Emanuelle and Francoise (1975) User Reviews

Sounds better than it actually is.

[BA_Harrison · 6/10 · 3 December 2012]

Pushed to the limits by her abusive boyfriend Carlo (George Eastman), distraught photographic model Françoise (Patrizia Gori) throws herself under a train. On learning of her sister's untimely death, sexy reporter Emanuelle (Rosemarie Lindt) sets out to make Carlo pay for his wicked ways, drugging him, chaining him up in her apartment's handy, secret, soundproofed room (complete with two-way mirror), and performing sexual acts in front of the helpless guy, occasionally enhancing his experience with hallucinogenic drugs.

Written by Bruno Mattei and directed by Joe D'amato, two of Italian exploitation cinema's most infamous sleaze-merchants, 'Emanuelle e Françoise le sorelline' sounds like solid gold for those who enjoy their Euro-trash on the stronger side, but it should be noted that this is a relatively early effort from both film-makers, and despite a steady stream of sex and a touch of violence—a three-way lesbian tryst, genital fondling, oral sex, inappropriate use of a wine bottle, and meat cleaver mutilation—the naughtiness is not all that explicit (by D'amato's standards, at least) and the carnage (achieved with the use of a couple of bottles of ketchup and a few spare mannequin parts) is too fake to be truly disturbing. A rather slow pace adds to the tedium, making this a less than essential film for fans of either Mattei or D'amato.

5.5 out of 10, generously rounded up to 6 for the hilarious blonde chick in the nightclub who takes her top off and jiggles her tits whenever the music gets faster.

bit of a bore but worth checking out

[richajtaylor · 6/10 · 31 May 2006]

Not what I expected from D'Amata who is mostly known for his gore/porn films but its somewhat of a different film. You have the big anthropophagus himself George Eastman as a selfish gigolo/actor who obviously causes the death of his pushover model girlfriend. We find out that Carlo's (Eastman)girlfriend has a sister and its no other than Emmanuelle (being played by someone else other than Laura Gemser here). After finding out the humiliation Carlo put her sister through Emmanuelle exacts her revenge by chaining the poor sap in a secret room in her house and drugging him up causing him to have hallucinations. The whole affair is slow moving but it has its perks: some 70's bush (if your into the rug look), slew of soft core scenes and some bizarre hallucinations involving cannibalism, we even get George Eastman reprising his Anthropophagus role with his big meat cleaver! Genre buffs will dig this, you'll need it to complete your emmanuelle collection otherwise I found myself drifting in and out of it.

Emanuelle gets her revenge, alright!

[The_Void · 5/10 · 5 March 2006]

Prolific sleaze maestro, Joe D'Amato, directed this flick before the sexy Laura Gemser became the star of the series, and for that reason; we have Rosemarie Lindt, from cult flicks such as Salon Kitty and Who Saw Her Die, taking the lead role. This puts the film on the back foot from the beginning, as Lindt doesn't bring the same amount of sassiness to her role as Gemser does, and the film is a less memorable entry in the series for that reason. Actually; it would appear that Emanuelle's Revenge wasn't intended to be a part of the Emanuelle series, and only got the title due to it's director's affinity with it. The fact that it's alternate, and more fitting, title is 'Blood Vengeance' shows this clearly. Anyway, the plot is a little bit more involving than most porno flicks, as it plays out like a thriller. We follow a young woman called Emanuelle who gets her revenge on the man responsible for her sister's death by chaining him up in her basement and forcing him to watch her having sex.

The Emanuelle character is nothing like the one played by Laura Gemser, as the young lady here has a sadistic streak a mile wide. The ending alone, without what precedes it, shows this clearly enough! Despite being more of a thriller than most Emanuelle films; Emanuelle's Revenge still finds more than enough time for sex scenes. The entire film feels very low rent, and the sex sequences do too; they're not terrible, but they're also not very erotic, and the fact that most of the film is filled with these scenes doesn't do it many favours. Emanuelle's Revenge is sure to please fans of seventies Italian films, however, as it's dripping with the typical sleaze style, and this is helped by the music and cinematography. The acting isn't especially brilliant and the film suffers from poor dubbing as always. Not having seen much of the Emanuelle series, I can't really say how good this is compared to the others; but in its own right, it's not too bad. The thriller structure is good, and the way that the film is consistently sleazy is sure to please also.

