Les week-ends maléfiques du Comte Zaroff

If you are a fan of the story "The Most Dangerous Game", you might not care for this ridiculous, sexed-up, Euro-idiot version of it, but if like me you just can't resist a movie where the protagonist at one point says to a potential female victim, "Shall we have some champagne, or shall I pour it over your naked body and drink it off you as if you were crystal?", this might just appeal to you. The character in this movie is a decadent nobleman who spends his weekends hunting an unusual kind of animal--not the most dangerous game perhaps, but the most sexy and naked female game he can find. Obviously, this movie is pretty politically incorrect. In its defense though, it's also pretty damn ridiculous, which renders it considerably less offensive than the OTHER decadent-nobleman-hunting-naked-women/"Most Dangerous Game" rip-off I've seen, "Beyond Erotica" (a better made, but definitely more offensive film).

The protagonist is played by Michael Lemoine, one of those strange European film Svengali who despite a lack of good looks or talent managed to seduce a number of incredibly beautiful actresses both on-screen and off. He was married to Janine Reynaud at one point, for instance (and reputedly pimped her out to wealthy producers to finance the movies the two of them made with Jess Franco). Lemoine's leading lady/champagne glass in this movie is Joelle Coeur, a brunette French beauty who kind of resembled the British Koo Stark or the German Olivia Pascal, and had the same kind of regrettably short career.

Obviously, this is not a great movie, or even close to to the best adaptation of this classic story, but it was obviously never meant to be either. It does succeed in being what it is-- a big fat slice of cheesiest kind of Eurotica.

Directed and also starred by Michel Lemoine, this movie is not The Most Dangerous Game. The plot is still the same : an insane man enjoy the sadistic pleasure of hunting human beings. But in this one, there is a lot of bad acting by the ensemble cast, silly dialogues, not very comprehensible situations,lots of nudity and enjoyable murders. And this movie get a prize at the Fantasy Film Festival of Stiges in Spain in 1977. If you get the "chance" to see it, I don't want to recommended to anybody but still an experience to watch naked girls touching herself and dancing for absolutely no reason through the whole film.

This is barely worth it's given rating but despite the slow pace, the nonsense story, the pretentiousness and the dialogue I liked it. I guess the well shot nudity helped but also the slightly odd angle (to call it surreal would be far too flattering) and surprising jolts of violence amid the sleepiness. The way the Count turns upon his first victim is a real shock and the couple trying out the historic torture instrument certainly get a surprise, as do we. Hard to recommend though because it is hardly quality stuff and certainly does not live up to Mr Lemoine's claims for the film. But then if you are not expecting too much and know something of the genre you could do worse. It's certainly as good as many of the below par and over rated Jess Franco movies.

Wow - this is one of those early 1970's European sleazy sex flicks warped in a "horror" film - there IS plenty of gore and also lots of nudity but the true joy of this dubbed version we saw was the unbelievably unintentionally hysterical dialogue. After the "Count" has run over one of his chippies with his car "Rebecca, you are broken. My poor little rag doll." Man oh man. The lead actor also "wrote and directed" and you can tell he really thought he could fool people that this was "Euro Cinema Art For Adults" but it mainly looks like an excuse for him to have nude scenes with various busty French chicks and oh yes, there;s this silly mundane plot to move along - actually at the end when there's supposed to be this "shocking: moment" - it is so lame, a high school play could put together a better skeleton - anyway, this film is good for a laugh with friends if you like to watch the European sleaze horror genre but a lot of it is awful and of course, sexist - hello - it's France in 1974 - what are you expecting - Julia???

Michel Lemoine's 1974 offering, "Seven Women for Satan," is easily one of the weirdest movies that I have ever rented; right up there with Jess Franco's "Venus In Furs" and Jaromil Jires' "Valerie and Her Week of Wonders." In the Lemoine film, the writer/director himself plays Count Boris Zaroff, son of the original manhunting count from the Richard Connell short story "The Most Dangerous Game" (1924), famously filmed in 1932 (never mind that Zaroff was a Russian and his son in this film is as Gallic as can be). When we first meet him, Zaroff, Jr. has just purchased an enormous château, in which his butler, Karl (played by cult Eurostar Howard Vernon), in fulfillment of a promise he made to Karl, Sr., the original count's butler, is training Boris in the ways of sadism and torture. To complicate matters, Boris seems to be haunted by the spirit of a beautiful woman who died in the year 1912. I say "seems" only because the dividing line between fantasy and reality here is a thin one at best. To add to the disorientation, Lemoine utilizes odd camera angles, fish-eye lenses, dreamy soft-focus photography and some truly bizarre discourse between the film's principals. The picture treats us to a fun torture chamber sequence and features the phoniest-looking dog attack scene ever (especially when compared to the 1932 film) and an excellent score by Guy Bonnet. It is only 84 minutes long, yet still feels padded with nudie-girl segments and assorted topless dancing and writhing (nice padding, granted!). Banned in its native France and yet the Silver Medal winner at the Sitges (near Barcelona) Film Festival, the picture, surreal and trippy as it is, should have been a midnight movie staple back when, as was "El Topo." Like the Jodorowsky film, it is a real stoner treat, and a must for the lysergically enhanced mind. A true rarity, but certainly not for all tastes....