Radley Metzger

The Image

Score

In the Village of Leisure - in the Land of Play - Deep within the Erogenous Zone - live Jack and Elvira, a swinging married couple who have their sights set on seducing a pair of naive newlyweds. The sparks fly in this erotic classic, which also features the sublime original theatrical trailer.

The Cat and the Canary (Uncut Director's Edition)

Carol Lynley stars as the guileless young woman who becomes the sole heir to eccentric millionaire Wilfrid Hyde-White's fortune in this remake of the Paul Leni silent-film classic. But there's a catch: all the surviving relatives must spend the night in the old mansion. If she dies or is judged insane within the next 12 hours a new heir will be named, and, as if a house full of greedy relatives isn't enough, a homicidal maniac is on the loose, or so informs asylum director Edward Fox, making a dramatic swashbuckling entrance crashing through the library window like a British Zorro. Radley Metzger, best known for his elegant erotic dramas and racy romantic comedies, steps out of the genre that made his name since his debut film Dark Odyssey. With tongue firmly in cheek he refigures the old, dark house farce as a British comedy of manners, nicely capturing the clipped delivery and witty repartee of the drawing-room comedy at the expense of the thrills and chills that make Leni's original so memorable. It's a stylishly handsome and often clever film (the reading of the will, with brash Hyde-White hosting from beyond the grave through the magic of home movies, is an inspired highlight), but it never achieves any tension or terror. Honor Blackman, Wendy Hiller, Daniel Massey, and Olivia Hussey costar. --Sean Axmaker

Lickerish Quartet

Filmed in the breathtaking Castle of Balsorano in Italy's Abruzzi Mountains, The Lickerish Quartet finds three people obsessed with an erotic film that features a striking young blonde woman. When the three - a man, his elegant wife, and her hungry-for-experience son - accidentally happen upon the young performer at a local carnival and invite her back to their castle, they fall into a maze of truth and illusion, as each fulfills their fantasy in the seduction of the mysterious woman.

The Cat & The Canary

Carol Lynley stars as the guileless young woman who becomes the sole heir to eccentric millionaire Wilfrid Hyde-White's fortune in this remake of the Paul Leni silent-film classic. But there's a catch: all the surviving relatives must spend the night in the old mansion. If she dies or is judged insane within the next 12 hours a new heir will be named, and, as if a house full of greedy relatives isn't enough, a homicidal maniac is on the loose, or so informs asylum director Edward Fox, making a dramatic swashbuckling entrance crashing through the library window like a British Zorro. Radley Metzger, best known for his elegant erotic dramas and racy romantic comedies, steps out of the genre that made his name since his debut film Dark Odyssey. With tongue firmly in cheek he refigures the old, dark house farce as a British comedy of manners, nicely capturing the clipped delivery and witty repartee of the drawing-room comedy at the expense of the thrills and chills that make Leni's original so memorable. It's a stylishly handsome and often clever film (the reading of the will, with brash Hyde-White hosting from beyond the grave through the magic of home movies, is an inspired highlight), but it never achieves any tension or terror. Honor Blackman, Wendy Hiller, Daniel Massey, and Olivia Hussey costar. --Sean Axmaker

With an all star cast, erotic auteur Radley Metzger turns his directorial prowess to the classic, spine chilling story of mystery and horror. So turn off the lights, snuggle up to your loved one, and get ready for a horrific night of suspense, mystery and murder!

The Radley Metzger Collection, Vol. 1 (Therese and Isabelle / The Alley Cats / Camille 2000)

Therese and Isabelle
Radley Metzger's most acclaimed film is a melancholy tale of a woman wandering through the landscape of her memory to relive the joys and sorrows of the first love of her adolescence. We flash back on the young Therese (Essy Persson), who has grown up as the only person in her single mother's life, but due to her mother's abrupt marriage she has now been banished from the family home to a finishing school. Feeling abandoned, Therese becomes friends with the vivacious and lively Isabelle (Anna Gaël), but their relationship grows past friendship to love, and together they taste the forbidden fruit of sex. Based on the autobiographical novel Le Batarde by Violette Leduc, Metzger's handsome black-and-white film (elegantly shot by Hans Jura) is constructed as a prismatic set of flashbacks, constructed not in chronological order but rather along thematic lines, intercut with the adult Therese revisiting the ghosts of her past in the now-deserted school. The tasteful restraint of the first half gives way to discreet sexual explorations and finally nudity, which may be troubling to some viewers in light of the age of the characters (who are played by adults), but Metzger never exploits the situation. The poignant scenes have a tenderness and raw emotion that captures the mix of excitement, fear, and confusion of adolescence, and ultimately the film becomes about the tragedy of loss that continues to haunt the adult Therese.