Painfully slow

[dopefishie · 3/10 · 5 May 2022]

Painfully slow. The first half is a series of deadly boring flashbacks. This film has more padding than a mattress. The second half is a bit more interesting but still manages to stuff pointless scenes in there. They honestly could cut an hour off of this movie, and it would be much better. The ending is the strongest bit.

At the end of the day, skip this one.

Workable Mix Of Sleaze And Story-Line From Smut-King, Joe D'Amato...

[EVOL666 · 7/10 · 17 August 2006]

I was both disappointed and impressed with BLOOD VENGEANCE (aka EMANUELLE'S REVENGE). On one hand, I was hoping for some of the hard-core sex and perversion that punctuates many a D'Amato production. ON the other hand, the story-line in this one is pretty strong, and although the acting isn't the best (as is usually the case with these sleazy low-budget Italian films) the plot and how it plays out carries the film rather well...

Francoise is a sweet young girl with a scumbag boyfriend named . He treats her like garbage and uses her as his scapegoat when he gets into gambling or other problems. After she catches Carlos cheating on her and Carlos kicks her to the curb, Francoise commits suicide. Enter Emanuelle (played by Rosemarie Lindt in this installment), Francoise's big sister who learns all about Carlos and what a douche he is. Emanuelle plots a twisted revenge for Carlos which doesn't work out quite as planned...

BLOOD VENGEANCE doesn't feel like an Emanuelle film - it's more just a semi-erotic revenge thriller. The sex is mainly dull and un-explicit, yet there's still a few good, sleazy moments - including a deliriously hallucinatory dinner scene which is one of the highlights of the film. I also enjoyed the somewhat unexpected ending - I was caught off-guard as to how everything eventually played-out and liked the "dark" resolution. Not a great film and not one of my D'Amato favorites - but definitely worth checking out for 70s exploit fans...7.5/10

Another sick, sadistic sex flick from Joe D'Amato.

[capkronos · 2/10 · 19 May 2003]

Laura Gemser sits out this time, but Rosemarie Lindt is here and ready, willing and able to disrobe at any given opportunity. She's Emanuelle, a successful fashion model with one problem...she has just been raped by a vile behemoth (big guy George Eastman). To get revenge, she seduces, drugs and then chains her attacker up in a secret room behind a one-way mirror where he must watch in sexual frustration as she taunts and teases him with a parade of men and women she brings home to play with.

Not surprisingly for a D'Amato movie, this is not your standard sex film. Despite lots of flesh baring, it's far from being erotic. There's violence, gore, full frontal nudity, warped dream sequences, rape, hardcore dinner table masturbation scenes (in the uncut version anyway) and much more that you may not expect. Memorable bits include a sick-o nightmare sequence with Lindt being pinned down by four women and raped with a wine bottle and the finale, where someone in the cast ends up a gory mess after being chopped up with a meat cleaver.

And no, none of this is as entertaining as it sounds. Low production values, bad dubbing, crummy plotting, bad acting and time padding make it a chore to sit through. On video this was available in both R or Unrated versions (Unrated is the one I saw).

View at your own risk!

Mind destroying

[BandSAboutMovies · 6/10 · 17 May 2021]

This movie is quite literally the Batman and Superman of Italian sleaze filmmaking uniting to create some art. Those two men have many, many names, but for the purposes of this article, we'll use the names that they used most often: Joe D'Amato and Bruno Mattei.

Producer Franco Gaudenzi wanted to bring the movie The Wild Pussycat to Italy, but it would have never made it past the Italian censors. For some reason, if the movie was made in Italy, it would pass. This is the country where it's legal to call your movie Zombi 2, but illegal to use Mrs. Ward's name. Let's forget the complexities of law when it comes to exploitation cinema and move on.

