The Beast | |
---|---|
Directed by | Walerian Borowczyk |
Produced by | Anatole Dauman |
Written by | Walerian Borowczyk |
Starring | Sirpa Lane Lisbeth Hummel Marcel Dalio |
Cinematography | Bernard Daillencourt Marcel Grignon |
Edited by | Walerian Borowczyk |
Production company | |
Distributed by | Argos Films |
Release date | |
Running time | 98 minutes |
Country | France |
Language | French Italian English |
Movies TV Shows News. Walerian Borowczyk's The Beast (La Bete) Unboxing Cult Epics by Todd E Walnuts. SHOCK TO THE PAST - EP#2 - THE BEAST (1975) by ViewWorldCinema.
The Beast (French: La Bête) is a 1975 French sexhorror film written, edited, and directed by Walerian Borowczyk. Although sometimes compared with Beauty and the Beast, there are no parallels in the plot except that it features the relationship between a beast (monster) and a woman. The film was noted for its explicit sexual content upon its initial release. It has become a cult film.
Background[edit]
A loose adaptation of the novella Lokis by Prosper Mérimée was originally conceived in 1972 as a film on its own. However, Borowczyk later rendered Lokis as a story (La véritable historie de la bête du Gévaudan) in Immoral Tales (1974), which was envisaged to be a film of six stories.[1] After Immoral Tales was remastered as a film of four stories, the footage became the dream sequence of The Beast.[2]
Plot[edit]
Businessman Philip Broadhurst dies and leaves his estate to his daughter, Lucy, on the condition that, within sixmonths of his death, she marries Mathurin, the Marquis Pierre de l'Esperance's son, and be married by Cardinal Joseph do Balo, the brother of Pierre's uncle, the crippled Duc Rammaendelo de Balo, who shares their crumbling farmhouse with Pierre's daughter Clarisse, and their servant Ifany.
Mathurin, who manages the family horse-breeding business, is dim-witted and deformed, and has never been baptized. Pierre summons the local priest to the house for the baptism, but Pierre, by promising the priest repairs to his church and a new bell, performs the ritual himself so that the priest will not find out the truth about Mathurin.
Lucy and her aunt, Virginia, are driven by their chauffeur towards the farm but their way is blocked by a fallen tree. They find a back route to the house at a back door to the house, where Lucy asks Rammaendelo about rumors. Rammaendelo, who is not in favor of the marriage because he is dependent on Mathurin to look after him, shows her a book that describes the beautiful Romilda's fight with a beast in the local forest 200 years ago. Lucy comes across several drawings depicting bestiality, and becomes sexually excited at the thought of her impending marriage, even though she has never met Mathurin.
Pierre blackmails Rammaendelo into persuading his brother to perform the marriage by telling him that he has proof that Rammaendelo poisoned his wife. Rammaendelo is unable to get through to the Cardinal on the telephone, so Pierre sends a telegram, assuring him that Mathurin has been baptized and urging him to attend this evening.
Everyone assembles for dinner, and Mathurin's uncouth manners become apparent. Lucy and her aunt try to leave, but are persuaded to stay. Everyone having drunk too much wine, most of the assembly fall asleep while waiting up for the Cardinal. Lucy retires to her room, undresses, puts on her thin wedding dress, and dreams that she is Romilda, playing a harpsichord. Seeing a lamb straying into the forest, she chases after it to find that it has been torn apart by a black hairy beast.
Pierre overhears Rammaendelo on the telephone to the Cardinal trying to dissuade him from performing the marriage. Angrily interrupting the conversation, Pierre slits Rammaendelo's throat with a razor and tears the phone out of the wall. In the ensuing comic dream sequence, the beast with a large visible erection chases Lucy through the forest. She loses most of her clothing in the process and ends up hanging by her arms from a branch, and the beast licks her and masturbates. Lucy wakes in a sweat and wonders if it was merely a dream. She tiptoes to Mathurin's room but he is asleep, fully clothed, on his bed. Lucy returns to her room, masturbates, and dreams that the beast is copulating with her. She wakes again and is convinced that Mathurin must have visited her. She visits his room again but he is still sleeping soundly.
Lucy returns to her dream. The beast continues to masturbate and Lucy rubs his ejaculate all over herself. Eventually the beast dies of exhaustion. Lucy wakes and walks into Mathurin's room to find him dead on the floor. She runs naked through the house screaming, and everyone runs to her aid. Virginia examines Mathurin's body and discovers that a plaster cast on his arm is concealing a claw for a hand. Pulling his clothes off reveals both that he is covered in thick black hair and that he has a tail. They run out of the house in terror as the Cardinal arrives. Virginia comforts the terrified Lucy as they speed away in the car, and Lucy dreams that she is naked in the forest again, burying the beast.[3][4][5][6][7]
Cast[edit]
- Sirpa Lane as Romilda de l'Esperance
- Lisbeth Hummel as Lucy Broadhurst
- Elisabeth Kaza as Virginia Broadhurst
- Pierre Benedetti as Mathurin de l'Esperance
- Guy Tréjan as Pierre de l'Esperance
- Roland Armontel as Priest
- Marcel Dalio as Duc Rammaendelo De Balo
- Robert Capia as Roberto Capia
- Pascale Rivault as Clarisse De l'Esperance
Release[edit]
The film premiered on 6 January 1975 at the Avoriaz Fantastic Film Festival[8] and was released theatrically in Germany on 6 February 1981.[9]
Reception[edit]
The film did well in Europe, but the run of the film in France and the U.S. ran into controversy due to its erotic nature and show of bestiality. Many felt the film went over the top with its sex scenes, leading to its withdrawal from film for several years. In the UK the BBFC refused to classify a heavily cut version for general cinema release, and the same cut print narrowly avoided prosecution under the Obscene Publications Act by the Director of Public Prosecutions when it was shown with Greater London Council approval at the independently run Prince Charles Cinema in London in September 1978.[10]
Further reading[edit]
Kerri Sharp. 'Hairy Hands Make Light Work'. UK: Headpress19: World Without End (1999), pp. 37–40.