Camille 2000
Radley Metzger's erotic take on Alexandre Dumas fils' tragedy The Lady of the Camellias is a hedonistic journey into decadence among the chic world of upper-crust Rome. Marguerite (Danièle Gaubert) lives off the gifts and good graces of an elderly sugar-daddy count, treating love as a game and sex as a pastime (she is "discriminating but not particular," in the words of one rival). Sweet-faced innocent Armand (Nino Castelnuovo), a young bachelor newly arrived in Rome, courts the comely beauty and wins her heart, and together they live a fairy-tale romance--until his father intervenes and Marguerite (already conveniently dying of one of those afflictions that strikes gorgeous young women who flirt out of their class) selflessly leaves Armand to his greater fate and sinks into a haze of drugs, alcohol, and promiscuous abandonment. Metzger's romantic tragedy is a fleshy delight--the camera lovingly caresses every voluptuous curve of Gaubert's face and body--with a surprisingly restrained display of nudity. Lushly photographing in seductive color in the elegant mansions of Rome, Metzger cranks up the kink in one scene, a party set in a prison turned pleasure house where dates are chained together and couples retire to a cell for privacy, but balances the erotic decadence with tasteful restraint. The art direction and cinematography are so rich that, apart from the magnetic Miss Gaubert, the characters are constantly in danger of being overwhelmed by their surroundings. But little matter--if the tragedy is less than devastating, the realization is delightfully tactile and alive.

The Alley Cats
The success of Radley Metzger's smooth, stylish erotic bonbon The Dirty Girls inspired him to try something a little more ambitious. The Alley Cats is the simple story of Leslie (petite, big-eyed brunette Anna Arthur), a frustrated young woman in the European jet set ignored by her fiancé, Logan. When she discovers he's in the middle of an affair with her best friend, Leslie decides to have a few dalliances of her own. To her surprise, she falls for a beautiful, seductive socialite and is suddenly confronted with a choice she never expected to face. Daring in its time, it feels rather dated today, as the decadent display of sexual freedom collapses in a conclusion grounded in conventional attitudes. But until then it's a lusty yet sleek look at swinging '60s Europe shot on gorgeous locations and in chic, elegantly furnished apartments in cool, crisp black-and-white widescreen, enlivened by a funky rock and jazz-influenced score. --Sean Axmaker

Three erotic Radley Metzger classics in one box set : THERESE & ISABELLE, CAMILLE 2000, THE ALLEY CATS

Alley Cats

The swinging Sixties have never looked so sexy, fun and erotic as in Radley Metzger's second solo feature The Alley Cats! When Leslie, a member of Europe's wealthy swinging set, feels ignored by her fiancee Logan (who is in the midst of a tempestuous affair with Leslie's friend Agnes) she decides to do some swinging herself. Her first lover, the suave, debonair Christian, pleases her greatly, but is soon called away on business. Frustrated, Leslie responds to the advances of Irena, a beautiful lesbian socialite. Soon she must choose between her fiancee Logan and her awakened lesbian feelings. This newly remastered video, presented in widescreen Ultrascope, features a scintillating, jazzy lounge music soundtrack and the original theatrical trailer.

Radley Meztger Collection Volume 2 (Little Mother / The Dirty Girls / Score)

Radley Meztger Collection Volume 2
Include the Films:
Little Mother • The Dirty Girls • Score
Credits:Films by Radley Metzger

Dirty Girls

In Paris, the City of Love, Garance can be found each night on the Champs-Elysees, or in the Rive Gauche, a small bistro. On this evening, Garance will entertain a shy young student, a hot-headed sadist, and an older gentleman who loves a good uniform. In Munich, the City of Pleasure, everyone wants Monique, the fantastic "woman of ten thousand pleasures". But while Monique desires only the mysterious Laurence, she soon finds herself entertaining an American businessman and a lonely movie star-to the delight of several onlookers! This erotic cult classic, from the director of Score and Therese and Isabelle, also includes extra bonus scenes!

Dark Odyssey

If you didn't see his name onscreen you'd never peg this early American Independent feature for a Radley Metzger film. This tale of a brooding Greek sailor (Athan Karras) who jumps a shipmate then jumps ship to New York to satisfy a personal vendetta looks more like the loose, street-shot cinema of Morris Engel (The Little Fugitive, Lovers and Lollipops) than the erotic romps Metzger became famous for. The sailor's plans seems to become temporarily derailed when he meets a nice Greek-American girl (Jeanne Jerrems), whose mix of politeness and forwardness disarms the tradition-bound Karras and he becomes torn between his mission and the possibilities of a relationship in the New World. Metzger and his collaborator William Kyriakis play with the contrasts between dour, humorless Karras, whose Old World values are spinning in the "permissive" social landscape of modern America, and the modern Jerrems. Some of the performances are inexpressive or clumsy and the story at times seems slight, but the location shooting and easy pace create a vivid world of the Greek-American community in New York City that gives life to the drama. --Sean Axmaker

She reached out for love and found a loaded gun! So begins "Dark Odyssey," Radley Metzger's first feature, made with William Kyriakis, shot in New York City. This contemporary Greek tragedy tells the gripping story of a seaman out to avenge the rape of his sister. But before he can, a young woman captures his heart, creating a conflict between love and machismo.