I'm totally sorry for the 2 hours, I lost watching this movie. If I would have watched a porno, I surely wouldn't regret so much. The movie begins with two lovers sitting on the back sit of a car. After a few minutes, the guy let his lover to be raped and f.... by every other guy in the film. He only kisses her on cheek and introduces her to the next guy. He doesn't even touch her fiancée. In which world do these aliens live? You couldn't even find any ugly old bitch to be behaved like the hot actress in this film. Lots of people raped her, tortured her, whipped her and she only obeyed!! That was nonsense. They are like robots. It is not even arousing. Listen to me, watch a porno instead!

I'm not kidding, whenever there's two people on-screen in this, there's a pretty solid chance they'll strip and/or do it. Oh, I'm not really complaining, albeit it does get to be excessive. This and its 1984 sequel were on sale in a box-set(which, for some reason, promised me that it would contain "the full television series", yes, in those words), and this appears to be something of a cult-favorite. The DVD came with the French Uncut(and that is the language most commonly spoken in this, the other two dip in and out occasionally) and the English version. This is a review of the first-mentioned; I can't comment on what is censored in the other one. The running time, sans the short ending credits, is 100 minutes. This is about S&M, and thus about power struggles and love. The exploration of those isn't half bad, and this isn't as pretentious as one might fear. A woman identified only by the initial O is taken to a castle by her boyfriend for her "training". Yes, this can be misogynistic; maybe the bondage and whippings were the full extent of crossing of boundaries that they were willing to go. Perhaps it was a choice. I don't know. The production values are average, and this is largely kitsch. With that said, it holds several cool images, and there is good erotica to be found in the pile. The acting is reasonable; Udo Kier is enjoyable to watch as always, I think this is the first time I heard him speak a foreign tongue. As far as the plot goes, this is fine, and certainly has both beginning and conclusion. The pace is awkward at times, and it can certainly drag at points. There is just about constant female nudity, including full frontal, and a ton of sexual content in this. I recommend this to anyone interested, be it for the allure or curiosity about the controversy this caused. 6/10

Adapted from a famous erotic novel – with Sadean overtones – by Dominique Aury (writing as Pauline Reage), this came hot on the heels of director Jaeckin’s box-office smash EMMANUELLE (1974), and was itself followed by Shuji Terayama’s FRUITS OF PASSION (1981). I would also like to watch Jess Franco’s reworking of the same source material, THE SEXUAL STORY OF O (1981) – recently released on DVD through Severin.Anyway, easily the best things about the film are the pleasing soft-focus photography and Pierre Bachelet’s haunting score. The stunning-looking Corinne Clery is ideally cast in the enigmatic title role – not so her male co-stars, stolid Udo Kier and a rather bemused Anthony Steel (Jaeckin originally wanted Christopher Lee who had actually played a similar role, briefly but effectively, in Franco’s superior EUGENIE...THE STORY OF HER JOURNEY INTO PERVERSION [1969]).With too many characters involved but not enough explanation as to their particular motives, the film winds up being mostly uninvolving as a result: the female ‘victims’ are too easily willed into participating into the clandestine and degrading goings-on, as if they – and the viewing audience with them – are supposed to take all of this twaddle for granted (not to say seriously)! However, the finale – in which Clery is seen to have mastered her skills in playing the game and now matches her ‘superiors’ in every way – is a nice touch.The Arrow R2 DVD I watched presents the film in an English-dubbed re-edited version prepared by Jaeckin himself (though the erotic content is said to be intact). Incidentally, I followed this with Radley Metzger’s similar but even more disturbing and explicit THE IMAGE (1976).

I have read the book quite few times and I decided to see the movie even though I knew it was not going to be anything even near to the book's incredibly erotic atmosphere. I have been disappointed before with movie adaptations of books but this one is by far the worst ever. The acting is bad, the settings are cheap and the sex scenes are awfully boring. They concentrate endless minutes on tits and nsist on some sort of bad taste loud background music. Totally bad. Not even the taxi scene can be saved. Those mini kisses they give each other are just so out of purpose. The ending also goes against the idea of the book, makes the whole thing become meaninsgless, to begin with her name "O". Use the rental money to buy the book instead.