THE DUTCH SEX WAVE COLLECTION: OBSESSIONS (1969)/FRANK & EVA (1973)/BLUE MOVIE (1971)/MY NIGHTS WITH SUSAN, SANDRA, OLGA & JULIE (1975) Blu-ray
Director(s): Pim de la Parra and Wim Verstappen
Cult Epics

The major output of Dutch provocateurs and independent filmmaking mavericks Scorpio Films is showcased in THE DUTCH SEX WAVE COLLECTION, a four-disc Blu-ray set from Cult Epics.

OBSESSIONS: Medical student Nils (actor-turned-producer Dieter Geissler, THE NEVERENDING STORY) keeps getting distracted from studying for his exams by a peephole into the apartment next door where his neighbor (Tom van Beek, SOLDIER OF ORANGE) engages in frenetic sex with a pair of girls (BLUE MOVIE's Marijke Boonstra and LIV's Vibeke Løkkeberg) who spend the rest of the time either in bondage or drugged stupors. In spite of his claims about something weird going on, his journalist girlfriend Marina (Alexandra Stewart, BLACK MOON) only sees a more prurient interest; however, she is busy pursuing an investigation into the murder of an American G.I. who got a model mixed up in drug dealing resulting in a prison sentence that ended the day before he was found dead. Marina refuses to believe the model is guilty and tries to track her down with the encouragement of her boss (Elisabeth Versluys). As Nils continues watching the goings-on next door, he starts to fall for one of the women who he rescues when his neighbor is out; and Marina becomes an unwilling participant in his covert investigation as she too starts to suspect her own story may be related. Their detective work does not go unnoticed, however, and soon the watchers become the watched as things turn deadly.

Inspired by the French New Wave and railing against the Dutch film establishment in their magazine Scope, Surinamese Pim de la Parra and Wim Verstappen founded Scorpio Films (or $corpio Films) with the goal of making popular and profitable films, starting with a series of shorts and Verstappen's THE LESS FORTUNATE RETURN OF JOSZEF KATUS TO THE LAND OF REMBRANDT but CONFESSIONS OF LOVING COUPLES, but they achieved international recognition with the de la Parra's Dutch/German co-production OBSESSIONS, an English-language Hitchcock-influenced thriller scripted by de la Parra and Verstappen with additional input and Anglicizing from Martin Scorcese who was in Amsterdam to shoot a dream sequence for his feature debut WHO'S THAT KNOCKING AT MY DOOR? OBSESSIONS is in many ways the missing link between Hitchcock's REAR WINDOW and Brian de Palma's BODY DOUBLE, scored by Bernard Herrmann whose work was highly influential on the oeuvre of the latter film's composer Pino Donaggio (CARRIE), and unambiguous about the sexual motivation for its protagonist's voyeurism as much as he protests. Whereas sex became organic to the plots of the subsequent Scorpio films in exploring Dutch social mores, the film's eroticism is largely decorative here and the drug subplot also feels merely functional to host further Hitchcockianisms like some VERTIGO-esque scenes of Nils following one of the girls, but the primary source seems to be REAR WINDOW – including a bit where the roles are reversed as Nils explores his neighbor's apartment and Marina desperately tries to warn him that the man is returning – however, Nils' irresistible obsession with looking is what ultimately effects the downbeat climax. Dutch actor/filmmaker Fons Rademakers ("Mother" in DAUGHTERS OF DARKNESS) appears as a playboy, and future Paul Verhoeven cinematographer Jan De Bont (BASIC INSTINCT) served as second unit camera operator.

