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Category: Joël Séria

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Plot: forty-something and two feisty twenty-year-olds roadtrip around rural France.

The first few directorial features from Joël Séria have an autobiographical slant. His debut Don’t Deliver Us From Evil (1971) was an irreverent coming of age tale loosely based on the 1954 Parker–Hulme murder case in Christchurch, New Zealand. Séria had designed it after his own experiences and rigid Catholic upbringing in the rural environs of provincial France. Before Satánico Pandemónium (1975) and Alucarda (1977) shocked deeply devout Mexican audiences senseless Don’t Deliver Us From Evil (1971) didn’t spare church nor state and was deemed so transgressive, incendiary, and iconoclastic that it was banned domestically on grounds of blasphemy. Even many decades after its original release Don’t Deliver Us From Evil (1971) effortlessly manages to shock. Which brings us to Charlie et ses deux nénettes (or Charlie and His Two Chicks hereafter), or Joël Séria’s soulful contemplation on everything beautiful in life. Whether that is a continental breakfast, a fresh pint of beer, or a half-naked adolescent girl. Before becoming a director Séria was a struggling actor and worked as a street vendor. Charlie and His Two Chicks was his way of reflecting on that phase of his life.

Whereas Don’t Deliver Us From Evil (1971) was unapologetically bleak and oozed with the blackest of contempt Charlie and His Two Chicks goes the exact opposite direction. Only Marie, the Doll (1976) would come close, and even that started out just as lighthearted, and good-natured as this and As the Moon (1977) a year later. Mais non, this is about as far removed from Don’t Deliver Us From Evil (1971) as is possible. Charlie and His Two Chicks is a comedic drama about the small things that make life worth living. Often described as a working class take on Madly (1970) (from and with Alain Delon) or a hippie-free-love riff on Ernst Lubitsch's Design For Living (1933); it wouldn’t be a Séria feature if there wasn’t some social commentary. This time Séria unashamedly examines and questions the establishment and accepted social constructs that force people into positions (social, economic, and otherwise) that they don’t want. Above all else, it opposes the French worker ethic – and that good things come to those who put in the hours, the diligence, and the effort. It rejects the Malthusian Darwinian theory and Protestant ethic of hard work under an exploitative, predatory capitalist system that is nothing more than a social construct to keep its citizenry tired and docile. Instead it oozes with an infectious joie de vivre and posits that the carefree lifestyle does wonders for body, mind, and soul. Perhaps also not unimportant it shows that the average homme quadragénaire without a solid income can land two searingly hot twenty-year-olds in his lap without doing much of anything to warrant it.

Charlie Moret (Serge Sauvion) is a 39-year-old work reluctant and commitment averse vagrant. On the steps of the National Employment Agency somewhere in the Parisian suburbs he strikes up a conversation with two beautiful girls. Guislaine (Jeanne Goupil) and Josyane (Nathalie Drivet) are both are twenty and out of work. The former is a hairstylist and the latter is salesclerk and both want something more out of life than the soul-killing 9-to-5 grind After having spoken to the recruitment consultant (Annie Savarin) on a whim Charlie invites the two chicks to a drink in a nearby café on the sidewalk and continue their conversation there. Guislaine and Josyane are wide-eyed and pretty. They’re ditzy, smiley, giggly, and enthusiast to converse with someone nearly twice their age. The chemistry and connection with Charlie is instantaneous. The drink turns into a dinner date and when the night is over he invites the girls to his home. Instead of sleeping on the couch, they dive straight into bed with him. By the following morning the three comfortably continue their arrangement. Charlie, Guislaine, and Josyane engage in a mutually respectful platonic love triangle. Charlie loves his girls and in him they see the loving father figure they apparently never had.

