Venus in Furs

Surrealistic erotic shocker from Jess Franco – the film is often incoherent but Franco's style has such verve and flavor that it overcomes this. The storyline remains intentionally vague, adding to the film's overall dreamlike sensibility. Maria Rohm – another of Franco's amazing female stars, every bit as intoxicating as Soledad Miranda – stars as a woman seeking revenge who becomes acquainted with a disillusioned jazz trumpeter (the plot, Franco says in his interview on the DVD, was based on something trumpeter Chet Baker told him, about being lost in fantasy when he plays). The storyline was modified slightly to accommodate an association with the then-popular Venus In Furs book, but is otherwise an original tale. Often distorted, this sadistic sex thriller remains a compelling stylistic piece of storytelling, set in exotic locales with mesmerizingly exotic women and a visual style (despite some heavy handed flash editing that Franco has later claimed he didn't care for) that is quite intriguing – wrapped in a neat 60's jazz score by English rocket Manfred Mann.

Venus in Furs, by Jesus (Jess) Franco, is pretty good. It's about a jazz trumpeter, played by James Darren, who finds a naked, dead woman washed up on the beach, and then things get weird.

It seems that Jimmy Logan recognizes the dead girl as Wanda Reed (Maria Rohm). In fact, he dimly recalls her murder - or did he dream it? Or is he dead himself? Welcome to 1969, where apparently this kind of hazy reality was, like, a reality.

Sometime after finding Wanda's body, Jimmy runs into...Wanda. Wait, isn't she dead? Who knows, man, but next thing anyone knows, the gang she was hanging with is joining her in the thereafter. Guys like art dealer Kapp (Dennis Price) and fashion photog Olga (Margaret Lee) and Klaus Kinski. Well, someone played by Klaus Kinski, but either way, weird.

Meanwhile, Jimmy's falling hard for Wanda, who - again - is probably dead. He likely isn't, because he has a girl named Rita (Barbara McNair), a singer in the combo wherein he jazz trumpets. And Rita can see Wanda, so it's not like Wanda appears only to Jimmy. So maybe Rita's dead too. It's not really important.

Visually speaking, this isn't a bad effort. And the score, particularly the jazz, is really cooking. James Darren isn't a bad actor. Also helping? The multiple naked women. I mean, they're in almost every scene.

In Istanbul, the trumpet player Jimmy Logan (James Darren) is dazed and confused on the beach and finds his musical instrument buried in the sand. Then he sees a woman in the sea and he pulls her body from the surf. He recognizes her as Wanda Reed (Maria Rohm), a gorgeous woman that he saw in the party of the playboy Ahmed Kortobawi (Klaus Kinski). Then he saw her being whipped and raped by Ahmed and his friends Percival Kapp (Dennis Price) and Olga (Margaret Lee).

Jimmy travels to Rio de Janeiro and spends the Carnival playing with a jazz band and his girlfriend Rita (Barbara McNair) in the nightclub of Herman. One night, Wanda Reed comes to the club and Jimmy becomes obsessed on her. Sooner he leaves Rita and stays with Wanda. Meanwhile, she kills Percival, Olga and Ahmed dressed in furs. When the police seek out the woman, Jimmy discovers a secret about Wanda Reed and him.

"Venus in Furs" is a surrealistic film by Jess Franco with James Darren (from The Time Tunnel) and his muse Maria Rohm in the lead roles and Klaus Kinski in a minor role. James Darren's narrative is boring and the annoying music may please jazz fans only. A jazz band playing in a club in the Carnival of Rio is a joke from someone that does not even know the Carnival in Rio. The resolution of the plot is actually a senseless mess but the atmosphere is intriguing. My vote is five.

Title (Brazil): "Venus in Furs"

As likely to be heralded in certain circles as a preeminent figure of stylish erotic Eurohorror as he is to be dismissed as a hack-of-all-trades and purveyor of Eurotrash, often both at the same time given his gargantuan and largely uneven filmography and depending where your affections lie, Jesus Franco if nothing else at least can't be brushed aside easily. If Oasis of the Zombies gives valid claim to the second, Venus in Furs does the same with the first.

A jazz player discovers the body of a woman washed up in a beach in Istanbul. Weirdness ensues. Not really 'meaningful' weird, the kind of weird that suggests a certain insight to be gleaned from closer inspection, but 'captivating' weird, 'hallucinogenic' weird, the kind of weird where you buy the ticket and are happy to be simply swept along for the ride. The movie seems disjointed at first, haphazard, low-key voice-over narration transporting us through time and space back and forth until plot and story cease to exist in any one given level. Yet it doesn't take long for a sort of inner rhythm and flow, jazzlike and hypnotic, to emerge. Suddenly we're in a ritzy party and Klaus Kinski is peering wide-eyed into the camera. The dead woman is now alive, scantily dressed and being flogged in a dimly lit basement by Kinski and two of his friends. From Istanbul to Rio back to Istanbul, the strange woman seems to be exacting some kind of revenge while she keeps a love affair with the horn player on the side.

For all the casual languid randomness, Franco seems to know what he's doing. Not narrative speaking so much as in terms of atmosphere and overall ambiance. The camera constantly zooms back and forth, the movie pulsating with a jazz vibrato. Shots from the primary narrative (the actual story) are later repeated inside a flashback (fantasy? reverie?) making the boundaries between present and past tense blur hopelessly, turning the linear into cyclical. Something which is further compounded by the bizarre ending where I think Franco reaches for more than he can grasp and comes up mostly with straws. That combined with the little epigraph superimposed over the screen brings the movie down a notch because it reduces the heady surreal noir that precedes it into a "so it was all..." conclusion. By openly stating what we've been suspecting, that everything exists in someone's head and adheres to the fragmented laws of dreams and memory, Franco robs us of the pleasure of understanding for ourselves.

Thirty years down the line Venus in Furs is more likely to appeal to fans of Alain Robbe-Grillet and David Lynch than Eurohorror hounds, the emphasis here being on mysterious rather than grotesque.

Paroxismus (AKA Venus In Furs) is an absolute treat from beginning to end. The film looks beautiful and the surrealist vibe that runs throughout the film suits the subject matter perfectly. The hepcat jazz trumpeter central character played by James Darren and the truly luminous and beguiling Maria Rohm add much to the proceedings, but the soundtrack, you cats, the soundtrack! Paroxismus is a Euro horror film in which the visuals and sound match beautifully, but the musical score is fantastic. Therefore, even if the dreamy images and plot baffles and befuddles, just close your eyes and listen a truly superb and innovative score.

Thus, Paroxismus is a Jess Franco gem.