FRANK & EVA: Frank (Hugo Metsers, SPETTERS) is a thirty-something man-child of a traveling salesman who has a habit of quite literally running away from his problems; be it drunk driving collisions, clingy girlfriends, or even pretending to commit suicide to disarm his wife Eva (Willeke van Ammelrooy, ANTONIA'S LINE) with whom he has been "living apart together" in a self-contained flat within their house. Eva has to learn of Frank's latest collision from the police and is shocked when the accident and the certainty that he will lose his license does not cost him his job (his bosses would rather hire a driver for him than replace him). Eva has been using private detective Joop (Helmert Woudenberg, AMSTERDAMNED) – named after the hapless hero of two of director de la Parra's short films played by Wies Andersen – to keep track of Frank's whereabouts, tracing him to bar owner Max (Lex Goudsmit) who is on his last legs after a lifetime of boozing and womanizing. Eva is frustrated to discover that even Joop adopts some of Frank's bad behavior upon meeting him, but she too falls for Frank's childlike efforts to ingratiate himself with her and back into her bed. When Eva discovers that she is pregnant, she thinks getting away with Frank for a vacation will help patch things up until his last girlfriend Sylvia (EMMANUELLE's Sylvia Kristel) takes up residence in Frank's apartment; whereupon she first tries to establish a relationship with Joop to be the father of her child, and then looks to take a lover of her own (after Frank, that is, dares her that he can bed a neighbor woman who has a habit of stripping in full view of his window). Although Frank is angered when Eva announces that she is pregnant, believing it a trick to trap him, his life is already showing signs of spinning wildly out of control to the point where even Max is shocked at his excesses, and no one may be able to prevent him from crashing.

Although FRANK & EVA – subtitled "Living Apart Together," a phrase that is uttered by both in English as the concept was adopted from the more westernly sources of the Sexual Revolution – is teaming with nudity (mostly Metsers) and sexual situations, it is not a Dutch sex film or softcore Eurotrash but a domestic drama that believably depicts the complexities of a (possibly one-sided) open marriage. Everybody likes Frank, even his long-suffering wife, and he seems to aspire to become Max who he enables with alcohol and is usually too busy manually-stimulating a tart under the table to notice Max's physical ailments other than his reluctance to get out of bed in the morning; and even chuckles "poor Max" when Eva warns that Frank is in danger of ending up like him (according to Metser's son on the extras for BLUE MOVIE, the actor really was boozing and womanizing during the production). Eva is also quite believable, taking joy in the possibility of Frank experiencing consequences of his behavior and frustrated when he falls ass backwards into new opportunities, yet also worried about what Frank could do to himself when his self-image finally crumbles away. Kristel is decorative but Woudenberg is funny and moving as a straight-laced type who gets a taste of Frank's lifestyle (and realizes that the type of women Frank wins over so easily will always see himself as a buffoon), rejects Eva's overtures not out of his friendship with Frank but his own experience with domestic investigations, and finally too becomes sickened by Frank's behavior. The ending is no copout, just all too predictable but ambiguous enough that we can be as cautiously optimistic as Eva.

BLUE MOVIE: Twenty-five-year-old Michael (FRANK & EVA's Metsers) is released from prison after five years for a "social offense" (bedding a fifteen-year-old girl) into a Holland where the sexual revolution is in full bloom. He is informed by his social worker Eddie (FRANK & EVA's Woudenberg) both that times and attitudes have changed but that his freedom has limits. Eddie has found Michael a place to live in a new sprawling apartment development outside the city and, in addition to the parole board's requirements that he find employment, Eddie has recommended that Michael find a nice girl from a good family and settle down lest his rehabilitation be derailed by temptation; indeed, Eddie has determined that there are three available girls in the entire complex. Eddie tries to discourage Michael's interest in married Elly (Carry Tefsen, DIARY OF A HOOKER) in favor of single mother Julia (Ine Veen, FIST OF FURY IN CHINA). In spite of his attraction to Julia, Michael feels that she has enough trouble without him. Eddie inadvertently pushes Michael to associate with zoologist Professor Bernard Cohn (Kees Brusse, MYSTERIES) who has just returned from Africa, but he finds the professor's younger German wife Marianne (Ursula Blauth, THE NAKED COUNTESS) and the feeling is mutual. Rather than searching for work, Michael finds his days preoccupied not only by Elly and Marianne, but also by other housewives who need a bit of muscle until he decides that sex is his business.

