Cast: Carole Laure, Pierre Clementi, Anna Prucnal, Sami Frey, John Vernon, Jane Mallett, Roy Callender, Marpessa Dawn Director: Dusan Maka...
Cast: Carole Laure, Pierre Clementi, Anna Prucnal, Sami Frey, John Vernon, Jane Mallett, Roy Callender, Marpessa Dawn
Director: Dusan Makavejev
Sweet Movie, a cult masterpiece, is a ferocious attack against Communism and capitalism. Any art-house film lover, or art lover in general, would find it hard not to fall in love with, or at the very least, even if they don’t get what the film means, appreciate it immensely. Sweet Movie does require multiple viewing for the viewer to fully grasp how intellectual the film actually is.
Released on June 12, 1974, Sweet Movie tells two stories
simultaneously, one of the winners of a “virgin” contest who refuses to have
sex with the “golden penis”, who has intercourse with a Mexican and moves to an
archaic community that has feasts full of vomit and excrement. The second story
is about an actress, who has been exiled from Poland for her involvement in a
film. She’s a paedophile and a killer who travels through the canals of
Amsterdam on her boat called “Survival” looking for people to have sex with,
who she then kills (in a pool of sugar). Her ship has a giant face of a teary-eyed
Marx on it. She makes sweets in the boat.
Sweet Movie is outrageous. It would offend a lot of people
(especially the paedophilic scene where the actress seduces a young boy and
then kills him), while others would applaud it for the right reasons. The
filmmaking by the auteur is groundbreaking and controversial who wasn’t scared
to face challenges and wanted to bring forth his ideas in any way he could
(like Pier Paolo Pasolini).
The film is full of symbolism. and even with a short runtime of
ninety-eight minutes, some may find the film tedious to get through, while, for
others, it would be a treat. The film is highly artistic.
The film showcases a lot of repulsive acts performed by the
actors, which was to bring forth the point Makavejev wanted to make. It
was a metaphor for the anger the Serbian people felt under a communist and
fascist government (somewhat like A Serbian Film). The film is also hilarious,
outrageously hilarious, that it could even be seen as a spoof of fascism and
communism.
Sweet Movie wasn’t scared of the challenges it would face, it just
wanted to tell people the truth in the most hilarious way and it succeeded in
it. 50 years later, as the political state of the world is deteriorating, the
film stays as relevant as ever.
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