CEREMONY

 

 

That was the movie's original title when it was filmed back in 1975 and it's okay if you've never heard of it. Few have.

But, as is the way with cult films (I'm looking at you Troll 2),  somebody was intrigued enough by the movie's very obscurity to become its champion. I guess that's me.

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And just what is this thing? Well, here's a friendly link to a synopsis complete with screencaps, but here's a more contextual summation:

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In the mid 1970s, an American porn director looking to capitalize on the sexual freedom of the continent made a couple of movies in Sweden. The second of these was an "artistic" character piece filmed in English and starring an American unknown who never made another film. It also featured a future mainstream actor beloved of Scandinavian audiences, an adorable Swedish Penthouse Pet who never takes her clothes off, and a tragic (unbilled) British porn superstar who never speaks a word. The movie, which plays like a clumsy wedding (pun intended) of Ingmar Bergman and the Mitchell Brothers, was released with little fanfare around the world under various titles and runtimes but to nearly unanimous critical disdain.

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Cut to the late 1980s. A massively chopped softcore edit for prudish American audiences was scheduled as late night programming on the cable channel Showtime. That's where I saw it - at the "right age," if you know what I mean. It made an impression. And, over the years and with the help of the internet, I've discovered that I'm not alone in my weird fascination with this weird little sex flick. Even so, for most of its fans, it's little more than a fuzzy memory.

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This could be because Ceremony or I Lust Och Nod or Liz is nearly impossible to find - in any version - and has never had a video/DVD release in the US.

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Is this movie an overlooked classic? No. Oh, no no no. Is it good? Not as such. But there's just something about it; about what they were trying to make here. An internalized, introspective porn movie about one woman's fantasies and urges, written with an attempt at depth and honesty (an attempt, I say) and constructed and filmed with a naturalism that tips over from languid beauty to boredom. I've seen some ambitious, arty porn and some mainstream dramas attempting to push the envelope of erotica, but I've never seen - before or since - a film that straddles that line so successfully for so little reward. This movie is a stilted, ambitious failure and I love it for that exact reason. 

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I'm here to spread the word about this forgotten "classic" and, by doing so, hoping to shake loose more info and, dare I say, dare I hope, someday, a good quality dub or - unlikely as it might be - a fully restored, unedited reissue.