La dernière femme

Before Lars von Trier (the 'bad' one - the one who directed 'Antichrist' and 'Nymphomaniac') there was Marco Ferreri. In 1976, when he made 'La dernière femme', the Italian screenwriter and director had wowed bourgeois audiences (and the members of the jury at the Cannes Film Festival) with 'La grande bouffe', a film in which four men gather to eat until they die. With the erotic drama 'La dernière femme' Ferreri probably set out to explore the limits again, tackling another theme related to human desires - sexuality and the ways in which it is perceived by men and women. The result was a controversial film, as he wanted, banned or limited for certain audiences in many cinema markets, the ending of which has become something of a legend in the history of cinema. It would not be Marco Ferreri's last 'shocking' film. I saw it almost half a century after it was made. I believe that if it was made today the film would be just as controversial, if not more controversial. But it's also a film that raises a lot of questions, bold in both theme and approach, with superb acting, famous actors in some of the most interesting roles of their careers, and enough mystery and ambiguity to leave room for hot debates.

Unlike the characters in 'La grande bouffe', who belong to the rich classes, the heroes of 'La dernière femme' are ordinary people, living in an urban environment unsettling by the rectangular artificiality of the buildings and the banality of the interiors. In the first scene of the film the engineer Gérard is fired from his job in a big chemical factory, but he does not seem at all affected by this situation. His worries are raising his one-year-old son and especially chasing after women. We learn soon that his wife had left him with the child in his care to devote herself to a feminist political career and perhaps to maintain a lesbian relationship. Gérard brings home Valerie, the gorgeous caretaker from the daycare where he was bringing his son. What starts as a casual fling develops into a complex relationship. Gérard and Valerie don't seem to match at all, what each is looking for in a relationship is as different as in the relationship between Mars and Venus. They don't love each other, they have a lot of sex, but neither finds satisfaction in their relationship, not to mention happiness. Is Valerie too immature? Is Gérard too self-absorbed? The two are neither able to love, nor separate, nor destroy each other. Maybe only themselves.

The acting performances are formidable. Gérard Depardieu makes one of his first great roles here, one of the creations in which he melts into the character and dominates it at the same time, a mixture of physical strength and vulnerability, sincerity and restrained violence. Ornella Muti is mesmerizingly beautiful, at once magnetic on the outside and cold on the inside, the exact opposite of the cerebral wife who had left her husband and child for political militancy. The characters remain open to interpretations and each of the viewers will have to judge which of them is the victim, if any. Or maybe they are both victims of circumstances, of a militant feminism that makes sense on the public stage but can become toxic in private? Michel Piccoli and Nathalie Baye also appear in supporting roles. Luciano Tovoli's cinematography creates an ambience that suggests the existential pressure of a world where society's indifference generates personal crises. Viewers who plan to watch 'La dernière femme' need to be warned about its extremes, but those who dare will be rewarded.

All of the reviews so far have missed the mark on this one. The funniest comment is that Depardieu is "corpulent." He doesn't have a six-pack, by any means, but he is not at all corpulent. Even in his later years, he has been, at most, a little chunky. What intrigues me most of all is that none of the reviews mention the creepy fact that a number of sex scenes in this film have a toddler in the middle of them, and that Gerard Depardieu, in a few scenes, spends an inappropriate time exploring said toddler's boy parts. I get that it's supposed to be a comment on some vague Freudian male penis obsession, but it doesn't have to be creepy like that to make such a point (whatever point that is; it's never made clear). It stops just this side of getting the baby involved in the sex, but goes as far as having a swinger fondling party while the baby watches and to have the baby naked on the bed between Depardieu and Muti carrying out some obvious foreplay, to name a couple of disturbing examples. No wonder this one is hard to find.

i have looked for a copy of this film for many years. i was so happy the day i located it and have truly enjoyed it several times.

after seeing it, i could understand why the US would not allow it to be imported. there are many scenes that most will find offensive. most of which involve having a baby around during some of the sex scenes, which are fairly explicit - most with gerard's erection very apparent.

looking past the sex scenes, the movie is great. i truly enjoyed the idea of 'the penis rules the world' and that 'food is the comfort of the world' and how those two ideas combine to create on of the most shocking of all endings.

i will recommend this to all that have a true mature mind and can enjoy the 1970's style sexist attitudes without taking offense. of all of the movies i have in my collection, this is one that i very rarely lend out, i do not wish to take the chance of losing it!

After having attended a film festival in Creteil (a posh suburb of Paris), I accidentally got a chance to watch "La derniere femme" on big screen. This invigorating experience took me in a not so distant past to a nice place called Creteil circa 1976. I was much too thrilled to have known Creteil through the vision of a maverick filmmaker Marco Ferreri for which he teamed with his regular partner Rafael Azcona. La dernière femme is a film which will easily please people of varied tastes. It can be liked by feminists,admirers of actors Depardieu and Ornella Muti and supporters of a highly unconventional filmmaker Marco Ferreri. The essential charm of this film lies in Creteil and its high rise buildings.Some of them are occupied by the likes of Depardieu and Muti.There is Michel Piccoli too who lends credible support to the narrative pattern. During my viewing of this film I did not mind at all watching a small kid act alongside Depardieu and Muti.I doubt as to how this can be true of other viewers who might find such a move harmful for young minds. Watch it to explore other films by Marco Ferreri.

