Sade (2002) is essentially a costume drama presenting Marquis de Sade as a political prisoner a few years before the time period ofs Quills. At the same time, it shows the post revolution chaos and cruelty under Robespierre. Sade is confined to a former nunnery which has become a prison for former nobility. He is saved from normal prison by his girlfriend, Marianne Denicourt, who is now living with one of Robespierre's officials. He forms a friendship with the young, innocent, and beautiful Isild Le Besco, much to the chagrin of her parents.

The Sade presented here was an atheist, given to excesses of the flesh, who cared deeply about his writing, but was guilty of no atrocities, other than in fantasy. As they were all awaiting the guillotine, his philosophy of indulging the flesh appealed to Le Besco, and she eventually loses her virginity to a gardener under Sade's supervision.

Le Besco shows everything during this scene. Denicourt shows breasts briefly with her current lover. IMDB readers have this at 6.5 of 10, and it earned a whopping $99k in a very limited US run. Le Besco garnered some new artist awards and nominations, and deserved them. This watered down Marquis de Sade is too bland to make it an interesting story, and it would have been a very long 100 minutes of dialogue heave subtitles had it not been for two things. First, Le Besco is a beauty, and can act. Second, the photography was stunning. The color palette of blues and greens was so well done that I didn't even try to correct the images to more normal flesh tones. I should have hated a talky, subtitled costumer with very little action or pace, and didn't. Yet, with such a weak story, this is only a C. A beautifully photographed film with an attractive star and not much substance.

Sade (2000)

The Marquis de Sade lived during a time of catastrophic upheaval, and so was prosecuted and imprisoned at various times by people from every point on the political spectrum, and for just about every crime and pseudo-crime you can think of, from murder, to unpaid debts, to pornography, to being a noble, to being too republican, to being insufficiently republican.

Amazingly, there was one time in his life when the Marquis was in prison for having done something truly honorable. When he was freed from prison in 1789 by the revolution, the revolutionaries recognized that he had been an enemy of the regime, and that he was an intelligent and capable man, so they awarded him many important positions in the new "republican" government from 1789-1793. They didn't realize that the marquis was basically a libertarian who wanted no restrictions on his freedom at all. He was not just an enemy of one regime, but of all regimes, including the new one. Sade simply could not abide the Reign of Terror, considering it a betrayal of the principles of free thought that had spurred the revolution to begin with. Robespierre even wanted to establish a state religion, and at one point made atheism a crime! So much for the Age of Reason. When Citizen Sade sat in judgment of many ex-nobles as their Grand Juror, he almost invariably found everyone innocent of all charges against them, including even his despised in-laws, who had imprisoned him for decades. As a result of his leniency, he was soon arrested himself and imprisoned for his lack of dedication to proper "Republican" principles.

That is where the film begins.

This movie focuses on one very narrow stretch of Sade's life, from December 1793 until July 1794, when he was incarcerated with an assortment of ex-nobles at an exclusive sort of spa/prison. The quarters were comfortable enough, but this was during the height of Robespierre's Reign of Terror, so the nobles were awaiting their turns at the guillotine. In the movie version of the story, Sade managed to escape the scaffold because his lover agreed to become the mistress of one of Robespierre's deputies in return for that deputy's protection of de Sade.

While de Sade was incarcerated, he kept himself busy doing what he did best: corrupting the innocent. A brilliant young girl in the next room became his constant companion, and he eventually used the imminence of death to convince her to live live to the fullest. I think you can imagine the activities involved in that.

The last twenty minutes of this film are lively and wicked and sexy, and the scenes capture Sade's essence so accurately that they could be passages in the marquis's own books. Before that, the film's treatment of de Sade is so reverent and pious that if the real de Sade had read the script, he might have pissed on it for portraying him as a serious philosopher, and a complete bore, and not as the dedicated libertine and all-around hedonistic scoundrel that he tried so hard to be.

• Marianne Denicourt (1, 2)

• Isild Le Besco (1, 2, 3)

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Other crap archives. May also include newer material than the ones above, since it's sorta in real time.

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MOVIE REVIEWS:

Here are the latest movie reviews available at scoopy.com.

• The yellow asterisks indicate that I wrote the review, and am deluded into thinking it includes humor.
• If there is a white asterisk, it means that there isn't any significant humor, but I inexplicably determined there might be something else of interest.
• A blue asterisk indicates the review is written by Tuna (or Junior or Brainscan, or somebody else besides me)
• If there is no asterisk, I wrote it, but am too ashamed to admit it.

Today's little offering is a collection of nude models, most of whom have done some work in legit movies.

From Luscious Liquids, here is Elina Giani. No movies to her credits, but she has done some posing for the Hefmag's newsstand specials.

• Elina Giani (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

From Bikini Showgirls, the over-inflated Summer Leigh and the uber-cutie Erin Kay. Triple-B's everywhere you look.

• Summer Leigh (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)
• Erin Kay (1, 2, 3, 4)

And then there are the last of the caps from the Hottie of the Year DVD. Recall that I've sent in caps of Antoinette Abbott and Zdenka Podkapova. Here are six more hotties.

Roxanne Galla is on the disk, but only in the coming attractions. But she is most decidedly a hottie although she does not pretend to be an actress.

• Roxanne Galla

A second potential HOTY, who has not appeared in movies or on tv, is Chanel Stevens. Woulda gotten my vote, however.

• Chanel Stevens (1, 2, 3)

Candidates Hotties of the Year who have done movies make up the rest of the list. They are:

Katie Jordan, one of Seduction Cinema's stable of performers. Katie had as much chance of winning this award as the Tigers had of winning the AL pennant.

• Katie Jordan (1, 2)

Nikki Nova, who appears in direct-to-video things as J. Nichole Italiano Those include Hollywood Nights, Lolita 2000 and Confessions of a Lap Dancer. What would a lap dancer have to confess? That she did it for the money and didn't really give a rat's ass about anyone on whose lap she "danced"? I am shocked, shocked. But I digress. Nikki poses a lot in full gynocam format. But she does it for the money. Doesn't give a rat's ass about the photographer.... or us, for that matter.

• Nikki Nova (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)

Jesse Capelli, who as Jennifer Leone, had bit parts in Not Another Teen movie and Van Wilder. Another babe for whom the term, gynocam, was invented.

• Jesse Capelli (1, 2, 3)

Angel Veil, who calls herself Rachel Sterling when she is on television or in a movie. Angel/Rachel is now the most famous of these babes because of her role as a Juggy Dancer on the Manshow. She also won the award as the hottie of the year. Difficult to quibble with that decision.

• Angel Veil (1, 2, 3)

"Mascara"
Written and directed by Linda Kandel, this 1999 chick flick tells the story of three friends facing their 30th birthdays with their lives totally unsettled. A reasonable premise, but unfotunately, the movie never gets any legs.

Slowly paced and sometimes boring, this is best watched by people who like very low-key movies. There are some bright spots, but this whole theme has been done before, and better.

• Ione Skye, topless.
• Amanda De Cadenet, topless and rear nudity.

Here she is all grown up and looking gorgeous wearing a bikini top in production stills from the upcoming comedy "Eurotrip".

STUDENT EXPELLED FOR HAVING ADVIL
We Found The Butts, All Right - Amanda Stiles, a sophomore at Parkway High in Bossier Parish, Louisiana, was suspended from school for a year because a teacher found some Advil in her purse. Stiles had been accused of smoking, and a search turned up no cigarettes, but she did have the over-the-counter headache pills. Her mom appealed, but the school board unanimously upheld the suspension, saying the state "zero tolerance" policy on drugs forbids both prescription and non-prescription drugs.