(1974; French) The journey of newly wed Emmanuelle (Sylvia Kristel) begins on a flight from Paris to Bangkok, to join her husband, Jean (Daniel Sarky), a wealthy diplomat in the French embassy, but eventually it takes her far beyond the boundaries of her marriage. Director Just Jaeckin's implausible, erotically charged, softcore film of fantasy females (who rarely wear their underwear and reach orgasm soon after penetration, though most of the time they're masturbating or turning each other on) is an adaptation of Emmanuelle Argan's novel of a naïve woman's reaching into the sensual unknown, where "couples are outlawed and a third person is introduced by force," upsetting all her preconceptions.

"Jealousy is outdated," says Jean, older by at least a dozen years, who has shared her nude photos with his friends before her arrival. Conditions among the impoverished Thais shock Emmanuelle, but soon she's lounging in luxury among other privileged women poolside, listening to how their boredom excites them with randiness. "Doing nothing," Bee (Marika Green), an archaeologist and outsider, will explain, "becomes an art."

Pure and innocent Marie-Ange (Christine Boisson), sucking on a lollipop, with an air of naturalness as she rubs herself into climax, disturbs and inspires Emmanuelle. Asked if she has ever been unfaithful to Jean, who has told her she is free ("You are not my object or my beauty") to do whatever she feels like doing, Emmanuelle, who says Jean deflowered her the day after they met in Fontainebleau, denies ever cheated on him in Paris. Yet she reminisces (or imagines?) how on the flight she allowed two strangers to copulate with her.

On the squash court Arianne Jeanne Colletin), attractive but more mature, suggests they play another more intimate game together. Unsatisfied with herself as a woman, Emmanuelle, envying Bee's having her own career, accompanies the archaeologist for several days without informing Jean of her absence: "I'm free. I can do whatever I want." Love is a search for pleasure, says Emmanuelle, repeating what Jean has taught her, but with Bee she feels something more, only to be denied reciprocity.

After going to a brothel, where he watches a sex show (including an act with a naked Thai inhaling and exhaling a cigarette from her nether lips), Jean pays a visit to Arianne, complaining that Emmanuelle has gone too far, before forcing himself upon her. Upon Emmanuelle's return, Arianne (openly describing Jean's having all but raped her) recommends Mario's "erotic science" as a method to forget about Bee.

Looking to her like an aged Don Juan, Emmanuelle reluctantly agrees, having Jean's blessing as well, to an evening with Mario (Alain Cluny). His future law, he instructs her, would be for love to be made without fear or restraint, breaking barriers so that virginity is not a virtue. "Fear creates a false morality" with its taboos and lies, he says, but don't give yourself entirely to one person.

Throughout the evening and into the night Mario guides her into a forbidden land of eroticism (the breaking away from everyday life), destroying her values - "Real love is always against nature" - by allowing her to be raped in an opium den and given as the prize of a violent Thai-boxing match.

When she asks him, "What part of me do you want?" he answers: "Death is the only way out." Preceding an enigmatic ending, Emmanuelle declares: "I'm a woman now."

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Copyright © 2008 Patrick Ivers. All rights reserved.
Reproduced with the permission of the copyright holder.

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