in certain sections of the film are perfectly obvious. The key scene in relation to 'Salo' is when the 'victims' enter the chateau and once they are in the chateau suffer the same sort of torments as in Pasolini's film.The basic difference between the two films is that despite the horrific subject matter Vadim retains a sense of romanticism which Pasolini rejected. It is a great pity this film is not more widely available on video as it is beautifully shot in scope with a delirious score that mixes Gotterdammerung with 'Les Parapluies de Cherbourg'!The acting, especially from Annie Girardot is exemplary. You can see why this actress gave a such a terrific performance recently in 'La Pianiste'. It was however one of Deneuve's first roles and like all her early films she was not at her best, but clearly decorative.A 'must-see' film for all those film lovers who have appreciated the likes of 'The Night Porter' and Visconti's 'The Damned'.10/10