Claude Mulot (credited here as Frédéric Lansac) directed some of my favourite horror films of the eurosleaze era (La rose écorchée being one) and here he concocts a modern-day science fiction convergence of “Frankenstein” and “Pygmalion.” The result is one of the most beautifully photographed films of the golden age of porn. Yes, that's a tall order.
One could easily miss all of this, though. While the synth-driven score pumps away unrelentingly from the very beginning, Richard Allan plays a screenwriter with an insatiable appetite for women. One after the other. Non-stop for a good 30 minutes. It borders on tedious and had me looking at the time, wondering how much more of this I was going to endure. Then he goes all Dr. Frankenstein and creates a robot who will never tire of his whims — a male fantasy trope seen before, seen after. And this is where the film takes a wild turn.
The absolutely splendid Marilyn Jess, in a non-speaking role, plays the titular femme-objet, Kim. There’s a powerful energy on display when she discovers autonomy and free will, like Elsa Lanchester’s Bride rejecting both monster and mad scientists in James Whale’s classic film.
But not only is the creation no longer the creator’s remote-controlled plaything, the tables have turned altogether. « Je suis devenu un homme-objet » narrates Allan in the film’s final moments.
The synth-heavy score by Jean-Claude Nachon, which features some rad prog moments, is mostly dialing it straight out of “Radioactivity”-era Kraftwerk. It elevates the film into the stratosphere. Pulse Video pressed a 180g vinyl of the soundtrack, and dear reader, I would have already ordered it were it not sold out on the Mélusine site.
La femme-objet made a star of Marilyn Jess (who reminds me of silent star Mary Nolan), assuming the crown left by Brigitte Lahaie as the latter did more mainstream work. The Pulse Video bluray features a lengthy modern interview with Jess and assistant-director Didier Philipe-Gérard, as well as nearly an hour of trailers for films by Mulot and his pornographic nom-de-porn, Frédéric Lansac (which was a character in La rose écorchée).
Oh yeah. R2D2. According to Jess, Mulot was a big Star Wars fan. So a radio-controlled R2D2 is in this. A lot.
