The Voyeur – L’uomo che guarda (1994)

Directed by: Tinto Brass | 97 minutes | drama | Actors: Katarina Vasilissa, Francesco Casale, Cristina Garavaglia, Raffaella Offidani, Antonio Salines, Eleonora De Grassi, Gabri Crea, Martine Brochard, Franco Branciaroli, Erika Savastani, Paolo Murano, Ted Rusoff, Maria La Rosa, Lulu, Matteo, Tinto Brass

Tinto Brass is a well-known name in the land of erotic films. For example, he is the director of the infamous ero-cult film ‘Caligula’ from 1979. A portrait of the rise and fall of the Roman emperor Gaius Germanicus Caligula with Malcolm McDowell and Peter OToole. A film of which there is a soft version and a long, hard-core version that also shows all the sex and violence under the reign of the emperor. Brass, however, had distanced himself from the film after he got into an argument with producer Guccione during the editing. ‘The Voyeur’ also falls within this genre of Brass explicit films.

The film opens with beautiful shots of the main character Dodò (Francesco Casale) in his apartment. Brass is especially expert in shooting beautiful symmetrical pictures, for example in the hallways of the main character’s apartment. He also uses style elements from earlier black-and-white films in a fun way. Like during a scene in a movie theater. Silvia (Katarina Vasilissa) and Dodò are filmed with lighting that mainly highlights the eyes and face, while the rest around it is dark. Silvia’s eyes sparkle like Vivien Leigh’s close-ups in ‘Gone with the wind’ (1939). A sparse moment in which the actors show that there is still such a thing as acting. Francesco Casale tries his best, but to no avail.

The film completely fails in these good cinematographic intentions. There is little or no compelling story. No tension building and no interesting dialogues. The film is so crammed with sex and sexual references that it seems vulgar. For example, Dodò’s father’s nurse walks around topless and parading her ass around all the time. Dialogues and scenes are almost exclusively about sex and all in a very explicit way. Viewers of erotic television programs do not get to see nearly as many explicit scenes as in this film. It’s not exactly porn, but it comes close. The whole is only packaged in a wafer-thin artistic jacket. And that’s the only thing the film deserves any credit for.