Love Kittens

Vintage “Sexy Classics”

First Run Features

R1 DVD

This selection of four films from the early sixties shows the changing attitude to nudity in film, especially those made for the U.S. Films from Europe were regarded as “artistic” and could feature gratuitous nudity. They were generally a lot of fun, but didn’t always appeal to the mass audiences. Producers decided they could make a product that would have wider appeal. Generally they would insist on a big name actress as a drawcard, such as Elke Sommer, and those actresses are the focus of these films. They mark the introduction of nudity to mainstream film but still retain a curiously traditional look.

It was an adventurous move especially in the U.S. as it required guts for producers to ignore the moral outbursts that would follow the licentious scenes of (shock, horror) kissing, smoking and dancing among the younger set. They had to be toned down a bit from the European style to fit into the U.S. markets and even then the U.S distributors demanded the right to do a final cut. It didn’t always work. They often finished up producing a film that looked more like one of those pompous British films of the immediate pre-War period. In these we are expected to believe that a fifty year old David Niven was really a suave sophisticated man about. town who could pull all the thirty-something “young” ladies. They also produced films that, despite their intentions, still looked French (or Italian or whatever) as they couldn’t afford to ignore the local audiences.

Sweet Ecstasy

Billed as “steamy beach romance” the film deals with a group of rich, spoilt young people on the Riviera. Into this group comes a young(ish) man who soon has to choose between a vivacious young woman from the group and his actress fiancée. Apart from lots of women in tight clothes and a “Mexican costume party” this film has little to recommend it. I saw it when it was released (mostly because it had Elke Sommer in it) and it seemed a bit dated even then. It was not so much sexy as naïve compared to what we were becoming used to in Australia, but in the more retarded U.S. it was sexy enough to sell. In spite of Elke Sommer this turkey doesn’t fly, though, because it is simply a dreadful film with a weird plot, stilted script, tedious music, bad acting and unbelievable characters. It has fortunately been overdubbed in English, which helps a bit. So does Elke Sommer, but at this time not for her acting ability.

The exotic locations, attractive young women and a minimum of brain-taxing plot were ideal for the U.S. audiences, especially when combined with a “love kitten” big name star. It was a strange approach as these films seemed to be a step backwards compared with earlier sexier European releases, but they were designed to be inoffensive. The best comparison I can offer is an adult (older audiences, not dirtier films) version of the old Gidget beach films from 1959.

Daniella By Night

It’s Elke Sommer again, pouting and looking sultry (or should that be “surly”?) all over the place. This film is in French with subtitles and shows how the Europeans were catering to their own markets. It is a combined German – French production. It involves Elke Sommer as a fashion model working for a leading couturier who is also selling some sort of secrets. She is inadvertently carrying stolen documents in her lipstick.

Without Miss Sommer’s name in it the film would have sunk without trace. It has all the characteristics of the most pompous British films mentioned above. Sommer’s acting was notably better than in Sweet Ecstasy so it seems she finally had a plot that she could work with. We still, however, have that dreary background music (jazz never seems to suit a film as background music). The best description of the film is “quaint”. We also have a few very brief partial nudity scenes to titillate the viewers. This gave the film a bit of a reputation that probably didn’t harm its take at the box office but audiences would have been disappointed.

The Nude Set

Also known as The Fast Set in areas where “nude” was a dirty word in newspapers, this film starred French love kitten Agnes Laurent. A spoiled young girl, Sophie, goes to Paris to study art and incidentally meet up with her boyfriend, and she discovers the delights of burlesque and striptease nightclubs. There is much licentious dancing and extended striptease scenes. They did not exactly inflame my passions but were fairly raunchy for their time. Inevitably Sophie finishes up as a performer, not just a spectator. There is no nudity by Sophie but what is shown in the strip shows.

The film was done with a touch of relatively unsophisticated comedy that lifted it above films like the previous two. At least the young people looked no more than twenty five. They were obviously rebels, though, as they rode motor scooters and the boyfriend drove a three-wheeler motor car.

Music is by the hilariously named “Moustache and his Rock and Roll” and has as much connection to rock and roll as a bunch of chanting monks.

Agnes Laurent was younger and somewhat more attractive than Elke Sommer and perhaps better fitted the title of Love Kitten. At least she smiled more often.

The Twilight Girls

This time it’s Catherine Deneuve in her first film role who now gets start billing, but she was very young (thirteen at the time) so it’s hard to pick her out. Agnes Laurent gets the Love Kitten role. There is also an appearance by U.S. about-to-be porn starlet Georgina Spelvin. The film was originally titled Les Collegiennes (The School Girls) and was renamed The Twilight Girls for the U.S. market. It was heavily cut with most of Miss Deneuve’s scenes eliminated due to their mild lesbian overtones and replaced with scenes by Georgina Spelvin with far stronger lesbian motifs. This version is taken from the Audubon Films master and with an English overdub and the American inserted scenes. Miss Deneuve is listed in the titles as Sylvie Dorleac, her family name.

The story is the usual “boarding school full of randy girls” and for a change the plot is reasonably intelligent. Young Anne-Marie attracts the attention of one of her classmates and has to decide between her or a young man she has noticed. Her schoolgirl lover is not happy and there are the usual bitchy catfights.

The film is really rather tame. It was the lesbian scenes that had it so heavily cut in the U.S.. Nudity was becoming more tolerated, but they were having none of that girl – girl business. Oddly after the lesbian scenes were cut extra anonymous scenes were inserted of Georgina Spelvin, and other scenes were recut to suggest lesbian activity where it hadn’t existed before. The entire concept of the girls sleeping topless was part of the U.S. version and gave a chance to flash a bit of breast. According to the extra on the making of the U.S. version these extra scenes “turned the mild puppy love into a cauldron of burning sexual curiosity”. It wasn’t enough, though, and the censors of New York took the film into the court, where it remained for two years. This, of course, ensured its success. A decade later Miss Spelvin appeared in The Devil In Miss Jones. How quickly the attitudes changed 1

None of the films stand out as great cinema but they are important as they show the loosening of the strict morality that prevailed up til then. Bit by bit such films chipped away at the moral restrictions and gradually people were allowed to watch whatever they wanted.

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