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DIRECTED BY: Peter Greenaway

FEATURING: John Standing, Matthew Delamere, Polly Walker, Vivian Wu, Toni Collette, Amanda Plummer, Shizuka Inoh

PLOT: A wealthy businessman’s son attempts to bring his widower father out of his grief by introducing him to the pleasures of libertinism.

COMMENTS: Probably the most quoted line from Peter Greenaway’s exploration of high-class sexual adventurism comes when father and son watch Fellini’s classic 8½. “How many film directors make films to satisfy their sexual fantasies?” Philip asks. “Most of them,” his son replies. It’s a noteworthy piece of art that coughs up its mission statement so readily. Greenaway is already renowned for his treatment of sex as an artistic endeavor. By aligning himself with one of the acknowledged greats of the cinema, he would seem to be making a definitive statement on the primal urge.

It’s important to remember, however, that Greenaway really doesn’t think much of the male of the species. The two weirdest elements of 8½ Women—how much humiliation men are willing to endure to get their base needs met, and what women deem important enough to lead them to assent—are opposite sides of the same coin. Blinkered, selfish, easily distracted by carnal matters, men are always getting in their own way, and so it goes with Philip and his son Storey. These men possess staggering wealth (their fortune was built on debt collection), so much so that they can usually ignore the niceties of culture or propriety, and even then, they can think of little but their next gratification. No surprise that women recognize them for the pathetic, hollow beings they are. 8½ Women feels like an argument for mutual benefits: the men get the sexual gratification they crave, and the women get to fulfill their own needs, be they professional or psychological.

Those needs, to be certain, are kinda peculiar. Gioconda wants to be pregnant at all times, but Clothilde just wants permission to wear her old mistress’ hats, while Beryl has a thing for farm animals, a fetish that lands her in the world’s most perverse body cast. Lording over them all is Palmira, the most powerful person in the house (and probably in any room she enters) by virtue of having the most control over her reason for being there: the pleasure of shagging Philip until he drops, a fact which is completely lost on Philip’s son, who petulantly expects to be next in line.

Walker is electrifying in her power, which highlights how deliberately unsexy this movie about men who keep a harem is. This spiciest scene in the film features novice nun Griselda (played by Colette) leading the Emmenthal boys to her chamber; they are enraptured, she is paying off a debt. She’s not the only one. It’s noteworthy that when one of them actually needs something from the men–such as Mio, a Japanese woman who wants to take on the qualities of a Kabuki female impersonator–they come up pathetically short. 8½ Women never stops reminding you that these relationships are transactional, and is surprisingly cruel to anyone who dares think love has anything to do with it. (One woman is even bludgeoned over the head with a roof tile for her mistake.)

8½ Women is implicitly weird because of what Greenaway brings to any project, but it ultimately doesn’t add up to much. People come, people go, those who understand the rules get what they want. Philip and Storey may get to the root of Fellini’s imagination, but never get anywhere near the magic found there.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

“Like all other Greenaway movies, 8 1/2 Women transpires in a surreal setting that reflects our reality as seen through a looking glass darkly… traditional cinematic elements exist primarily to provide a framework in which Greenaway can operate to present a variety of outrageous sequences… unless you like the offbeat simply because it’s offbeat, 8½ Women may not be the best choice for an evening’s entertainment.” – James Berardinelli, Reel View (contemporaneous)

(This movie was nominated for review by Caleb Moss, who described it thusly: “”Peter Greenaway presents Marquis de Sade, complete with father/son homoerotic subtext, a giant pig, a woman with an odd sexual predilection for horses and swine, inexplicable earthquakes, self-aware parallelisms with Fellini, and as you may of guessed, literally half of a woman, to name some of the very least of strange, detached debaucheries in this film.” Suggest a weird movie of your own here.)

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