References[edit]
- ^'Polish culture: Walerian Borowczyk'. Archived from the original on 3 October 2013. Retrieved 19 February 2013.
- ^LOKIS Le manuscrit du Professeur WITTEMBACH
- ^Review with several screenshots at devildead.com
- ^DVD: Beast, The, 3-Disc Limited Edition / La Bete (1975), by Mark R. Hasan
- ^MITTERNACHTSKINO - La Bête – Die Bestie
- ^Bildstoerung » LA BÊTE - Die Bestie
- ^Paszylk, Bartłomiej (March 2009). The pleasure and pain of cult horror films: an historical survey. McFarland. p. 148. ISBN978-0-7864-3695-8. Retrieved 23 January 2011.
- ^La Bête – Die Bestie ¦ DVD ¦ Schnitt Online
- ^Schwarzglut - Bête, La (Frankreich 1975) - Review
- ^BBFC Case Study of La Bête
External links[edit]
- The Beast on IMDb
- The Beast at Rotten Tomatoes[dead link]
- Online review from Moria
Retrieved from 'https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=La_Bête_(film)&oldid=936935463'
(Redirected from The Beast (movie))
The Beast may refer to:
Religion[edit]
- The Beast (Revelation), two beasts described in the New Testament Book of Revelation
Fictional character[edit]
- The Beast in William Golding's Lord of the Flies
- The Beast in the Poltergeist film series
- The main antagonist of Kung Fu Hustle
- The main antagonist of the first season of The Magicians
- The Beast, from the fairy tale Beauty and the Beast
- The Beast (Disney), from the 1991 animated Disney film Beauty and the Beast
- The Beast, from the miniseries Over the Garden Wall
- The Beast, from the Doctor Who episodes 'The Impossible Planet' and 'The Satan Pit'
- The Beast, an Ork Warboss from Games Workshop's Warhammer 40,000 universe
- The Beast, a split personality of the character Kevin Wendell Crumb and an antagonist in M. Night Shyamalan's 2016 film Split.
- Beast (comics), originally known as The Beast
Films[edit]
- The Beast (1916 film), a Fox Film film
- The Beast (1974 film), French/Italian drama
- The Beast (La Bête), a 1975 French film
- The Beast (1986 film), a 1986 Icelandic film
- The Beast (1988 film), a 1988 American film based on the play Nanawatai
- The Beast (1996 film), a made-for-TV movie based on the 1991 novel Beast
- The Beast (1995 film), a short film featured at the 1995 Cannes Film Festival
- The Beast (2011 film), a South Korean film
- The Beast (2019 film), a South Korean film
Television[edit]
- The Beast (2001 TV series), a short-lived 2001 TV series
- The Beast, a 2007 television movie starring Ian Gomez
- The Beast (2009 TV series), an American crime drama starring Patrick Swayze
Music[edit]
- The Beast (band), a hip hop and jazz band
- The Beast (Vader album), 2004
- 'The Beast' (Angus and Julia Stone song), 2007
- 'The Beast', a song by the Fugees from their album The Score
- 'The Beast', a song by the band Concrete Blonde from their 1990 album Bloodletting
People[edit]
- The Beast (nickname), a list of people
- The Beast (wrestler), ring name of Yvon Cormier (1938–2009), Canadian professional wrestler
- Brock Lesnar (born 1977), American professional wrestler and former mixed martial arts fighter
- Bob Sapp (born 1973), American mixed martial arts fighter
- Dan Severn (born 1958), American mixed martial arts fighter
- Daigo Umehara (born 1981), Japanese professional gamer
- Mark Labbett (born 1965), British TV personality known for his role as a Chaser on The Chase
- Adebayo Akinfenwa, British footballer
- Eddie Hall (born 1988), British strongman
- 'The Beast from the East' was the nickname of American professional wrestler Bam Bam Bigelow (1961–2007)
Other uses[edit]
- The Beast (book), a 2013 translation of an earlier work byy El Salvadorian journalist Óscar Martínez
- The Beast (car), a Rolls-Royce Meteor tank engine-powered automobile
- The Beast (game), an alternate reality game promoting A.I.: Artificial Intelligence
- The Beast (newspaper), a Buffalo, New York newspaper
- The Beast (roller coaster), a wooden roller coaster at Kings Island near Cincinnati, Ohio
- The Daily Beast, an American news and opinion website
- 2014 HQ124, a near-Earth asteroid nicknamed 'The Beast'
- Presidential state car (United States), the state car of the President of the United States, nicknamed 'The Beast'
- 'The Beast', the 2016 Fort McMurray Wildfire in Alberta, Canada
See also[edit]
- La Bête (film) (The Beast), a 1975 film by Walerian Borowczyk
- The Beastmaster, a 1982 sword and sorcery film
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