The Lickerish Quartet

It's a pretty adventurous movie, poised rather uneasily between constant arty inventiveness and a distinctly stilted coating of baroque overemphasis that, of course, makes due space for the porno calculations. From the very first scene of the family watching the dirty movies, heard initially as disembodied heads in darkness, there's an obvious hankering after seriousness, and the astonishment is that this ambition never becomes utterly foolish. It's quite a provocative film, and would likely not seem so dated with warmer, more nuanced actors, a less obviously titillating style, and without the unfortunate montages of running through the fields and suchlike to the accompaniment of gooey sixties music. There's ultimately no real revelation though, despite the constant return to doubling and echoing and evocation of the odd relationship between art and life, but it gives the feeling of having been intuitively (more than intellectually) shaped and prodded into something quite coherent. The highly designed library sex scene hardly fits but is memorable in its own right.

It's hard for me to rate this movie because I have no reference to what porn or sexploitation film was like in the late 60s. This is definitely not one of those seedy production, but actually a decent dramatic movie.

I understand that the director was born in New York, but the movie has European flavor to it. The world was going through the sexual revolution, and many experimental films were created during this period. What I see in this movie is what the French used to call Nouvelle Vague (New Wave) where the reason for the story takes back seat to the unintelligible vagueness that's supposed to enhance the artistry of the production.

Nouvelle Vague didn't last too long as it didn't gather much following, but there were more than few of this type of movies made by Jean-Luc Godard and Roger Vadim. In fact, the film strongly reminds me of Roger Vadim's style of film making.

I have to give credit to the beauty of this film. The director certainly has eyes for keeping interesting and clean appearance to the picture.

How you rate the story of the movie probably differs widely depending on the audience. I kind of liked it for its modern appearance, and interesting story.

It really took me back in time to experience what it was like to live in the '60s and very early '70s. It will probably do the same to you.

'The Lickerish Quartet' is very much a product of the early 70s when the idea of mixing the art movie and soft core genres was in vogue. Radley Metzger created a fascinating albeit very pretentious pseudo-psychedelic mindbender which is quite unlike any other similar movie of this era. At times I was reminded a little of Jess Franco's 'Succubus', but 'The Lickerish Quartet' is truly a one-off. Metzger plays with time, with frequent cuts, flashbacks, flashforwards, and dream sequences, so by the end fantasy and reality are blurred, and everybody, including the audience, is no longer exactly sure what actually happened, and what didn't. Silvana Venturelli is beautiful and well cast as the mysterious "visitor", and Frank Wolff ('Cold Eyes Of Fear') stands out from the supporting cast, as the wealthy sophisticate who gets a lot more than he bargains for. This movie is a real treat for lovers of 60s and 70s "head" movies, and will appeal to fans of Jodorowsky and Bunuel as much as Franco or Jean Rollin. Highly recommended.

Metzger's porno-existentialist film (or something like that)deals with a family of three, living in a spacious castle, whose comfortable lifestyle is upset by the arrival of a mysterious woman who may or may not be an actress in one of the stag films the husband likes to watch. A woman who may or may not even be real.... But what IS real, anyway...?

Sounds fun, right? Not really. I had the opportunity to see this in a theatre last year (1998). There was nothing but dead silence from the audience all the way through.

Yes, the film is interesting, as all really weird flicks tend to be, but it's also almost unbearably irritating. The acting is clumsy, and the director's painfully obvious desire to make Art (instead of just plain "art") weighs down the whole production. And, good golly, that dialogue: "Your virility is just as illusory as her virginity!"

There's some cool visuals, though. Especially the weird scene in the library wherein the male and female leads make out on the floor, which for some reason is covered with dictionary entries of sexual terms set in large bold type.

Don't you miss the '70s?

I didn't enjoy this quite as much as I did a few years back and this may be because I found the pacing a little difficult this time. Nevertheless it is still a fabulous looking, brave, intriguing and beguiling movie. I don't know where the title comes from and I don't know why the daredevil motorcycle sequence, early on, was so long but the central idea with the supposed projection of an old stag movie that is not all it seems is a great notion. The castle setting (Balsorano, Italy) is amazing and the Stelvio Cipriani score one of his very best, so lush and stirring, particularly effective in the 'very sixties' running jumping and having sex outdoors sequence and the superb pop art library sex sequence. I must mention the solid Frank Wolff, who would drown himself in a Hilton bath tub shortly after this film and the amazing, Silvana Venturelli, who would do little else after this than some playboy layouts. Not for everyone but if the names Vadim, Robbe- Grillet and Warhol don't scare you off, you'll probably get something out of this unique film.