D'Amato and Mattei took up the challenge of remaking this movie for Italian audiences with both writing the script and co-directing the picture, even if only D'Amato got directing credit. What was important for the producers was that the film could play theaters and it passed the Italian censorship board on November 5, 1975 after some lesbian elements and scenes with sodomy were removed.

Ironically, when this was brought to Switzerland by Erwin C. Dietrich, he added in actual hardcore scenes with French actress Brigitte Lahaie (who is in Fascination) and dubbed it into German, releasing it as Foltergarten der Sinnlichkeit (Torture Garden of Sensuality) and Die Lady mit der Pussycat (The Lady with the Pussycat).

Truly, scumbag pictures bring all the nations of the world together, do they not?

Francoise (Patrizia Gori, The Return of the Exorcist) has had enough of the abuse from her gambler cad of a husband Carlo (George Eastman!), so she jumps in front of a train. Her sister Emanuelle - no, not Laura Gemser just yet, she's played here by Rosemarie Lindt from Salon Kitty - gets revenge by drugging Carlo and restraining him in a soundproof room. There, she teases him through two-way mirrored glass as he's forced to watch her make love to numerous men and women, all while he's repeatedly dosed with LSD.

Finally, Emanuelle enters the room and attempts to castrate Carlo, who has been repeatedly fantasizing about killing her and finally does so for real. His joy is short-lived as while he's hiding in the secret room, he gets locked in and the police closed down the crime scene for thirty days, basically leaving him to die.

Also known as Emanuelle's Revenge, Blood Vengeance and Demon Rage, this is exactly the kind of movie that you'd imagine D'Amato and Mattei would make together, filled with numerous sex scenes, frequently spinning and zooming camera angles and a cannibalistic feast sequence.

Back when we reviewed Emanuelle In America, the guys at Severin said, "If you thought that was rough, watch this one." Their release has a great George Eastman interview in which he says that D'Amato had the ability to do bigger and better things, but preferred doing ten B movies a year than one A film. You can get the Severin edition of this film and see just how good-looking a completely irredeemable piece of trash - I say that with love - can look.

UGH - Joe D'amato left his format and it showed

[Ronrego · 3/10 · 20 January 2000]

Unfortunately, the late, great Joe D'amato left his favorite horror format for this mixed-up caper of romance, revenge and the powers men and women hold over each other.

There is very little gore here, but many relationships. This spells disaster for a Joe D'amato Pic.

Obviously, Joe wanted to branch out from his usual Gore and Chicks flicks..but this bomb will put you to sleep...or hurt your finger from holding down your VCR's Fast Forward key.

Take my advice, Skip It!

Doesn't know what it wants to be

[the-antichrist-is-near · 2/10 · 30 May 2023]

Maybe in the light of D'Amato's full filmography this movie could be of interest, but in a bigger picture it feels rather irrelevant. There is a decent, but extremely generic and milked out story line. However, if it is shown in such a flat and boring way as here, the story isn't going to elevate the whole movie to a higher level. Add in the subpar acting and dubbing plus some over-the-top bad effects, and you're left with nothing really... Judging from other reviews it seems that D'Amato used to do more horror/gory stuff before and slowly shifted towards incorporating the erotica that got popularized by Emanuelle. What it ends up with here is a movie that's not really thriller/gore, also not really erotica, and also just not that interesting to watch...

Ugly and depraved exploitation flick D'Amato's style.

[HumanoidOfFlesh · 8/10 · 4 September 2012]

Hardcore alpha male and playboy Carlo(George Eastman)rejects cruelly his girlfriend Francoise(Patrizia Gori)after years of abusing her innocence and prostituting her.Distressed girl commits suicide by jumping onto moving train.Francoise's sister Emanuelle(Rosemarie Lindt)sets out to seduce Carlo and perform bloody revenge on him.Carlo is chained in her house,drugged and sexually tortured.The climax is hysterically bloody and exploitative.I must say that I enjoyed this piece of filth from legendary Joe D'Amato.There is lesbian scene,rape,two insanely bloody meat-cleaver attacks plus totally twisted dinner party orgy which involves cannibalism and sexual violence.If you like trashy and exploitative cinema with no redeeming values give this ultra-sleaze a chance.8 meat-cleavers out of 10.