To make ends meet Charlie and his two chicks become traveling street vendors. Guislaine and Josyane become vital additions and soon the three are making a pretty penny to finance their freewheeling, carefree lifestyle. As they travel from town to town on one such markets the three make their acquaintance with worldly Tony (Jean-Pierre Marielle), a vendor of Chartres cathedral miniatures. Tony is a suave and fast-talking macho who easily insinuates himself into the thus far uncomplicated love triangle. He storms into their cozy little world and sweeps young Josyane hopelessly off her feet with his luxurious trailer and sophistication. After much deliberation and thought Josyane ventures out into the world with Tony leaving Charlie and Guislaine heartbroken and sad. Now with Josyane no longer around Charlie and Guislaine dutifully travel from market to market, and as the seasons change it becomes increasingly clear that they are living next to, and not with, each other. The passion when Josyane was around is no longer there. On their way to Paris Charlie and Guislaine notice an abandoned vehicle on the side of the road. Sitting shivering and crying in the trunk is a destitute Josyane. At long last reunited Charlie et ses deux nénettes reconcile, rekindle their flame, and hit the open road.

Producer Gérard Lebovici originally wanted Jean-Paul Belmondo to star, but when Séria send him a copy of Don’t Deliver Us From Evil (1971) he politely declined. Lebovici left and the project was handed to Albina du Boisrouvray instead. Given the task of replacing Belmondo were Jean-Pierre Marielle and Serge Sauvion. Marielle was a monument in French cinema and his ventures into English-speaking roles are far and few. Dario Argento's Four Flies on Grey Velvet (1971) and Ron Howard’s The Da Vinci Code (2006) (watch for him as the aging and murdered Louvre curator Jacques Saunière) appear to be the better known. Sauvion was mainly a television – and voice actor who regularly could be found on the big screen, but is unknown otherwise. Back again is Séria muse Jeanne Goupil – and what a difference a year makes. Or two as it is in this case. Goupil has blossomed into a stunning young woman, and whatever awkwardness she was plagued with during Don’t Deliver Us From Evil (1971) is wholly and completely absent here. Goupil and Séria would marry in 1975, have a child, and have been together since. The second nénette is Nathalie Drivet who would work with Séria again for the comedy Cookies (1975) and the twisted romance Marie, the Doll (1976). Somehow Goupil and Drivet never ended up working with Jean Rollin.

Like the German comedies from around this time Charlie and His Two Chicks is a very laidback affair. At no point is it in a hurry to tell any sort of story as it freewheels from one scene to the next having Charlie and his two girls either enjoying a good meal or driving to their next stop. While it may not possess the deeply oneiric atmosphere of Faustine and the Beautiful Summer (1972) it concerns itself not much with comedy, and more often than not it’s a contemplation on life, and the small things that make it worthwhile. And that’s really what concerns Charlie and His Two Chicks, the platonic relation between the three leads. For the most part it just wobbles along in a sort of episodic fashion until Jean-Pierre Marielle is introduced. His character is the crux of the feature. In Josyane’s absence Charlie and Guislaine come to the sobering realization that the chemistry and mutual affection is gone when Josyane’s no longer around. It’s a sweet little tale of redemption about three everyday misfits (pariahs in the eyes of “normal” society) who find comfort in each other’s company. Perhaps it would be a stretch to call Charlie and His Two Chicks a fairytale, but it has that magic realism often found in French cinema. It’s not Amélie (2001) but it’s never for a lack of trying. It was to blue-collar France what Rita, Sue and Bob, Too (1987) was to Great Britain.

The most interesting thing about Séria’s career is that he followed the exact opposite trajectory of many of his contemporaries. He started out in horror with Don’t Deliver Us From Evil (1971) and from there gradually ascended into regular, mainstream cinema. Of the Séria canon Charlie and His Two Chicks is, by a wide margin, the most easy-going and accessible up until that point. Only Cookies (1975) and As the Moon (1977) would navigate even further into the mainstream with Marie, the Doll (1976) smackdab in the middle as the prerequisite transitional effort between the two phases. And that’s the strange thing about Joël Séria, he never went on to make either languid, dreamy fluff like Faustine and the Beautiful Summer (1972) nor something resembling a proxy-Jean Rollin fantastique as Girl Slaves Of Morgana Le Fay (1971). In that respect only Marie, the Doll (1976) bordered lightly on said territory. Of course, Séria was smart to ride the wave of German and Italian comedies from around this time, and Charlie and His Two Chicks, Cookies (1975) and As the Moon (1977) fit perfectly within that context. It just makes you wonder what Joël could have done had he followed Don’t Deliver Us From Evil (1971) with a bunch of lesbian vampire flicks to give Jean Rollin some competition or an occult horror in the vein of Erotic Witchcraft (1972) or A Woman Possessed (1975) from Mario Mercier. It could have been the French Blood Of the Virgins (1967) or Vampyres (1974). The world may never know.

