Film Review
If Mauritz Stiller is remembered today it is most probably for his 1924
epic period melodrama
The Saga of Gosta Berling, the
film that earned Greta Garbo her ticket to Hollywood and set her on the
road to stardom. This film was towards the end of Stiller's
career; previously he had carved out a reputation for himself as one of
Sweden's most accomplished filmmakers, something to which his
hauntingly lyrical masterpiece
Sir Arne's Treasure (1919)
testifies. We shall never know the full extent of Stiller's
genius, let alone his versatility as a filmmaker, as 31 of the 45
films he directed have been lost forever. If
Erotikon, one of the director's
rare excursions into comedy, appears distinctly un-Stiller-esque to us,
it is because we have so little to compare it with.
Adapted from a play entitled
A
kék róka by the Hungarian playwright Ferenc
Herczeg,
Erotikon is a
satisfying modern blend of social satire and romantic comedy. It
was among Stiller's most expensive films to make, coming at a time when
his employers at Svensk Filmindustri had opted to scale back their
output and make fewer, more opulent films aimed at both the domestic
and international markets. Most of the budget appears to have
been swallowed up by a lavish set-piece consisting of a
1001 Nights-style ballet, with
scores of attractive females barely draped in the skimpiest of outfits
(the film certainly lives up to its title). This
play-within-a-play of course humorously mirrors the film's main
intrigue, a love quadrangle involving an entomology professor, his
wife, a sculptor and an aviator, who, viewed objectively like insects
under a microscope, come to resemble subjects in a weird kind of nature
study. When the professor, instructing his class on the mating
habits of beetles, remarks that "two females will suffice, but one is
never enough", he might as well be referring to both sexes of his own
species. As it turns out, whilst his wife is carrying on an
affair with two men behind his back, this learned academic is happily
flirting with his own niece, his excuse being that his wife doesn't
give him enough 'mutton casserole'.
Erotikon was among Stiller's
most commercially successful films and was widely distributed abroad,
so its influence on other filmmakers of the period (from Lubitsch to
Chaplin) cannot be understated. For a time when most comedies
involved boisterous slapstick, the film is remarkably sophisticated and
no doubt influenced the 'new wave' of silent comedies that came in the
1920s, spearheaded by those of the great Ernst Lubitsch. With its
subtle innuendo, well-observed social critique and occasional dalliance
with full-on eroticism,
Erotikon
could almost be mistaken for a Lubitsch comedy and most probably had a
great impact on the German filmmaker when he saw it. A forerunner
of the smart American romantic comedy, it is the kind of film in which
Stiller would have excelled in Hollywood, had he been given the chance
instead of being unceremoniously dumped by his bosses at the first
opportunity. Even though the film has little of the overwhelming
visual poetry of Stiller's period masterpieces, it nonetheless
possesses a quality of greatness, and it functions equally well as a
pointedly observant study in human frailty and as a cheekily acerbic
commentary on middle class manners circa 1920. As erotic Swedish comedies go,
this one is in a class of its own.
© James Travers 2014
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Film Synopsis
Professor Leo Charpentier is an eminent entomologist who is far more interested
in the mating habits of insects that in his wife's conjugal
needs. So, naturally, his wife Irene looks elsewhere to resolve
her romantic deficit. Not content with making her husband's
sculptor friend, Preben Wells, her lover, she begins having an affair
with a third man, the dashing aviator Baron Felix. Preben is the
first one to realise that Irene is cheating on him; when Leo is not
absorbed in his study of beetles he is happy being distracted by his
young niece. So angry is he with Irene's betrayal that Preben
informs Leo of his wife's latest amorous adventure. The only
honourable thing is for Leo and the Baron to settle their differences
in a duel...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.