Wim Versteppen's BLUE MOVIE attained notoriety for a shot of Metsers' erection more so than various background displays of nudity and hardcore imagery, but it is the film's social commentary that keeps compelling a shapeless and episodic story. While Eddie tells Michael that people think differently now, he also warns that even a social infraction such as sleeping with a married woman could have an effect on his parole (the relationship between the two has some interesting parallels with their characters in FRANK & EVA). Michael walks into a bookshop and is surprised to see not only pornographic magazines of all varieties openly displayed but women consuming them (with one woman seen specifying the type of S&M she is looking for). He thinks to purchase condoms when Elly asks him to drop by that night but is entirely ignorant of the pill. Professor Cohn likens the apartment complex to a zoo, nothing that monkeys can show restraint in the wild but become sex maniacs in captivity; and, indeed, the film can come across as a less fantastic version of David Cronenberg's SHIVERS, particularly in terms of the climactic party in which he screens a blue movie for fellow tenants of all ages and persuasions – Michael himself reveals that his sentence got extended because of a fight with an inmate who wanted to go to bed with him yet he seems accepting of threesomes with third parties of either sex as when bisexual Anne's (Monique Smal) husband discovers them in bed and simply apologizes for being late before embracing them both – with only the impotent and easily scandalized turned away. "This is Holland today," Michael tells Eddie whose own advice and guidance now seems intended to restrict Michael to a narrowly-focused version of the world with which Eddie is comfortable. The ambiguous ending includes the suicide of a person made to feel excluded as Michael once was, and Michael questioning whether he can reconcile sexual desire and love. The film was photographed by future Paul Verhoeven DP of choice and future blockbuster bomb director Jan de Bont (BASIC INSTINCT) while the titular film-within-a-film is barely glimpsed in the background of the party scene but was directed by producer de la Parra and shot by Theo van de Sande (MIRACLE MILE). The film was a German co-production through Dieter Geissler (THE NEVERENDING STORY) – star of de la Parra's Hitchcockian Martin Scorcese-scripted OBSESSIONS – where it was known as DAS PORNO-HAUS VON AMSTERDAM. Director Versteppen continued to direct in various genres through to the eighties, but his only widely distributed film stateside was the Rutger Hauer thriller FATAL ERROR.

MY NIGHTS WITH SUSAN, SANDRA, OLGA & JULIE: Studly Anton (Hans van der Gragt) rides his motorcycle into the countryside in search of model Susan (FRANK & EVA's van Ammelrooy) who has retreated from public life to a farmhouse which functions as a sort of half-way house for the similarly-troubled including her former photographer turned agoraphobic voyeur Albert (Serge-Henri Valcke, SOLDIER OF ORANGE), young Julie (Marieke van Leeuwen, CARNAL NIGHT) who "needs a lot of sleep," and nymphomaniacs Sandra (Marja de Heer) and Olga (Franulka Heyermans) who have just screwed and murdered an American tourist (Jerry Brouer, GRAND ECSTASY) and dumped his body in a nearby lake. Sandra and Olga set their sights on seducing Anton away from "cold pussy" Susan, unaware that feral and mute Piet (Nelly Frijda, THE JOHNSONS) – who lives in a nearby shack but "belongs to the house" as much as any of the other women (and Albert) according to Susan – has witnessed the murder and is keeping company with the corpse. Despite Piet's behavior, which includes violent attacks on Susan's home and belongings, Anton is not so ready to believe that she is responsible for the murder but also not entirely sure that Susan is not somehow responsible as horny Olga tells him. Sandra and Olga try to drive a wedge between Anton and Susan by rousing the jealousy of Albert who watches them from a hole in the wall between their bedroom and his storage room cell, but the next murder may result from an entirely different set of betrayals.

Co-scripted by Scottish writer Charles Gormley who scripted FRANK & EVA as well as BLUE MOVIE, and Harry Kümel (DAUGHTERS OF DARKNESS), MY NIGHTS WITH SUSAN, SANDRA, OLGA & JULIE looks like another sex film with the promise of four comely ladies and a stud romping about in the sunny countryside, it is actually a return for de la Parra to the Hitchcockian thriller, albeit more casually constructed in terms of script and editing; perhaps coming closest to resembling something in the master's later filmography like FRENZY (or perhaps it earlier unrealized incarnation KALEIDOSCOPE) with a certain THE TROUBLE WITH HARRY aspect to the appearances of the American's corpse and the blackly comic ending. However casual the treatment, the setup is ripe for further explosions of violence from too cool Susan, vaguely threatening Albert, and the more pathetic than sinister Piet as underscored by a brittle orchestral score by Elizabeth Lutyens (DR. TERRORS' HOUSE OF HORRORS) – along with the thematic usage of Stevie Wonder's "Don't You Worry 'Bout a Thing" – while the expansive Techniscope photography of Marc Felperlaan (THE LIFT) surprises by giving the cottage a labyrinthine feel (Anton's bed is about fifty feet above Susan's in the vertiginous rafters of the farmhouse) and comes across tempting naked bodies lounging about the grass and hay. The film may not work as a cohesive whole but it delivers the skin quotient and is fairly diverting in its mystery.