Gérard (26 year-old G.Depardieu in a star-making, César-nominated performance) is the he-man single father of a little baby boy who meets carefree, sensuous Valérie (ravishingly beautiful 21 year-old Ornella Muti). They feel instantly attracted to each other, she moves in with him on the spot, they fall in love, she fancies playing stepmother to the baby, he gets jealous, she wants freedom, he gets enraged, she no longer fancies constant love-making, he gets desperate, they quarrel and fight, and things disintegrate until the totally shocking finale knocks you OUT!

This film was banned mostly everywhere outside Europe, including the US - and you won't find it in VHS or DVD for sale on Amazon, or for rent in your local store. I caught it on Cinemax Cable, late night. It's a step FURTHER than Ferreri's previous "La Grande Bouffe" in shocking power and sexual frankness, and so I've warned you. In this film, Ferreri questions issues like "couple", "love", "sex", "relationship", "family", "woman" and especially "man". He tells a love story exclusively from a macho point of view: the male characters (primitive, childish Depardieu, phony Piccoli, stupid Salvatori) are shamelessly misogynous and speak out their minds with no censorship or civilized "varnish" -- sensibility my a**.

Gérard eats, drinks, bites, sucks, spits, burps, shouts, f***s, harasses, fights, you name it - his bodily needs rule. And most of all, Gérard wonders what is the purpose of having a penis in women lib's times. The male organ is very much the center of the film, visually as well as metaphorically, representing men's questionable appendix in a world (Europe in the 70s) where family, marriage and male-female roles were being seriously questioned. In Gérard's character's own words, as he holds his son's penis in his hand: "All we are left with is the right to go around sporting one of these. But now they want to take away our pride in having them - we're not even allowed that anymore! So what are we supposed to do with them now?"

Depardieu was soon after to become France's biggest star since Delon/Belmondo. You can really think of no other actor more suitable to portray this childish-gross-larger-than-life he-man than Gérard, with his imposing figure and shameless physicality, total emotional assessment and unbelievable boldness - he's completely naked most of the time, is shown in explicit masturbation and has some 2 or 3 full erections, one of them in close-up, no body double!! (This was way before Viagra, mind you, and before Oshima, Bellocchio, Von Trier, Breillat, Larry Clark etc.). He was very probably the first major Western star to be shown like "that" in a non-porn film. The final scene in which he finally finds a way to "deal" with his manhood is one the most shocking EVER done.

Ornella Muti's nude beauty is also largely available here in some daring scenes, though her face is perhaps even sexier than her body - the combination of her catlike, dreamy green eyes, full lips, dark long hair, that lovely gap in her front teeth and the naughty girl-woman expression is very much a promise of liberated but life-changing sex.

"La Dernière Femme" ("The Last Woman") belongs to Italian director Marco Ferreri's great films, dealing with some of his favorite themes: destruction of male-female stereotypes, flesh/sex/ physiological urges as symbols of life and mortality, physical disability/decay/deformity/mutilation , all of them treated with highly acid sarcasm, a touch of surrealism, another of depression and a lot of dark humor. Ferreri belongs to a very selected group of rebel, risqué and subversively poetic filmmakers, along with Buñuel, Pasolini, Fassbinder, Portuguese João César Monteiro and very few others. A one-of-a-kind, he attracted great European stars who worked for him over and over again (Mastroianni, Tognazzi, Noiret, Piccoli, Salvatori, Depardieu, Girardot, Deneuve, Vlady, Schygulla, Muti, Romy Schneider etc etc) because they knew they would be given offbeat, once-in-a-lifetime roles.

Sadly, chances are you won't probably see a copy of "La Dernière Femme" anywhere, unless you look really hard for it. It contains extremely daring scenes, including Depardieu and Ornella having sex in bed with the baby around; nude Depardieu having his nude infant baby explore (I mean, REALLY explore!) Ornella's nude body; and another in which he proudly grabs his baby's willy and points it right at her bemused face. But don't be mislead: beyond the pleasure of shocking his audience, Ferreri firmly shoots us his uncomfortable questions: what is a modern man to do with/without his penis in (post-)feminist times? What the heck do women WANT from men, after all? If you thought "Sex and the CIty" you're galaxies away from "La Dernière Femme".

If you are a Ferreri fan and liked "La Grande Bouffe", "The Ape Woman", "The Queen Bee" or "Tales of Ordinary Madness", you should REALLY try to see this one - I guarantee you will NEVER see anything like it!! Not for the prude, humorless, conventional or romantic.