Wicked Memoirs of Eugenie (4 Stars)

Made in 1980, this is the second film that Jess Franco made based on Marquis de Sade's novel "Philosophy in the Bedroom". The first film was "Eugenie", made in 1970. Jess Franco expressed dissatisfaction with the 1970 film, which is ironic, because it's now considered a cult film. On the other hand, "Wicked Memoirs of Eugenie" has been forgotten. With the exception of a heavily censored German version, it's never been released on DVD or Blu-Ray. The only version available to me is a poor quality rip from television.

The film is structured around Eugenie herself, played by the German actress Katja Bienert, who can be rightly considered to have been Franco's muse. She functions as both participant and narrative anchor. Rather than arriving as an innocent to be educated in the manner of "Philosophy in the Bedroom", she's already integrated into the decadent world of Alberto's coastal villa. From the outset, she moves through it with familiarity, suggesting that her memoirs are not about initiation, but about immersion.

Alberto, a wealthy libertine, presides over the villa, while his sister Alba shares his life in a relationship that carries an incestuous charge the film treats as entirely normal. Sultana, their slave, completes the central arrangement, her status clearly defined and repeatedly reinforced. Eugenie circulates within this closed system, interacting with each of them in turn, and often acting as the point through which their relationships are expressed.

The narrative unfolds as a series of encounters that Eugenie either participates in or observes. At times she seems aligned with Alberto, sharing his detached, voyeuristic perspective; at others she mirrors Alba's more active, manipulative role, drawing Sultana or other figures into increasingly elaborate situations. This fluidity is key to the film's structure; Eugenie is not fixed in a single position, but shifts between observer, instigator and participant.

Sultana's role as a slave provides a recurring axis for these interactions. Many of the film's sequences revolve around how Eugenie relates to her; sometimes exercising power alongside Alba, sometimes appearing more ambiguous, as though testing the limits of the system she inhabits. These variations do not lead to change so much as repetition with slight differences, reinforcing the sense of a closed world.

Alba remains the most consistently active presence besides Eugenie, often initiating scenarios that Eugenie then enters or reshapes. Alberto, by contrast, begins largely as a spectator, watching the women, but gradually becomes more directly involved, drawn into the same cycles he once merely observed. Eugenie's position links these shifts together, giving the film its loose continuity.

There is no conventional plot development or resolution. Instead, the film accumulates episodes that revolve around Eugenie's movement through the villa and its inhabitants. By the end, she has not "changed" in any clear sense; rather, the film has revealed the full extent of the environment she inhabits and her ease within it.

In contrast to the 1970 film, which retains at least a trace of de Sade's didactic framework, this later work by Jess Franco uses Eugenie less as a character to be shaped than as a constant around which its repetitions and variations can revolve.

Linda (3 Stars)

There's something strange about the American releases of old European films. Apart from the awful dubbing, the DVD covers often have nothing to do with the films themselves. Look at the picture above. It's a pretty girl lying on a bed with a book and a pen. What's the pen for? Is it to underline her favourite passages? Maybe, but it doesn't matter. The girl in the picture doesn't appear in the film. No girls lie on a bed reading a book. In fact, nobody reads a book at all in this film.

"Linda" is a film made by Jesse Franco in 1981. I have mixed feelings about Jesse Franco. Over his career he's made some very good and some very bad films. More of the latter. However, the film stars Katja Bienert in the title role, which is reason enough to watch it.

The film takes place on the island of Madeira. That's a Portugese island, but the film was made in Spanish. A young woman called Betsy Norman is working in a luxury hotel, the Transcontinental. She's having an affair with Ronald Medford, the boyfriend of Sheila, the hotel owner. The names all sound very English, don't they? Sheila finds out, and she has a perfect way to punish Betsy. She delivers her to an exclusive brothel where she's locked up and forced to give herself to the high paying customers. Ron searches for her and tries to free her.

So where does Linda fit into the story? She doesn't. She's irrelevant to everything. Linda Norman is Betsy's 16-year-old sister who's living in a convent school in Switzerland. She takes a two-week holiday in Madeira to see her sister, but when she arrives Betsy has already disappeared. Linda meets a young man and falls in love with him, but they separate at the end of her holiday.

It's a weird story. I can't help thinking that Jesse Franco just put Katja Bienert into the film as an after-thought because he was fascinated by her youthful beauty. She was 14 at the time the film was made.

