La beauté du péché

This film was actually a pleasant surprise for me. By reading the plot, I expected a rather shallow comedy full of clichés, and instead I got a drama that made me think about its issues after it was finished. Although the plot brings a few funny situations, generally it's a sad film about a young woman who longs for freedom and tenderness that she has never experienced. Mira Furlan was more than excellent in playing this role.

The film was made in 1980s in Montenegro (then a republic within Yugoslavia) and it portrayed a huge contrast between the country's strong patriarchal tradition and new "fashion" at the time, i.e. nudism that was developing on the Adriatic coast. The important thing is that the director didn't show any obvious support toward any of the attitudes in the film, instead he left the answers to the audience. Overall, I could say that the film was ahead of its time, especially when the issue of nudity is concerned. Here, I need to stress that viewers shouldn't expect any particularly "hot" scenes, because nudity in the film is shown just the way it is - natural and imperfect, unattractive and poetical at the same time. Another reason that made me think the film was ahead of its time was the feeling that little has changed since 1980s in former Yugoslavia: traditionalists are still powerful and loud, women are still often abused and kept silent, Church is even more dominant than before, while liberal and progressive ideas still have to collide with centuries-old points of view. It seems that only fashion and technology have changed. However, this is an issue that people from ex-Yugoslavia will understand best, just like the film itself, although I can recommend it to everyone who likes eastern European films and has a basic knowledge about the Balkans.

I know the movie since I was a kid but at the time I couldn't understand it that well... now I had another watch and I pleasantly surprised.

Please note that this movie addresses a very serious issue in Balkan societies, and although has some humor in it, it has nothing to do adult/erotic content (just showing how the movie is badly represented, which I discuss later a bit)

The movie was obviously very relevant for that time, but funny enough it is still relevant for the whole Balkan. The contrast of old, that is traditional, versus new, coming from West, is something that is always an ongoing issue and challenge that is discussed constantly in Balkan societies (in particular, ex-Yu).

The message of the movie transcendent two extremes depicted here, highly conservative Montenegrins families from mountains and emancipation that comes from West in form of the nudism. It can be applied on the discussion on gay parades, capitalism vs socialism, darwin vs church, etc. So 30+ years later, the same discussions appear. To generalize a bit, it is the issue of how much Balkan societies should bent their traditions, ie offer their butts, to please the West (nowadays Brussels mostly) in order to progress (economically mostly).

The movie is hard to understand, especially for people that do not have personal experience with the same issue, so I can understand that not many people cannot relate emotionally to the message of movie (I noted that there is very little reaction about it here and elsewhere on the Web). On the other hand, if Montenegrins/Serbs or whoever, cannot even make a proper wikipedia page about it in their language, why should someone from Sweden do it in English or Swedish, as an example. Also there is no a version one can watch online (unless pirate) that talks about preserving national movie heritage.

All those comments were about the context and message of the movie. I cannot discuss the picture/music quality, since the quality of the pirate version I watched was awful :(

When a shy young married woman from a small village is "pushed" to go to work as a maid for a nudist resort, she discovers the kind of activities and freedoms she never knew existed and is eventually drawn into that world herself when she falls in love with a vibrant English couple who stays at the resort, which of course, will change her and will bring serious consequences on her former life.

Unlike what the summary sounds like, this is definitely not an x-rated adult movie or something like that... This movie is basically a story of an old-fashioned strict society clashing with the modern lifestyle of the west. What I liked most about this movie is that it's very honest, and Jaglika's innocence is indeed well played and very endearing, she makes the whole movie work. Though I'm usually not a big fan of these kinds of films, I could really relate to it and understand the motivations behind the different characters. It may not be the most fascinating foreign film out there (or even in the top 100), but it's an interesting look into a different culture (whichever one you choose to view as "different"). 7/10