Synopsis
There comes a time in every girl's life...
A sexy widow discovers her late husband had a secret apartment where he cheated on her. Now she decides to use the same apartment to explore her own sexuality.
The Libertine
1968 ‘La matriarca’ Directed by Pasquale Festa Campanile
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Alternative Titles
The Matriarch, L'amour à cheval, Una viuda desenfrenada, 女性上位时代, A Matriarca, Laisvamanė, L'Amour à cheval, O Mando é das Mulheres, 더 리버틴, Распутница, Huckepack
Releases by Date
Theatrical
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Italy
15 May 1969
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USAR
21 Jan 1970
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France16
Releases by Country
France
21 Jan 1970
- Theatrical16
Italy
23 Dec 1968
- Theatrical
USA
15 May 1969
- TheatricalR
Popular reviews
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Watched with Enrico, my ever-thoughtful Italian movie pal. Their review is here!
Spoilers ahead.
The summary of The Libertine, that a young widow discovers her husband had a fuck pad in which he indulged his interest in vaguely transgressive sexual practices (mostly, he seems to have into mild bdsm) and decides to use it to do her own exploring, sounds like a recipe for simple exploitation. And yes, boobs are on frequent display (whether or not they belong to star Catherine Spaak is anyone's guess — often, the editing suggests they belong to a double), particularly in the film's second half, but there is really just a single sex scene in the entire movie and, even in the American release,…
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Amusing, kinky and stylish little Italian sex comedy. Nothing to daring or special but a fun watch for fans of the genre or people like me who are not too familiar with it and want to get a taste of what they are like. I’m not immensely intrigued after this one but I would watch a few more if they got good Blu-ray releases.
It’s interesting that Italian Sex Comedies were immensely popular at the time (and pretty much every notable Italian Genre director from that era made some) but have largely been ignored by Indie-labels when it comes to restorations and home video releases. I could get excited by a Sergio Martino/Edwige Fenech Sex Comedy Box-Set. Vinegar Syndrome, Severin, Arrow, anyone…?
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“Are you tired?”
“No, no. I can keep it up another five minutes.”
“Keep it up as long as you can.”Mimi’s not so dear hubby dies and she
soon learns of his elaborate stabbin’ cabin. She purchases a book on the psychology of sex and proceeds to go to work on a parade of Italian genre actors, luring them to the sex lair for her own sexual education. Catherine Spaak is breezy, delightful fun and I thought her audible, inner thoughts might get annoying but got funnier and more interesting as the film progressed.
It’s not nearly as sexy or naked as I was anticipating but rather better written and almost sweet with a few laugh out loud moments. … -
Innocent at first sight. Raunchy when taking a closer look. Obviously it's a product of its time, and that also means a varying range of dated perceptions on the men-women ratio, but if you are able (and I most certainly am) to get past that, what remains is a very cute and free-spirited movie that is both naughty and fun, with a very lighthearted touch to the at its core very melancholic central premise. It's a sparkling experience that's very much about bringing a mood. Which, plus the captivating and adorable presence of the sexy Catherine Spaak, is exactly what makes it all so amusing. Less so it's about plot, which is, after all, very simple and put into the…
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This film is fashion, modernism, fetish, sexual awakening, knowledge, and beauty. I really like the exterior and interior architecture of the buildings in this film, I really like Mimi's beauty along with all her dresses and hairdos, I really like this film involving the theory of fetishes, human nature, and sadomasochism specifically and scientifically through leading theories from the experts. This film is so wild but elegant.
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Sweet dreams are made of déambuler à dada sur le dos de Jean-Louis Trintignant dans une jungle de mobilier italien dispendieux, who am I to disagree?
Update du cri de détresse / avis de recherche de mon billet précédent : éternelle reconnaissance à la bonne âme qui a sauvé la mienne en m’envoyant une copie NM du 45 tours de Se Te Ne Vai de Marisa Galvan ✨
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I've long had a soft spot for this fun, oddly progressive little erotic comedy that makes for a fine showcase for Catherine Spaak playing off a wild gallery of familiar Euro '60s cinema faces like Jean-Louis Trintignant, Luigi Pistilli, Frank Wolff (as a randy dentist), and a very game Philippe Leroy who gets in some crazy whip action. Armando Trovajoli's marvelous lounge-friendly score is the icing on this beautiful cake, which won't be for all tastes but makes for a fun revisit every now and then as a kind of gentler, kinder cousin to the ultimate swinging Italian kinkfest, The Frightened Woman. mondo-digital.com/libertine.html
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Pasquale Festa Campanile's "The Libertine" is sometimes charming and sometimes dull observation of a woman taking control of her life by exploring romance and sex after the death of her husband. Essentially revealing the fantasies and desires, from the tame to the untamed, of people in her life, the protagonist experiences a second coming-of-age in this mostly watchable but rarely impactful lighthearted drama.
Catherine Spaak cuts a likable lead as the widow who learns more about life after her husband passes on than she did when he was alive. The narrative is no more than a series of episodes built around the amorous eccentricities of the people in her life, but they amount to nothing of real interest or purpose;…
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mini-collab with the wise Sakana! read her review!
Somewhere in the last third of this film, I realised with some surprise that I had become disconnected from it, after having enjoyed much of it up until that point. Why? Here are some possibilities:
(1) Mimi’s pursuit of sexual emancipation (and a kink she can call her own) seemed like an almost entirely intellectual exercise, with not much to indicate that Mimi gets any actual enjoyment from the acts she performs as part of this pursuit. Except for the very last scene (which I loved), Spaak (and her dubber, Maria Pia Di Meo—there’s so much voiceover in this film it feels weird not to mention the woman who actually speaks all…
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L’histoire de Margherita, jeune veuve qui cherche son kink et le trouve à califourchon sur Jean-Louis Trintignant (ce n’est pas un gros spoiler).
- L’air déterminé et le détachement de Catherine Spaak, qui est toujours au moins dix-huit pas en avance sur ses partenaires masculins (qui baille presque en attendant qu’ils se réveillent).
- L’air irascible de Trintignant.
- Le col en renard rose (et le reste de la garde-robe de Spaak).
- Les décors qui me donnent envie d’aller magasiner en Italie en 1968 en portant un costume ajusté.
- Le triomphe.Carlo : Would you mind telling me what you’re doing?
Margherita : I want to make a scandal. I want you to find out what kind of woman I am. -
"Listen, you must..."
"Ma'am? I've finished. Is there anything else?"
"Who are you? What are you doing there?"
"Nothing, I fixed the pipe. Shouldn't I have?"
"What a nerve! Go away! Go away right now! Can't you see?"
"Yes, I see, I see... I'm not blind."
"Oh, Mom, I don't get it. If we were supposed to wear clothes we wouldn't have been born naked."A young woman's husband dies and she finds out that he had a secret apartment where he cheated on her and engaged in various "kinks" that she was unaware that he had. This would obviously cause some contemplation about oneself and how one fit into his life: his desires, his needs, his wants. Mimi, though,…