Diamonds of Kilimanjaro (3 Stars)

As films go, this is a hackjob. It was made in 1983 by the legendary director Jess Franco, entirely in Spanish, even though some of the actors were foreigners who spoke no Spanish and had to learn their lines phonetically. When it was sent to France for dubbing into French the film was denied a film certificate, so scenes had to be deleted, unfortunately so many scenes that the film no longer made sense. To make up for it the French director Olivier Mathot shot replacement scenes, hiring the original actors, but the new scenes were shot in French. I wonder just how awful that sounded. The film I watched today is the French version, but dubbed into English. Supposedly plot changes were made in the French version, but I haven't been able to find a description of the changes. It's noticeable that in some scenes a character is heard speaking when his lips aren't moving. I don't mean that the dubbing is out of sync, I mean that the dubbed version adds dialogue where the original Spanish version had silence.

"Diamonds of Kilimanjaro" (spelt with or without a D) is a retelling of the story of Tarzan, except that Tarzan is a woman called Diana. The story is so identical to Tarzan that I'm surprised the film studios weren't sued for breach of copyright.

The film begins with a plane crash in an unexplored African jungle. An explorer called Dan De Winter has been searching for diamonds, accompanied by his young daughter Diana. The natives of the Mori tribe treat them as Gods who have fallen from the sky. Diana is raised as one of them. It's a matriarchal tribe, so she becomes one of the leaders.

Years later Diana's mother is on her death bed and sends an expedition to find her daughter, her only heir. She doesn't care about her husband and says that if he's found alive she'll kill him with her bare hands. Diana's uncle goes on the expedition with the intention of killing Diana, because he wants the inheritance for himself.

In the jungle we find Diana, now 18, half naked and swinging from vines. The Moris obey her commands, although there is rivalry from Noba, a teenage girl who sees herself as the tribe's rightful ruler.

This was the fourth film that Jess Franco made with the German actress Katja Bienert. She was only 16 at the time she played the part of Diana. Jess clearly idolised her. Every time we see her there's soft romantic music. I can't help feeling he was more interested in showing her naked body than in making a good film.

Looking at Katja Bienert, it's easy to see why Jess Franco was so fascinated by her beauty.

The men in the Mori tribe kneel when women walk past. That's remarkably civilised.

I'm curious about Aline Mess, the actress who plays Noba. IMDB lists a few other films that she appeared in, but I haven't been able to find out anything about her, not even her age or nationality. If anyone can tell me anything about her please leave a comment.

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Die Schulmädchen vom Treffpunkt Zoo (4 Stars)

In 1978 Christiane Felscherinow wrote an autobiography about her life as a teenage heroin addict, "Wir Kinder vom Bahnhof Zoo" ("The Children of the Zoo Train Station"), which was translated into English as "Christiane F: Autobiography of a Girl of the Streets and Heroin Addict". (Note: Bahnhof Zoo was the main railway station in West Berlin before reunification). In 1981 the book was filmed as "Christiane F". That was the official film version, made with assistance from Christiane Felscherinow. But three years earlier, immediately after the book's release, an unofficial version was made, directed by Walter Boos.

The name of this film is best translated as "The Schoolgirls who meet at the Zoo Train Station". As you might guess, a film with this name and this director has more in common with the Schoolgirl Report films than the book it was supposedly based on. There is a small amount of drug usage in the film, but the emphasis is on showing nude schoolgirls. Certain scenes, such as two girls blackmailing a teacher to give them better grades, are obviously outtakes from the Schoolgirl Report films. The film shouldn't be taken too seriously.

The film is noteworthy as being the first film made by actress Katja Bienert, who was 11 at the time the film was made. Despite her young age she had a very voluptuous body. Her second film was "Schoolgirl Report 13". Over the following few years she made a series of films for the Spanish director Jess Franco, as well as posing nude for German magazines. In the late 1970's and early 1980's she was the quintessential German Lolita. German magazines such as Quick wrote about her with sensational headlines such as "12-year-old sex star", but in a recent interview she laughed about her nude scenes and called them "harmless".

Katja Bienert in school

Schoolgirl Report 13 (4 Stars)

All good things must come to an end. The Schoolgirl Report films began in 1970 and dominated German cinema for a decade. It's now 1980, time for the 13th and last film in the series. During the 70's the Schoolgirl Report films were much imitated. In the 80's nobody cared any more. Times had moved on. The era of the Aufklärungsfilm, literally translated enlightenment film, was now over. Germans had been enlightened. Now the market was ready for real pornography, and the recently available videotape technology offered a good medium. That's a shame. Films like those made in Germany in the 1970's will never be made again.

It's interesting that after 12 films featuring the music of Gert Wilden he's been abandoned for this film. There must be a story behind it, but I don't know what it is. Maybe someone can ask him. He's 96 now and still fit. He says that music keeps him young. Another difference is that this is the only film in the series in which the main actors are named in the credits.