All four films had previously been issued on Blu-ray/DVD combos from Cult Epics before being separated into separate Blu-ray and DVD editions of THE DUTCH SEX WAVE COLLECTION. The oldest of the releases, OBSESSIONS' negative is lost, so the 1080p24 MPEG-4 AVC 1.33:1 pillarboxed fullscreen transfer is derived from a scan of a 35mm print as restored by Dutch Film preservationists The Eye Film Institute. Damage is minimal but some defects of the low budget production and processing remain in brief fluctuations in sharpness in parts of the image. The color scheme was rather sedate to begin with, and fading might have also been an issue, but the digital colors are fortunately not pumped up (in spite of the filmmakers' stance against censorship, one wonders if the peephole scenes might have been intentionally lit a tad dark compared to the more incidental nudity of the protagonists in Nils' more brightly and evenly-lit apartment. Cult Epics had been a bit inconsistent in using lossy and lossless audio formats on their Blu-rays, and this is the only film in the set encoded in lossy Dolby Digital 2.0, but the dialogue is always clear and the sound design is not that complex.

Extras start off with the option to play the film with either an introduction by director de la Parra (3:33) or a shorter one by actor/producer Geissler (0:37), and both appear in longer video interviews as well. In his interview (22:46), Geissler discusses his early career as an actor and his interest in working behind the camera. He had come to know a night club owner who routinely invested in short films and proposed an inexpensively-produced feature film, starring in and producing in the globe-hopping thriller 48 HOURS TO ACAPULCO and its promotion at the Venice Film Festival where he met de la Parra and Verstappen who asked him to co-produce and star in OBSESSIONS. Although he spoke English from his time living in England, he recalls the challenge of having to adapt his accent to the Mid-Atlantic one of Stewart, and the make-up effects for the climax. He discusses the film's worldwide sales and its German release where only the violence ran into some trouble with the censors theatrically but its availability to minors on VHS got it pre-banned for twenty-five years (the film was only recently released on Blu-ray and DVD in Germany).

In his interview (20:27), director de la Parra recalls the combination of elements in the film being chosen to ensure a box office success and overseas sales, including the decision to shoot the film in 35mm and in English. He originally wanted Jacqueline Bisset and then Jean Seberg for the role of Marina but they were too expensive, while Geraldine Chaplin was willing but not the "Hitchcock blond" he wanted. Although he could not afford Herrmann on the budget, he reveals that the composer saw a rough cut months later and allowed the production to use some unused television scoring material that he sold to a film library, with his scoring credit coming from de la Parra following his instructions as to where to place the cues (a full rundown of Herrmann's library cues is available on YouTube. He also recalls that Roger Corman wanted to buy the film, but only if de la Parra arranged for Geissler and Stewart to fly to Los Angeles for a day of additional shooting to up the film's erotic content (he refused but did recommend Scorcese to Corman, resulting in BOXCAR BERTHA), and that American studios did not want to work with Herrmann after his falling out with Hitchcock, but de la Parra recommended Herrmann meet Scorcese for which he wound up scoring TAXI DRIVER. The disc also includes a short featurette on Scorpio Films (4:02) looking at the intentions of the filmmakers, their successes, and the partnership of "Pim and Wim." A 2017 text interview with Scorsese conducted by Bor Beekman for the magazine Volkskrant is also included on text screens and the original screenplay with handwritten notes by Scorsese is also included as a step-through gallery. There is also a photo gallery (2:04) and the film's theatrical trailer (2:55).