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Plot: two teen girls, one hot summer, a lifetime of blasphemy and heresy.

It was really Jean Rollin who paved the way for the French fantastique. Not by some grand design or clever promotion but rather the accident of circumstance. When The Rape of the Vampire (1968) hit cineplexes across the country it did so during the student riots, general - and worker strikes opposing the Charles de Gaulle administration. In other words, it was the only thing in town. However, It was the follow-up The Nude Vampire (1970) that would consolidate Rollin’s oneiric visual style. Suddenly every two-bit producer and director with a few spare francs and some croissants was scrambling to launch their own fantastique, erotic and otherwise, and follow Rollin’s lead. Of all the imitators that inevitably followed only three have stood the test of time: Mario Mercier, Bruno Gantillon and Joël Séria.

Whereas Mercier was a real-life shaman whose Erotic Witchcraft (1972) and A Woman Possessed (1975) felt more like occult rituals captured on celluloid rather than formal narratives; in contrast the careers of Gantillon and Séria followed a similar trajectory after a single horror outing. Both men transitioned into other more marketable genres before graduating into television. Gantillon had his mesmerizing Girl Slaves Of Morgana LeFay (1971) and Séria had his iconoclastic and irreverent Don’t Deliver Us From Evil. Also not unimportant was that that year saw the release of offerings as diverse as Hammer’s Lust For A Vampire (1971) and Twins Of Evil (1971), Jesús Franco’s Vampyros Lesbos (1971), the Belgian-Canadian co-production Daughters Of Darkness (1971), and the El Hombre Lobo breastacular The Werewolf Versus the Vampire Woman (1971). If there ever was a year to premiere this sort of erotic horror, 1971 was the year of choice.

Coinciding with the witchcraft and Satanic Panic cycle of the seventies Joël Séria’s irreverent coming of age tale Mais nous ne délivrez pas du mal (or Don’t Deliver Us From Evil, internationally) isn’t merely a tale of the sexual awakening of two impressionable young girls under the guise of an occult horror. More than anything else it is a scathing and damning indictment of the hypocrisy of the Catholic Church, the laissez-faire attitude of the bourgeoisie and the injustices of the French social hierarchal system. Loosely inspired by the Parker-Hulme murder from New Zealand in 1954 and Séria’s memories of his own Catholic upbringing Don’t Deliver Us From Evil was banned in the Fifth Republic on charges of blasphemy and heresy. Séria’s debut feature was a fairytale that remains little seen outside of Eurocult circles and that’s a pity. Even 50 years after its original release it has lost none of its power. More importantly it was the French precursor to Juan López Moctezuma’s Alucarda (1977) and Fernando Di Leo’s widely misunderstood and incendiary satire To Be Twenty (1978) with commedia sexy all’Italiana lolitas Gloria Guida and Lili Carati. That Séria abhors Catholicism (who in the right mind could disagree with him?) should be fairly obvious as the title is a slight alteration from a line of the Pater Noster prayer.

Anne (Jeanne Goupil) and Lore (Catherine Wagener) are two post-pubescent Catholic schoolgirls living in the rural province of Anjou. Both are 14, neighbors and best friends, and both come from affluent, conservative, aristocratic families. Both are bored and confused with the hypocrisy they witness at their convent boarding school and within their own families. Anne’s parents are the Count de Boissy (Jean-Pierre Helbert) and the Countess (Véronique Silver) who have their own interests and leave her in the care of gardener Gustave (René Berthier). One night Anne reads erotic literature she stole from one of the nuns and the two girls solemnly vow that they will live their life together, in service of Satan, from now on. After a particular gloomy sermon from the local priest (Serge Frédéric) at mass the two denounce their faith, mock the clergyman, and begin their journey into wanton depravity. When Anne’s parents leave for a two-month holiday they sent her to live with Lore’s parents, monsieur Fournier (Henri Poirier, as Henry Poirier) and madame Fournier (Nicole Mérouze). United for the summer, the two are free to commit as much mischief as they could possibly want.