Gert Wilden in December 2012

The outer frame takes place in a classroom where a group of teenagers are rehearsing a performance of "Romeo and Juliet". The teacher criticises them for saying the lines without feeling, to which they reply that Shakespeare is old-fashioned and they can't relate to him; today sex is more important than love. The teacher tries to explain that Shakespeare's words are as relevant today as when they were written. One by one the young actors tell stories to their teacher, sometimes disagreeing with him, but he always contradicts them.

1. Peter tells the teacher about a story he read in the newspaper. A shopkeeper was found stabbed to death in his apartment, and the only suspect was a 16-year-old Greek girl, Irina. The police detective interviews her, which means we move into a nested frame. How I love German Rahmennovellen! Irina's friends had egged her on to steal from a shop. She stole black panties from a small clothing store, but the owner saw her. He said that he wouldn't call the police if she modelled the panties for him. He also asked her for a written confession of the crime. He then used the confession to blackmail her into having sex with him every day that week. She told her boyfriend Niko about it, but he was angry and broke up with her. However, she denied having killed the man, insisting he was already dead when she arrived. Before the police could take her away Niko arrived and confessed to the crime

The wonderful Rosl Mayr

2. Erika tells a story that she has heard from her friend Janna. Achim made a bet with his friends that he could have sex with Janna within a week, and he would present her panties as proof of his conquest. Janna heard about the bet and swore he would never succeed. Playing along, she took him home and told him she knew about the bet, but it didn't matter. She took off her clothes and handed him her strangely old-fashioned panties, along with a signed note saying "These are Janna's panties". They jumped into bed, but before they could start Janna's grandmother knocked the door. Achim ran out onto the balcony naked, clutching the panties in his hand, which he used to cover himself. When he climbed down from the balcony his friends were already waiting for him. Despite his embarrassment he boasted about his victory. His boasting was cut short when the grandmother, played by the delightful Rosl Mayr, came out and said they were her panties. Her name is Janna as well, and it was her signature on the note.

3. Peggy talks about visiting her friend Daniela in an alcohol rehab clinic. While there Daniela told her how she came to be there, once more a nested frame. Daniela first started drinking after her father's suicide when she was 15. At first it was only small amounts. Then she was visited by her cousin Stefan, and she fell in love with him. For a few weeks he took her out and introduced her to the glamourous night life of Munich. She wanted sex with him, but changed her mind at the last moment because she was too nervous. Stefan got angry, hit her and raped her. After this she drank more heavily. She got a new boyfriend, Werner, but he was clumsy during sex and she didn't enjoy it. The only thing that made her happy was alcohol. Since she was still only 16 she didn't have enough money to buy herself drinks, so she began to work as a prostitute. Eventually she was thrown out of a moving car by her "friends", leading to her being sent into rehab.

4. One of the other girls tells a story about something that happened in school. Two girls wanted to have sex with two boys. The boys said they were experienced, the girls said they were experienced, but in truth they were all virgins. Typical teenagers! They went to a barn to have sex, and one of girls took her little sister Rolli along to watch the bikes. While she was sitting alone a charming young man sat and talked with Rolli. In the barn everything went wrong; two hikers wandered into the barn, the haybales collapsed and the teenagers ran away in panic. At the end of the story they complained that they were still virgins, but Rolli happily sighed "I'm not a virgin any more".

5. Thea tells a story about her friend Ingrid. Ingrid's boyfriend Michael was two-timing her with a French girl called Claudi. Michael's best friend Walter was supposed to distract Ingrid while he was on a date with Claudi, but things went wrong and the two girls met. Cat fight! They ripped each other's clothes off and fell into a lake. Michael and Walter pulled them apart. Ingrid got romantic with Walter, and Claudi forgave Michael. So, in this respect the 13th film is like the previous 12 films in the Schoolgirl Report series. Whatever happens in the previous scenes, in the final scene we have a happy ending.

And they all lived happily ever after.

Karin König as Rolli --- German schoolgirls never wear bras

Here are links to all my reviews of the Schoolgirl Report films:

• Schoolgirl Report (October 1970)
• Schoolgirl Report 2 (August 1971)
• Schoolgirl Report 3 (February 1972)
• Schoolgirl Report 4 (August 1972)
• Schoolgirl Report 5 (April 1973)
• Schoolgirl Report 6 (October 1973)
• Schoolgirl Report 7 (April 1974)
• Schoolgirl Report 8 (November 1974)
• Schoolgirl Report 9 (August 1975)
• Schoolgirl Report 10 (March 1976)
• Schoolgirl Report 11 (March 1977)
• Schoolgirl Report 12 (February 1978)
• Schoolgirl Report 13 (August 1980)