Erotic Symphony

1980 [SPANISH]

Crime / Drama / Romance / Thriller

20
IMDb Rating 4.6/10 10 479 479

nun insane asylum period drama husband wife estrangement

Plot summary

Jess Franco film about a woman returning home from an insane asylum only to discover her husband is now living with a man. The two men eventually find a nun who's been raped and the three come up with a plot to kill the wife for her money.

Director

Jesús Franco Photo
Jesús Franco

Top cast

Aida Gouveia Photo
Aida Gouveia as Wanda
Lina Romay Photo
Lina Romay as Martine de Bressac
Mel Rodrigo Photo
Mel Rodrigo as Flor
Albino Graziani Photo
Albino Graziani as Doctor Louys
720p.BluRay 1080p.BluRay
777.68 MB
1198*720
Spanish 2.0
NR
Subtitles us   ro  
23.976 fps
1 hr 24 min
Seeds 8
1.41 GB
1796*1080
Spanish 2.0
NR
Subtitles us   ro  
23.976 fps
1 hr 24 min
Seeds 18

Movie Reviews

Reviewed by lazarillo

Truly an erotic symphony

If you're a fan of the late Spanish horror/porn director Jesus Franco, you could certainly do worse than this 1980 outing, which is--like much of the director's more interesting sex films--based on a story by the Marquis De Sade. A young noblewoman (Lina Romay) is released from an asylum and returns to her isolated castle where she finds her sexually depraved husband has taken up with both a pretty-boy male gigolo and a libertine, runaway novice nun (Susan Hemingway). What follows is a slowly developing murder plot interrupted by no small amount of sex.I enjoy Franco most when he's indulging in polymorphous perversion like he does here--you have bondage, nunsploitation, gay sex, a "Devil's three-way" (two guys and a girl), and a couple impaled while having sex. This is truly an "erotic symphony" as Franco plays the bodies of his assorted cast like instruments (and scores the whole thing with classical music) making the actual plot more of secondary consideration.Of course, Franco can't keep his camera off the vaginas of his two actresses, but at least he doesn't try to zoom his way back into the womb like he tends to in some movies. He gets a lot of mileage out of his wife/leading lady's bounteous breasts, but he tragically neglects the beautiful post-adolescent posterior of Susan Hemingway, which COULD have finally been enjoyed without guilt here as she had reached the age of majority by this time. (Pervert that he was though, Franco would trade her for the even younger Katja Beinert in his subsequent early 80's films). The gay sex scene is not particularly graphic, but unusual for Franco. Whether you like it or not, you have to admire the sheer variety of sex on display, particularly given how complete compartmentalized and commodified sex films are TODAY. There will never be another one like Jess Franco. . .
Reviewed by parry_na 8 / 10

A genuine trip!

This is a film by Jess Franco, notorious/prolific/dangerous director who made in excess of 200 films between 1962 and 2013 (even he lost count). Being a fan of his work is an endlessly rewarding experience. Just when you think you are beginning to get a handle on his styles and proclivities, he will reset the default switch.Such is the case with 'Sinfonia Erotica'. Beginning with the music - many good things have been said about his incidental musical scores, often the finely crafted work of Daniel White, Bruno Nicolai or Franco himself. Here, Franco is credited alongside Franz Liszt, and it is fair to say this film contains a fusion of wistful electronica and Liszt's background classical sweeps. Whereas music in Franco films is often gloriously inappropriate, here, the score is simply *not quite fitting* for the scenes. This gives the action a fractured, drifting quality, an elegance complimented by Franco's idiosyncratic directorial flourishes.Lina Romay, who I have always thought of as an excellent, enthusiastic actress, gives possibly her most persuasive performance here. As Martine de Bressac, she is a fragile, damaged figure a million miles away from her ferociously exotic turns in various other roles for her partner/director. She is billed as Candice Coster, and as is often the way, wears a variety of blond wigs pertinent to that stage name. She is abused and humiliated here by her aristocratic family, and laughed at by rescued house-guest Nun Norma, played by Susan Hemingway. There is also a flamboyant gay couple, which I mention because they and their occasional sex scenes are such a rarity for Franco - I think in his fifty years of films, this is the only male homosexual relationship I can think of.For all this, it is Franco's directorship that is the main feature here. The locations, which are stunning and propel the visuals far ahead of 'Sinfonia Erotica's' typically low budget, are featured to their fullest by the meandering cinematography, obsession with the views outside the window, drifting in and out of focus (no frantic zooms to speak of though) and sparkling use of lighting; the sound design is often given to echo effects and disorientating distortion, all of which makes this a truly (and terrifically) dreamy trip of a film.
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