The Escapees

Michelle and Marie (Laurence Dubas and Christiane Coppe) escape from a mental institution. While Michelle is strong and determined to get away, Marie is more emotional and grows very attached to Michelle.

Their journey leads them to a traveling troupe of performance artists (aka: strippers). When they join the group, Michelle desires thrills, excitement, and male companionship. Poor Marie only wants to be with Michelle. Forever.

When the pair hook up with a thief named Sophie (Marianne Valiot), they seem to have found peace at last. Alas, Marie's true insanity comes into play.

This is another adult fantasy film from Director Jean Rollin. Filled with odd characters and bizarre situations, THE ESCAPEES is, at its heart, a love story. There's far less nudity -at least until the finale- than in most Rollin projects. The plot is also more straightforward, less surreal.

Rollin drastically retrains his penchant for absurdity here! This does allow for some stretches of dullness, including the long-long-LONG goodbye sequence near the end! Fortunately, Marie's anthropophobia saves the day!

The denouement is pure, bloody Rollin...

Rollin's 'Les Paumées du petit matin' is finally being released in the UK and US by Redemption Films, re-titled 'The Escapees'. In the same vein as Night of the Hunted and Requiem for a Vampire, Rollin tells the tale of two young runaway girls escaping from an institution.

It might not be as accomplished as some of Rollin's greats, but it contains truly unforgettable scenes, imbued with all the ethereal, surreal qualities of a stylish Rollin masterpiece.

The stunning Britte Lahaie makes an appearance, which is as good a reason as any to buy this film, and Redemption promise an original negative in their release.

At one time this was one of Jean Rollin's lost films, but in the age of DVD/Blu-ray its becoming a thing of the past. So is it worth the lime-light(?)... for me, it's a no. That's not implying its awful, just strictly mundane and forgettable low-budget drama.

There's really nothing there, outside a couple of brief moments highlighting Rollin's signature touches (two young women, erotic lesbianism and haunting tragedy). It just lacked those surreal images or better put dream-like quality, instead favouring a glum, down-to- earth reality to tell a tale about the journey of a pair of runaways from an insane asylum. The journey doesn't really add up to much, as it meanders and falls on the repetitiveness with its talkative nature. Because visually it's not striking enough, the plot less nature is found out by being bogged down and it slowly moves from one scenario to another with little conviction. Although the last 10 minutes or so, is where Rollin shines (outside the intro and ice-skating ring scene).

Laurence Dubas and Christiane Coppé are quite good as the two runaways. Watching their neurotic relationship develop made the ending much more effective. Also showing up in a minor bit part is Rollin's regular Brigitte Lahaie.

"The Escapees" is nothing more, nothing less then a curio.

It is surprising that this Jean Rollin film has no vampires, or cemetery and candelabra or even a gothic building and instead at the start a couple of young girls in an asylum. One is in the garden and a rocking chair creaking forlornly. Then she speaks for the first time and helps the other escape. There is a poetical way that the girls just appear with a gypsy like crew with exotic dancers and weird rowdy drinkers with a lovely stage with a junkyard filled with rubbish and a train that thunders through. The surreal scenes go to other ones without really any reason. Seemingly an ice rink appears after an odd place in an underground bar, a costume appears and she dances with a spotlight as if in magic. More with a big ship and other people liking to dance and in the end would seem to be a couple of swingers and from no were guns appear and suddenly there is flesh and death.

Although there is no horror and only a bit little sleaze and violence (courtesy of Brigitte Lahie no less) this is an unmistakable Jean Rollin film - nobody else could, or even wants to make films his way. Two girls, one rebellious and the other one almost catatonic, run away from a borstal-like psychiatric clinic, meets a butch pickpocket-girl, some black strippers and a bunch of sailors and ends up in various adventures. This almost plot less, commercially doomed movie, equally pretentious as it is naive, was bound to make 95% of its audience either laugh or leave their seats, but for a Rollin fan there are some beautiful shots to be found. The figure skating scene was incredible and so was some of the shots at the junkyard. I also liked the sad ending. Not among his best but an interesting footnote in his filmography... for a Rollin fan that is, all others beware! The most shocking thing about this film for me is that there is no...*gulp*... beach scene! What happened, Jean? A few years back you couldn't even shoot a cheap porno without a trip to the beach?