The Seven Minutes

After scoring a hit at Fox with "Beyond the Valley of the Dolls," Russ Meyer plays it straight with a courtroom drama? Well, sort of...

Irving Wallace's novel is a terrific, suspenseful read and Meyer does a good job bringing the story to the screen, completely replacing the "surprise" ending of the novel with one of his own. As you can probably imagine, Meyer can't really play anything straight, so this film is full of Meyer's bright colors and eye-popping, um, camera work. The man is a brilliant cinematographer, and this film looks just as good as any of his others that I've seen. Odd camera angles, fast cuts, bad acting, Edy Williams, and gratuitous cleavage shots are all here and well worth a look.

Beware of the old television print of this film, for sale in some US video outlets. The hack job done by the censors just ruins the film. Fox has a gorgeous print of the film around, as it has been shown on the FX channel in the past, open matte (unlike BVOD, this one wasn't shot in Panavision), fully uncut and looking brand new. Write the folks at Fox and demand a proper video release!

The Seven Minutes was Russ Meyer's follow up to his big studio debut, Beyond the Valley of the Dolls. That one made a lot of money for 20th Century Fox but also caused it a fair bit of embarrassment and flack due to its salacious content and X rating. The Seven Minutes was the second film in his two picture deal and it went down a much less controversial route. It takes the form of a courtroom drama and perhaps unsurprisingly, unlike its predecessor, it bombed at the box office. But as is the way, despite the unfamiliar subject matter, it's still pretty obvious as a Meyer movie and is ultimately quite a strange film.

On the face of it, The Seven Minutes is a serious drama but Meyer seems incapable of playing it straight. His distinctive camera-work and super-fast editing are still in abundance. While he still makes space for a bevy of buxom women who appear throughout, such as Shawn 'Baby Doll' Deveraux. In truth, Meyer had no interest adapting the Irving Wallace novel that the film is based on but the studio insisted. In the end he figured the subject of freedom of speech and censorship was something he knew about from past experience and could make something interesting with it. But Fox felt battered by the publicity that they had attracted with Beyond the Valley of the Dolls and the similarly X rated Myra Breckinridge, so they made it clear that The Seven Minutes must make an R rating. Consequently, it is easily the most restrained outing he ever released.

The story boils down to a court case about a book called 'The Seven Minutes' which is considered obscene, so much so that it is accused of inspiring a vicious rape. The title refers to the average time that a woman takes to achieve orgasm. To be honest, going into this film I didn't have very high expectations. Its reputation sort of goes before it and the very idea of Meyer directing a film not based around buxom women set off alarm bells, seeing as they always seemed so integral to the success of everything else he did. As it turned out, I was very pleasantly surprised with this flick. Despite being a courtroom drama it still retains enough Meyer madness to ensure it's fascinating. In truth, his fast editing style is wholly inappropriate for such a film, the twists and turns of the plot end up coming at us so fast that it's very hard keeping up with plot developments, while the appearances of the pneumatic women that punctuate the movie are completely incongruous for a film trying to make a serious point! But ultimately, its aspects like these that makes it more interesting at the end of the day. The extreme melodramatic tendencies and bizarre tone and presentation are what mark it out. Make no mistake, it's not up there with Meyer's best movies but who in all seriousness would expect it to be? It's his least typical film though that's for sure and its one I am pleased to have finally seen. It's notable too for featuring a young Tom Selleck as well as a cameo from veteran actor John Carradine; it also features Meyer regulars Charles Napier, Stuart Lancaster and his then wife, Edy Williams.

Adaptation of Irving Wallace's book about a 30-year-old novel titled "The Seven Minutes," banned worldwide for three decades as being depraved and obscene, coming under fire once again after the son of a major political contributor in California is charged with raping a girl--under the influence of the erotic material! This coincides with the case of a bookstore manager arrested for selling a recent reprint of "The Seven Minutes", resulting in a trial that pits pornography against free speech. Director Russ Meyer's second (and final) film for 20th Century Fox is admirably serious in its attempt to show the hypocrisy of so-called purveyors of decency and political opportunists looking for a legal scapegoat, yet it is too bogged down in talk to appeal to Meyer's fan-base (despite the quick cutting which reduces most shots to a length of seven seconds or less). Yvonne De Carlo has a bravura cameo in the third act as a key witness for the defense, and there's an amusingly old-fashioned tag featuring the defense attorney and his girl making love in front of a roaring fire. But the majority of "The Seven Minutes" concerns itself with the legal protection of salacious material instead of the usual Russ Meyer presentation of salacious material, which didn't thrill audiences in 1971 and probably won't today. *1/2 from ****

I just watched this film on Bravo. While I admit to being a bit of a Russ Meyer fan in the same way many people slow down to look at train wrecks, I actually found this movie surprisingly entertaining. Russ Meyer is the master of campy dialogue, bizarre twists and nonsensical plots, and of course larger (pun intended) than life characters. This movie has them all, but at a much more subdued level than most of his other films. In many ways, this film works ... much better at least than other Russ Meyer films.

If you are looking for a quality film delving into the drama of the courtroom, forget it here. With even a modicum of legal savvy it is easy to see all the holes in the courtroom antics of both sides. The twist at the end might be typical Russ Meyer, but it was also pretty predictable. Normally, I dislike predictability in a movie, but Russ Meyer flicks are usually such mixed up, twisted messes, that seeing a plot actually come to fruition with a credible twist that fits into the rest of the story was a bit of a treat.

I echo the sentiments of other users when they say that this is not a Russ Meyer fan's movie. Unfortunately, the only people who likely will ever see this film are the serious Russ Meyer fans who want to see everything the man has made. (Said fans can look for the cameo of Russ as well, in true Hitchcockian style *smile*.) I felt this was a good film, easy to watch, fun and sexy at times, with a few valuable (yet no doubt satirical) comments about the hypocrisy of the day. Being that Russ had his own personal problems with censorship, the movie is an obvious "poke-in-the-nose" at all the holier-than-thou types out to save society while wallowing in their own debauchery.

My Rating: 7 / 10 (Unless you are looking for a Russ Meyer genre film, then only 2 / 10)

"The Seven Minutes" is a film by director/producer Russ Meyer, the same guy who brought us films like "Beyond the Valley of the Dolls" and many other boundary-stretching pictures, I really expected this movie to be much sleazier that it actually was. Sure, there is a lot of adult content by 1971's standards...much of it seemingly over-the-top. But there also is a very good story buried underneath the nudity and unusual language...one possibly worth seeing.

When the story begins, some vice cops arrest the manager of a book store for selling a book they considered obscene. However, the prosecutor and his friends don't see much reason to pursue the case. After all, times have changed and the crime is only a misdemeanor.

Unfortunately for the poor bookseller, a huge political insider's son is accused of rape...and they decide to try an interesting defense. The District Attorney agrees to blame the book for the sexual assault! While this seems insane, back in the 1970s some folks did believe obscenity could cause rapes. More unfortunate is that seemingly EVERYONE is now lock-step behind the prosecution and the defense attorney is stymied again and again because he's one man fighting a huge machine. Does he stand a chance or will the manager be a scapegoat to be tossed to the wolves, so to speak?

Underneath the Meyer excesses (there is a lot of adult material in the film for a 1971 release), the story actually is very good and has some merit. It fights for First Amenment rights and also exposes a LOT of hypocrisy...which isn't surprising since the novel it's based on was by Irving Wallace.

I think this film is well worth seeing, but remember...it's an adult film. I wouldn't show it to your mother, kids or Father O'Malley if he stops by for a visit!