Coming after several commercial sex comedies and the scandalous anti-Vietnam War piece "O.K.," but well before his widely exported critical successes "The White Rose" and "The Nasty Girl," this was director Verhoeven's first film featuring his wife, the international star Senta Berger. But she doesn't appear for a while, as the first twenty minutes or so are taken up by a couple lolling about a high-ceiling'd "glass house" during a heatwave, with fewer and fewer clothes on. The doorbell rings just as they're getting around to making love-it's Igor's (Hartmut Becker) wife Hanna (Senta Berger), who's returned unexpectedly from a trip to confirm that her husband and Christine (Marianne Blumquist) are sleeping, perhaps even living together. She confronts them, with a gun even-but is she seriously angry, or is this just a game they're all playing? In fact, are all of them willing to go on as a permanent domestic menage a trois?
"Glass House" lands vaguely in the realm of certain among the era's "daring" psychological thrillers (Negatives, Games, Secret Ceremony, The Penthouse, Stop, etc.), which flirted with three-ways and other sexual transgressions but all quickly lost their shock value as censorship boundaries fell. Here, there's a fair amount of nudity, but predictably little (until near the end) from the "name" actor, Berger. This being German cinema, the sexuality feels kind of clinically observed rather than erotic, while there's no attempt at all to get any kind of suspense or intrigue going. Every once in a while the "action" (such as it is) is interrupted by still photographs of the actors' faces, while we hear their commentary on the characters' feelings and how they relate from their own experiences.
The film immediately feels like a somewhat boring, talky, non-commercial experiment, interesting as a reflection of the cinematic and cultural moment, but really like an uninteresting, semi-improvised stage play unnecessarily filmed. It's neither any fun or very meaningful, with little engagement possible with these rather jaded, petulant characters, whose arguments are alternately personal and didactic. The ending, at least, is sort of impressive: One actor (no, not Berger) walking a crowded urban street, ranting amidst real-life gawkers, stark naked, until finally dragged off by police.
Movies like this are always interesting in the abstract, because the period was so full of very personal efforts that amplified the artistic, political and social issues of a period in which society seemed to be changing so rapidly and profoundly. But many of these movies are also tedious as art (let alone as entertainment), and despite its curiosity value as a rarely-seen obscurity, "Glass House" is indeed a bit of a bore. It's hard to imagine it really had any life at the time beyond playing festivals. I doubt anyone went beyond Berger fans hoping she'd made a "nudie." They must have been sorely disappointed to discover they'd walked into one more arty exercise in which bourgeoise artistes toying with bohemian trends discuss "revolution" and so forth. Like the wordless folk-rock theme that keeps weaving in and out, the movie is earnest but kinda shapeless.