Anne reads the misanthropic, misotheistic poetic novel The Songs of Maldoror from Comte de Lautréamont and les filles initiate themselves in the dark arts. Anne begins torturing small animals, commencing with her pet cat and graduating into canary-poisoning and sparrow-strangulation. In those lazy, hazy days of summer the two girls explore their own sexuality, experiment with lesbianism, and the all-too-easy seduction of mentally challenged cowherd Émile (Gérard Darrieu). In lieu of getting what they want the two commit arson and when a motorist (Bernard Dhéran) turns the tables on them during a game of seduction the two take to cold blooded murder. Anne and Lore consecrate their union in a Black Mass ceremony wherein church artefacts are desecrated. When a commissioner (Jean-Daniel Ehrmann, as Jean Daniel Ehrmann) is assigned to investigate the case the girls fear that they will be separated. The two decide to commit one final act of defiance during the fall term school play. To a wildly enthusiastic audience the girls dramatically recite part of Charles Baudelaire’s The Flowers Of Evil before committing self-immolation in the ultimate act of mockery.

Understated. If there’s one to describe Don’t Deliver Us From Evil it’s that. Joël Séria is content to merely observe as the girls descent from youthful mischief into full-blown profanation and cold blooded murder. That Don’t Deliver Us From Evil is irreverent and iconoclastic is evident. The detached, documentary-like camerawork and quiet, folkish score serve brilliantly to create a false sense of security. It starts out like every other French coming of age feature and only the subtle hint here and there provide clues that not everything is what is it seems. There’s a whole lot more boiling beneath the surface, some of which becomes only clear upon multiple viewings. It dabbles in the general territory of Jean Rollin and Bruno Gantillon’s Girl Slaves Of Morgana Le Fay (1971), but Don’t Deliver Us From Evil is wholly its own beast. The enduring ability of Don’t Deliver Us From Evil to shock audiences doesn’t lie so much in what it shows (it’s surprisingly low on both blood and gratuitous nudity) but rather in the profundity of its implications. Suggestion, when wielded in the right hands, is probably the most formidable weapon. Adding immensely to the overall ick and sleaze factor is that Jeanne Goupil and Catherine Wagener (21 and 19, respectively, at the time of filming) truly do look like unspoilt minors. The brunt of the nudity falls on Wagener, but Séria would have Goupil in a state of constant undress in his oddball romance Marie, the Doll (1975).

By 1971 France had been pervaded by existentialism by philosophers Søren Kierkegaard, Jean-Paul Sartre, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Simone de Beauvoir. In a post-World War II the movement rose to prominence as a response against Nazi despotism. Don’t Deliver Us From Evil arrived at just the right time to benefit from the lesbian hysterionics following Hammer’s Karnstein trilogy, the advent of erotic vampire horror in continental Europe, the women’s liberation movement as well as the looser, permissive mores following the Summer of Love. The societal circumstances and socio-political climate were right for something like this to materialize. Joël Séria was a proverbial crusader hellbent on dismantling the French church and state.

We would be remiss to mention that Don’t Deliver Us From Evil immediately found its place in cult cinema history by being presented at the Directors' Fortnight, in parallel selection of the 1971 Cannes Film Festival and allegedly being banned the land of ‘Liberté‘ on grounds of blasphemy. The banning remains somewhat contentious as we weren’t able to find any substantial evidence to support said claim. Exposing the hypocrisy of the church is never a good idea anyway. With his following features Séria took to thoroughly dismantling the state and the French national identity. To do that with silly comedies of all things makes it all the more poignant. Obviously Séria had an axe to grind with his country, culture and traditions. If anything, without Don’t Deliver Us From Evil there would be no Vampyres (1974), no Satánico Pandemonium (1975) and certainly no Alucarda (1977). Not bad for a little shocker over half a century old.