Laura

David Hamilton established his name as a fashion photographer through the still, dreamy soft focus images of young girls, usually portrayed in muted colours, for which he has become famous. At some point he appears to have decided that this experience was all he needed to produce great movies, and he started to direct films that characteristically show all the same features as his fashion images. Unfortunately these were not generally well received and some critics have suggested that he has only a rudimentary appreciation of how to blend successive still images into an ongoing movie sequence. Personally I greatly enjoy his still fashion photography and this enjoyment is sufficient for me to also appreciate his films - overlooking any faults in their dynamics. His best known film is probably "Bilitis", a study of a young girl coming of age, but my preference is for "Laura", a film about a young girl modeling for a sculptor who is blinded in a fire. We can, I hope, ignore comments on the IMDb database which suggest that there is something sinister in Hamilton's preference for models and actresses who appear very young. In his films his objective is to create a story which has a strong emotional appeal but which is also visually beautiful to watch. My judgment is that Laura achieves this objective superbly. One sequence which haunts my memory as much as any other film sequence I have ever seen; comes towards the end of this film. It shows the sculptor, nearly blinded by the fire, returning to his almost finished sculpture whilst he explores the torso of his model with an extended finger trying to recreate in his mind the beauty that he can no longer see.

My recommendation would be to watch this film, which is not readily obtainable today, as soon as any opportunity arises.

POSTSCRIPT - added January 2005

This film has - to my surprise - now been released as a DVD. If these various very different assessments intrigue you in any way, why not buy a copy and add your comments to those already here?

I have read several technical critiques of this movie over the years, but it they all miss the mark for me, because this film provides something that very few films ever do - a gentle, poignant and tranquil approach into a world where the artistic, feminine and erotic merge in a manner that is generally well conceived and often breathtakingly beautiful.

David Hamilton is first and foremost a fine art photographer, and whilst there may be cinematic errors here, the visual content of the film allows one to pause and consider the wonder of the female form. I am delighted to own a copy of this visual hymn to some of the most delightful aspects of human life.

Howard Nowlan Fine Art Photographer, Cornwall, UK.

David Hamilton's "Laura" has got to be one of the most gorgeous erotic films of all time. The story of a young girl's sexual awakening is a rather simple one, and certainly more based on fantasy (more specifically, 'male fantasy') than reality. 15 year-old Laura (Dawn Dunlap) lives in a pastel world where everything is white, everyone is beautiful, and nothing is quite real. Laura develops a fascination with the much older Paul, a sculptor with an eye for a special kind of beauty. The conflict here, is that Paul is the former lover of Laura's mother Sara, (Maud Adams). Here develops a classic situation of mother/daughter competition. When Paul sees the beautiful Laura, he is smitten, at the girls beauty, and also at how she resembles Sara, at age 15. Sara's attempts to keep the two separate are not entirely successful. Filmed on the French Riviera, in soft focus style, by renowned photographer Hamilton, you can imagine the look of the film, if you are familiar with his work. It is strange, quiet, dreamlike, quite unlike anything i have seen before. Quite controversial too. Dawn Dunlap, who was not so much older than the character she played, is very graceful and nice to look at, and former Bond girl Maud Adams is incredibly beautiful in this one as well. Although the character of Paul, (James Mitchell) is supposed to be close to 50 years old, the relationship between him and Laura is not so hard to take, as he is also a very handsome guy, who looks nowhere near his age. Also worthy of mention is the lush, dreamlike soundtrack that accompanies these images. One scene that stands out is a dream sequence; Filmed in black & white, Laura is running through a maze of little streets and alleys, looking for Paul, but he continues to allude her. Very nicely done. Hamilton creates a kind of quiet suspense, as the viewer waits for the time when the two get together. While there is nudity in the film, it is all done with the utmost of taste and subtlety. One thing: I cannot stress how important it is when watching this film, that you see the original French language version. The English dubbing for this one is wretched, absolutely dire. It is not even proper English, but American English, and it totally destroys the feeling and tone of this very French film. I first saw it in English, and I didn't think too much of the film, as the visuals were great, but the voices and dialog were so bad. When i saw the French version, it was like another experience entirely. Usually i don't mind voice dubbing so much, but here it is intolerable. I think that a lot of reviewers here have only seen the easier to find English version, which might explain the films low rating. "Laura" is a very classy erotic film, in it's original French language.

Sometimes a movie can be merely about its images, like this one. The story can be about the images too.

I was very impressed with the way vignettes were composed. Rather lovely, most of them except for the annoying fade to black at the end of each and every one. To appreciate this, or rather to not be offended, I suppose you have to accept that the female form is appealing, and accept that a young girl can initiate an affair with an older man.

Besides the appeal of the balletgirls and the way they are displayed, there's the story.

It isn't much of one, surely insufficient for most commentors, and the fact that it is so slight seems to rile them a bit, as indication that the nudity was all that mattered.

But the elements of the story that do exist are what I call "folding." Usually the purpose of folding is to place the viewer in the movie, and that's the case here.

We have an artist in the writer/director who represents young girls in the nude. He and we have a surrogate on-screen, in a character who is an artist (a sculptor) and represents young girls in the nude. The titular Laura is a dancer, inviting viewers.

So far, the fold is ordinary. By the thinnest of plot devices, our sculptor goes blind after starting a sculpture of Laura. So she offers to be the model, allowing him to caress her on every part, sufficiently to make a clay copy, which he similarly caresses. She, meanwhile has a crush on him and seduces him during this process.

See the fold? We not only get to look but touch, and that touch is returned.

No, ma'am that's not a slight story. No, not at all.

Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.

Laura, Les Ombres De L'ete

David Hamilton does a great job expressing his seeming obsession with pre-pubescent ballet dancers in Laura, Les Ombres De L'ete. Possibly one of the worst (and most boring) "art house" pictures ever made, professional photographer/amateur filmmaker Hamilton drowns in his excessive use of soft focus, pseudo-artistic fadeouts, and nudity, devices employed to make up for the shallow plot.

After seeing teenaged Laura (Dawn Dunlap) at ballet class, sculptor Paul Thomas Wyler (James Mitchell) knows that he must sculpt this beautiful little girl, just as he had done with her mother Sarah (Maud Adams) 20 or so years prior. But Sarah can see through his superficial intentions and tries her best to keep her very curious daughter from posing for this oh-so-artistic womanizer.

Laura contains several sequences of excessive nudity (mostly of young Dunlap) and there is no doubt that Hamilton's subjects are quite attractive; in fact, the photo-shoot scenes, with Sarah taking endless pictures of her naked daugher prancing around (including a few gymnastic poses), are certainly provocative. But like Hamilton's other exploitative French productions, the story is built around these sequences and without them there is little else to interest the viewer. The film comes across as heavy-handed, pretentious, and, ultimately, empty. Some termed this soft-core when it was released but the film simply isn't graphic enough to qualify for the category. -- David Ross Smith