Paradisio

An eccentric English professor travels around European cities, pursued by Russian agents, sporting a magic pair of sunglasses which enable him to see women naked. That's about it. The film is shot in black-and-white, but the view through the sunglasses is in lurid colour. Our hero stumbles across the wonderful lenses when a scientist friend of his is killed. The rest of the story is a feeble comedy-thriller as he blunderingly stays one step ahead of the sinister Russians. Girls are all voluptuous and compliant, and they obligingly pose for our hero to ogle them. However, this being 1961, they all carry strategically-placed bags, trays etc. Don't expect to see candid groin shots! The film is largely dialogue-free: possible so that it could be distributed around Europe with a minimum of local-language dubbing. It's a sort of Jacques Tati Meets The Female Breast. One interesting side observation: our modern fad for super-thin models is thrown into stark relief by these buxom babes, who were obviously the taste of the time. The mixture of black-and-white with colour is odd but appealing. We see post-austerity Europe in harsh grisaille (Berlin still has bomb craters) but we view the women in a warm reddish haze. Not a masterpiece, but worth sitting through once.