Not the Emanuelle you are looking for

[kosmasp · 4/10 · 25 March 2024]

Actually she may be looking for you - but both those puns aside (and as always none of them intended - believe it or not) ... I watched a direct remake of this just a while ago. And I am surprised it is not connected or shown up on imdb - then again I reckon you have smaller movies where not many really care about.

The remake also has an Emanuelle ... but watching those "side by side", the newer version is way better ... even if this paints the bad guy ... really bad! Even though he also has a moment of clarity ... where he warns his girlfriend ... not that it excuses any of his behavior! I mean he really does some horrible stuff ... or let's horrible stuff happen.

The police seem quite incompetent. But there is not much story wise to be honest. And while there is a lot of nudity, it mostly is not something to get excited about (no pun intended either). This also has aged badly ... the ending is ... ok I reckon even though I don't like it on many levels. While I reckon it is a nice twist, it makes no sense for the person to do ... what they do! But I reckon it is better than the original ending ...

D'Amato's visionary cinema of the two way mirror

[jaibo · 8/10 · 28 March 2009]

Made before director D'Amato got together with Laura Gemser, and not really an Emanuelle film, this strange erotic revenge thriller is one of D'Amato's most coherent and visionary statements. The story is simple – young model Francoise is abused and betrayed by her cad of a lover Carlos, finally throwing herself under a train when the pain gets too much. Francoise' older sister Emanuelle finds out the whole sorry story through some letters left by her sister, and goes about getting even with the bounder. She seduces him, drugs him and keeps him chained and imprisoned behind a two way mirror positioned in her living room, through which he sees her putting on an erotic solo show, making lesbian love, indulging in orgies and, with the help of some hallucinogens, partaking with revellers in an imagined cannibal feast.

The two way mirror is an extraordinary image, and is central to the meaning of the film. Carlos' treatment of Francoise is unthinking patriarchal abuse; Emanuelle – a feminist journalist – has previously called for a women's movement in which "women mustn't lose their womanhood" – uses all of the feminine tools at her disposal to get one over on him. There's something about Carlos' isolated immolation behind the mirrored screen which suggests the position of a lonely, frustrated man trapped in a world where he can watch women get up to all sorts of stuff, as in pornography, but he cannot get to join in and, what's more, he holds up his escape attempts by his compulsion to look. The terrible vision of the cannibal feast – an image which is central to D'Amato's work – shows us a world in which people eat flesh and blood to survive, the dog eat dog world of contemporary society. In his dark prison, disempowered Carlos dreams of murdering a naked Emanuelle with a cleaver, and when he does get free (narrowly missing the emasculation which many powerless men imagine the women's movement will bring them), he causes her death in reality. But hiding from the police back behind the mirror, Carlos finds himself fatally trapped – his planned escape through violence has been a road back to imprisonment, and he will starve and thirst to death in an ending straight out of Edgar Allen Poe.

The story is reminiscent of one of Poe's horror tales crossed with a dollop of De Sade (Francoise and Emanuelle suggest Justine and Juliette); the tale conjures forth a horrific, relentless universe in which cycles of violence turn round forever, men on top and abusing women one minute, women on top and torturing men the next – yet no one ever gets free from the hate and anger which traps them. D'Amato is a consummate poet of the cinema, and he goes out of our way to show that his two way mirror stands for the cinema screen: people appear on its surface, it shows lurid and violent images of desire and death, at one point a police cameraman working in the room with it asks for time for "a few more shots." D'Amato does all he can to mirror Emanuelle's antics on her "screen" with Carlos' antics abusing Francoise off it – he forces her to have brutal sex whilst sleazy men watch, he gives her to a nasty old satyr of a producer, he emotionally blackmails her into starring in pornographic films. At times the relationship between Carlos and Francoise reminds one of the story of Linda Lovelace and her husband/manager Chuck Traynor as told in Linda's autobiography Ordeal; perhaps Emanuelle is reminiscent of one of the women who played the game for themselves and made successful careers for themselves as powerful players in the porn industry. By some alchemical magic, D'Amato has captured the spirit of the newly libidinous, permissive world and shown us the choices open to women in it. He doesn't, as a maker of sleazy product himself, remain free from contamination, but purity isn't the game for artists of his kind: they are immersed in a world from which they bring back reports of the truth, and show us their findings without editorializing, with the inscrutable look of sphinx on their face.