FRANK & EVA: Previously unreleased in the United States – with de la Parra noting that shooting in Dutch rather than English restricted its sales – FRANK & EVA comes to Blu-ray is another Eye Film Institute high definition restoration of a 35mm print in absence of the original camera negatives, and the 1080p24 MPEG-4 AVC 1.33:1 pillarboxed fullscreen transfer looks its best in the brighter moments as well as some low-lit interiors while the darker scenes (a lot since Eva would rather go without electricity after Frank has spent the utility money than borrow it) have varied black levels that sometimes make such compositions look flatter than they may have looked originally. Whereas OBSESSIONS seems like it could have been matted to 1.66:1, FRANK & EVA for the most part looks ideally framed at 1.33:1 with many long shots the length of Metser's height and also calling attention to the claustrophobic low ceilings of Dutch apartments (really, the ceilings seem to start just above the door frame and seem to slope downwards thanks to the wide angle lensing). The Dutch DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mono fares much better, sounding clean and even vivid when it comes to the pop scoring of Antoine Duhamel (PIERROT LE FOU).

FRANK & EVA is the only film in the set accompanied by an audio commentary by director de la Parra (who also appears in a 2:24 video introduction) in which he recalls that the film cost the U.S. equivalent of $300,000 and that it was made possible by the massive success of BLUE MOVIE which made him a millionaire overnight. He recalls the difficulty of shooting with direct sound, which he wanted in order to emulate Hollywood productions rather than European post-sync which he likens to coitus interruptus, but that the decision to shoot in Dutch (due to the actors' discomfort with English) restricted sales. He reveals that Kristel contacted him and asked for a role, so sure that she was going to be famous, and that it was indeed her presence rather than the more seasoned van Ammelrooy that sold the film to territories like France, Italy, Japan, and the U.K. He also discusses the effect of the Sexual Revolution in Holland, his own open marriage, and realizing upon completing production that they had no scene of Frank and Eva in bed together so they got Metsers and van Ammelrooy back for an evening at his own home to shoot a "gaudy scene." In "Up Front & Naked: Sex in Dutch Films" (12:03), video conversation with van Ammelrooy and filmmaker Eddy Terstall (MEET ME IN VENICE), van Ammelrooy also recalls the scene which she dislikes not for its gratuitousness but because the position (necessitated to hide Metser's hair which he had cut shorter for another role) made her look flat-chested. A younger filmmaker, Terstall did not work with de la Parra or Verstappen, but he had been a friend of OBSESSIONS actress Boonstra and knew de la Parra through her. The pair discuss the commercial necessity of nudity in Dutch films and the differin ways sex was treated in the seventies and in Terstall's more recent films. The disc also includes a photo gallery (3:24), Sylvia Kristel film poster video gallery (3:32), the film's theatrical trailer (2:24) and a trailer for OBSESSIONS.

Although successful in several territories – including Japan where it was optically censored – BLUE MOVIE was apparently not released stateside, and the lack of an English dub was probably the reason. Cult Epic's 1080p24 MPEG-4 AVC 1.37:1 pillarboxed fullscreen Blu-ray is derived from an HD restoration carried out by the EYE Film Institute. Since the film was shot on 16mm reversal film, the film can only look so good in high definition with the scan of the 35mm duplicate negative looking quite grainy and boasting uneven shadows (with a grade to achieve consistent total blacks likely to obscure available detail in the low lit interiors and night exteriors). One fault of the restoration, however, is that every reel change has a frame or two of black leader at the head or tail. The back cover cites Dolby Digital 2.0 mono audio but that is only true of the DVD side of the combo with the Blu-ray boasting a DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mono track with clear Dutch and German dialogue and the scoring of Jürgen Drews (SHORT NIGHT OF THE GLASS DOLLS) mixed to be understated rather than being a fault of the mix. Optional English subtitles are free of errors.

Extras start off with a 1971 interview with director Verstappen (11:25) boasting the most bizarre hairstyle, in which he discusses the film's run-in with the Dutch film inspectors and how the censorship system in Holland seems designed to pass such films from other countries while restricting the expression of Dutch filmmakers. He also discusses the film's funding, noting that the German co-producers took advantage of the tax haven of Liechtenstein while also expressing his own skepticism and frustration about the accuracy of reports about the film's profits from its international distribution. Producer de la Parra appears in an introduction and interview from 2018 at the Cinémathèque Française "Dutch Sex Wave" series (17:18) in which he recalls that Verstappen modeled the film on American sexploitation films he had seen on a visit to New York and that he designed with the goal of abolishing the Dutch film inspectors. He also comments on the notoriety of the film's exposure of Metser's "crazy Henkie" which he claims Verstappen told de Bont not to film but he did anyway.

