Les lèvres rouges (1971)

User Rating:

6.7/10   

Director:

Harry Kümel

Writers:

Pierre Drouot (writer)
Jean Ferry (writer)

Release Date:

3 December 1971 (West Germany)

Genre:

Horror

Tagline:

An erotic nightmare of vampire lust [DVD]

Plot:

A newlywed couple are passing through a vacation resort. Their paths cross with a mysterious, strikingly beautiful countess and her aide.

Plot Keywords:

Newlywed | Sexual Violence | Male Frontal Nudity | Seduction | Zither

Cast

John Karlen	...	Stefan
Delphine Seyrig	...	Countess Bathory
Danielle Ouimet	...	Valerie
Andrea Rau	...	Ilona Harczy
Paul Esser	...	Hotel clerk
Georges Jamin	...	The Man
Joris Collet	...	Butler
Fons Rademakers	...	Mother

Also Known As:

Blood on the Lips
Blut an den Lippen
Children of the Night (video title)
Daughters of Darkness (USA)
Erzebeth
Le rouge aux Lèvres (Belgium: French title)
The Promise of Red Lips
The Red Lips
The Redness of the Lips

Runtime:

USA:100 min (uncut version) | USA:87 min

Country:

Belgium | France | West Germany

Language:

Dutch | English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.66 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Canada:13+ (Quebec) (re-rating) (2005) | Canada:18 (Nova Scotia) (2003) | Canada:18+ (Quebec) (original rating) | Iceland:16 | Australia:MA | West Germany:18 | UK:18 | USA:R

Filming Locations:

Brugge, West-Vlaanderen, Belgium

Company:

Showking Films

Trivia:

In 2007, Harry Kümel revealed in an Interview that initially, Delphine Seyrig, already being a well-renowned icon of sophisticated European cinema, wasn't too eager to take the part of the Countess Bathory when he sent her the script. Seyrig's Boyfriend, famous French Director Alain Resnais, was a big fan of graphic novels and when he imagined Kümel's material and idea of the film to be something of a graphic novel, he enthusiastically convinced Seyrig to take the offer. Kümel also said that, at that time, he and his co-writers thought Seyrig's consent was "too good to be true".

Quotes:

Countess Bathory: I feel it in my bones, the night is dying...

Movie Connections:

Featured in Shiver & Shudder Show (2002) (V)

Soundtrack:

Daughters of Darkness

psychosexual fever dream

I was fortunate enough to unwind last night with Harry Kumel's erotic and Stygian "Daughters of Darkness" (Les Lèvres Rouges). It is a tasteful vampire movie (an oxymoron?).

Let me start by saying that the art direction is astonishing. If ever a building was elevated to the status of a character, it would be the off-season and deserted Grand Hotel des Thermes in Ostend where the majority of the film is set. Its de Chirco-esqe arcades and columns shot in their full crepuscular splendour separate the action from the real world, enveloping the players in a metaphysical demi-monde. One senses from the beginning the film's perversity, everything is set in Melvillean twilights and dusks, somewhere ephemeral, between or beyond good and evil. The travelling couple of the vampire movie, the man generally virtuous and upstanding, the woman meek and ingenue, in this case are replaced by a fractured and sensual pair. He announces on the night-train to Ostend, "I don't love you", which she parrots back, and they decide that this means that they are perfectly matched.

The soundtrack is perfectly atmospheric sub-Nyman, and the sense of colour is almost unmatched in film history. Twilight exterior shots, in the mode of Whistler are interposed with glowing yellow interiors. The exquisite monochrome costumes perfectly match the psychosexual themes. Particularly memorable is Delphine Seyrig in a flowing scarlet dress sipping a turquoise cocktail from a martini glass.

Whilst this is a perfectly cast movie, one would have to say that Delphine Seyrig as the countess Elizabeth Bathory runs away with the show in a screen-stealing performance. The sensuality of her voice is reminiscent of fever dreams, and the subtlety of her expression turns what could have been, in the wrong hands, a porno flick, into a Schnitzlerian psychosexual drama par excellence.

There were a few false notes, some ludicrous Hammer-inspired shots towards the end plus a less than satisfying codicil whose raison d'etre seems to be a false belief in the relevance of the plot. But all of this can be sorted with judicious editing and doesn't really detract from the general tone of the movie. Watch this, but beware it is a truly adult fairytale and an explicit exploration of sadomasochism.