Enjoy, just don't forget the cold shower afterwards!

[christopher-underwood · 8/10 · 5 December 2005]

This is a pretty nasty little film but I really like it. Unusually for a revenge movie, after a brief introduction we are into the revenge stage even before we know it and there are flashbacks throughout the film to show us very clearly why this revenge was necessary! George Eastman seems just a little too cruel at first and his little innocent girlfriend a bit of a Justine who seems to get treated all the worst for trying to be so kind. Still, once we are off we really are with all manner of extreme behaviour on show. The more explicit outtakes/inserts are here presented as extras rather than within the film itself and both are the better for it. Spirited performances from all concerned and flesh on show from the opening credits till the delirious finale. Enjoy, just don't forget the cold shower afterwards!

One of D'Amato best and softly kinky films!

[Criss779 · 8/10 · 8 September 2009]

In this (Reportedly a remake of a Greek film of the 60s) Joe D'Amato guilty pleasure, goes a beautiful mature agent woman Emanuelle (Rosemarie Lindt - exploiting only the famous name) making a plan against an evil, giant playboy (Habitual George Estman) for murder her sister Françoise of solitude. Is undeniably kinky and trashy, but the music, the photograpahy (Of D'Amato itself) and the composition makes more than worthwhile and it really works! Still, be sure this is not for every taste ... Is a D'Amato film, and one of his best.

With Patrizia Gori and Mary Kristal, in color by Luciano Vittori. Still a hard to get DVD overseas. Also known as Emanuelle's Revenge.

Twisted little exploitation flick

[Woodyanders · 8/10 · 9 July 2019]

Callous macho stud Carlo (well played to the hateful slimy hilt by George Eastman) drives his sweet and vulnerable lover Francoise (an appealing portrayal by fetching brunette Patricia Gori) to commit suicide by kicking her to the curb after having his wanton way with her. Her sister Emanuelle (a fine and credible performance by foxy blonde Rosemarie Lindt) decides to exact a harsh revenge by chaining Carlo up in a secret room in her house.

Infamous Italian sleazemeister Joe D'Amato, who also co-wrote the sick script with Bruno Mattei, keeps the engrossingly sordid story moving along at a steady pace, maintains an appropriately harsh seamy tone throughout, and ends the seedy plot on a pleasing grim note. Moreover, D'Amato not only delivers an extremely satisfying serving of tasty bare female flesh and sizzling soft-core sex (a lesbian threesome rates as a definite arousing highlight), but also tosses in several moments of hideously gruesome violence for gory good measure. D'Amato's slick cinematography provides an impressive glossy look. Gianni Marchetti's groovy melodic score hits the funky-grinding spot. A nice slice of prime 70's Eurosleaze.

Silly, silly film but worth a watch

[noahbbrown · 28 May 2007]

It's funny to see George Eastman playing a 'hunk' here, a few years before he put on a few more pounds and became notorious for playing the likes of The Anthropophagous Beast and 'Big Ape' from 2019:After The Fall Of New York. This is a bit slow and it doesn't contain any truly disturbing scenes like Emmanuelle In America, but it is worth seeing. The premise is good and the ending is quite Poe-like, almost - quite a tragic tale. Performances are pretty lame, despite what someone else has said here, Eastman isn't very good really. Some funny sleaze set-pieces and the bit at the end with the racing cars has a big 'WTF?' factor, as they say on the internet... Excellent, ridiculous Italo-psych score and the club scene is hilarious too. Not one of Joe's best, but god damn he wasn't lazy with the work-rate was he?