Metsers' son Hugo Metsers Jr. appears in a 2018 interview (9:42) recalling the feeling of freedom growing up in the seventies with his parents focused on their work but now feeling a bit lonely in retrospect. He accidentally saw the film at age ten when he and his friends stumbled upon it while looking for sexual content on pirate TV stations and was embarrassed ("My erection went down immediately"). He finally forced himself to watch the film ten years later and finds the sex unarousing and the plot a little "stupid" but appreciates the social and philosophical aspects. Of his father, he reveals that FRANK & EVA was truer to life than intended with his father stoned and screwing nightly during production, and that he left film at the peak of his career and went back to the stage (Metsers Sr. dislikes attention from his film work these days and does not talk about it). Also included is a featurette on the Eye Film Institute (7:01) and its preservation efforts for Dutch film as well as a poster and photo gallery (3:08). The film's theatrical trailer (1:50) is included along with trailers for de la Parra's OBSESSIONS, FRANK & EVA, and MY NIGHTS WITH SUSAN, SANDRA, OLGA & JULIE (which seems in the thriller mold of OBSESSIONS but more sexually explicit).

Transferred from the Dutch Eye Film Institute's high definition master of the film which was screened last year at Cinematheque Francaise's Dutch Sex Wave in the City of Light special event, Cult Epics' 1080p24 MPEG-4 AVC 2.35:1 widescreen transfer of MY NIGHTS WITH SUSAN, SANDRA, OLGA & JULIE has its rough edges with the frame lines visible at the top and bottom of the frame but the colors are vivid with rich sun-dappled greenery, deep blue night shots, and bold primaries in the wardrobe and gel lighting as well as variegations of skin tones of the bare flesh on display. The original English-subtitled Dutch DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mono track is clean and if it seems "quieter" than the English dub, it is more a matter of the subdued performances than the technical quality of the track compared to the Private Screenings VHS-sourced English dub. When the English DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mono track is selected, the film is preceded by a disclaimer mentioning the VHS source for the track and that the English version ran five minutes shorter so the footage that reverts to Dutch is presented with English subtitles. While the sync of this track is better than the actual voice acting, the overall editing has some hiccups like the Private Screenings logo music that pops up during the opening credits and the fade to black at the end.

The film can be played with an optional introduction by the director (11:15) in which he reveals that he wanted to make the film a decade before with a British cast but could not get funding until the success of BLUE MOVIE made it possible. He wanted Rutger Hauer (TURKISH DELIGHT) for the male lead but the actor did not like the way in which the character was originally introduced, he promised Ammelrooy that she would not have to do as much nudity this time around, the original director of photography got into a bad car accident so he was replaced by his assistant Felperlaan, and that his expensive original choice of composer Bernard Herrmann (who scored OBSESSIONS) recommended Lutyens. The disc also includes three "Scorpio Short Films" directed by Parra including "Heart Beat Fresco" (10:19) in which a seemingly idle young artist actually suffers from some sort of neuromuscular condition, only possessing muscular coordination in bed (the titular artwork are examples of his inability to draw straight lines). "Joop" (10:50) and "Joop Strikes Again" (10:30) which depict the comical events that befall the titular character (Wies Andersen) in his romantic pursuits. The former is scored by the notorious Jane Birkin/Serge Gainsbourg duet "Je t'aime... moi non plus" while the latter features Burt Bacharach's "This Guy's In Love With You." The disc also includes the film's theatrical trailer (2:02) along with trailers for OBSESSIONS, FRANK & EVA, and BLUE MOVIE, along with a comprehensive poster & photo video gallery (3:59). The four discs are packaged with an exclusive 16-page booklet featuring "Scorpio Films & The Dutch Sex Wave" extracts from an article by journalist Guido Franken about the company's rise and fall, as well as a new slipcover designed by Gilles Vranckx. FRANK & EVA, BLUE MOVIE, and MY NIGHTS WITH SUSAN, SANDRA, OLGA & JULIE, however, can also be purchased in their individual editions directly from Cult Epics with their own exclusive limited slipcovers while supplies last. (Eric Cotenas)

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