Goto, l’île d’amour (1968) - film review

Goto is an island which, through a series of natural disasters, was cut off from the rest of the world in the late 1800s.  Its inhabitants toil in stone quarries and relax in the state-run brothels.  There in no art, no science, no prosperity, but everyone is happy to swear allegiance to their sadistic ruler, Goto III.  At a public execution, Goto’s wife, Glossia saves the life of a condemned man, Grozo, whom Goto pardons and adopts as his personal fly killer.  From the day that Grozo takes up his new office, the island of Goto will never be the same again…

This is an early work from the controversial Polish filmmaker Walerian Borowczyk, a surreal fantasy which coldly satirises the state-controlling regimes of Eastern Europe.  As in many of Borowczyk’s other films, the film has very strong erotic and sensual undertones, although there is surprisingly no explicit eroticism in the film itself.

Watching the film affords a bizarre and unsettling experience, because it is quite unlike any other French-made film of its era.  With its gainy black and white photography and threadbare sets, it resembles a film from the early years of the silent movie, something which the larger than life, slightly over-the-top, performances and the use of Handel’s chamber music, constantly reinforces.

As a result, the film has an unsettling timeless quality which makes it both compelling yet profoundly disturbing.  Although the images appear bizarrely innocuous, Borowczyk manages to chill his audience in subtle and unexpected ways.

© James Travers 2001

Write a review for this film...

What do you think of this film?