An ageing business man (Levien) visits his dying mother and remembers his poor childhood in the early part of the 20th Century. His mother, a massive and difficult personality, ruled the household with outrageous and anarchistic behaviour that occasionally caused her to end up in prison. Levien's quiet father keeps the family together by holding down a factory job. Levien adores his mother and doesn't object to being pulled out of bed in the middle of the night to assist her on some anarchist act of destruction or other. But when he starts a relationship with his estranged aunt in secret, he begins to doubt his mother's actions. This film has faults, but its saving grace is the strong central anti-hero female roles of Levian's mother and aunt, particularly unusual considering when this movie was made.
2 Reviews
Raising the issue of censorship
lor_26 June 2023
Warning: Spoilers
This quite obscure Dutch film (hardly known at all in America) is perhaps "lost" in the sense that it deals with taboo and borderline forbidden subject matter. It even dares to mix the "coming of age" sexual content with militant political content, actually taking the decidedly unpopular position of supporting violent anarchists. The director is also quite obscure, having made only a couple of features; I knew of him only via his contribution to a wonderful movie by the great Bert Haanstra: "One Could Laugh in Former Days" (literal translated title).
"Twee" is based on two novels by Geert van Oorschot. It concerns an old man Levien, who visits his dying mother and narrates a flashback of his childhood, recalling his abusive mother (one vivid scene has her realistically beating the crap out of him as a young teen in front of all the other school kids after he's reported for an infraction by his phys ed teacher).
Movie's main storyline revolves around his mother's activities as an anarchist (also resorting to acts of violence including destruction of property), giving the movie a social and political slant. Also, as an older man his thoughts about applying euthanasia to put his ailing mom out of her misery is also controversial subject matter.
But the central theme of the picture, heavily emphasized, is the youngster's obsessive attraction to his aunt, who is suffering at the hands of a dominating husband. She eggs the boy on, teasing him, and in a memorable scene has him fondle her painted (nails) toes, highly erotic. He fantasizes her naked, and with melodramatic music frequently playing on the soundtrack is obsessed with auntie (played By Kitty Courbois, a striking but not beautiful actress). Casting 16-year-old Eric Clerckx as Levien in the flashbacks guarantees the movie's notoriety (and unavailability).
A key scene of the two of them going bathing on a secluded beach together is highly sexual, played with both actor and actress displaying full-frontal nudity. It's a scene of sexual initiation, softcore, but definitely over the line as she teaches him some highly kinky sexual activities including erotic asphyxiation and an armpit fetish. They run to the sea for a naked swim and the scene turns idyllic.
Later, auntie has them undress and takes Levien to bed and even caresses his bare cock -pretty strong stuff even though carefully softcore, as his fingers do the walking under the covers - any penetration kinkily left to his finger in her belly button, yet Eric gets to play with her pubic hair in closeup. At this poiint the movie shows her orgasmic reaction shot, and the filmmakers' intentions are revealed.
Even with so much censorable content, I was surprised that the film bore some resemblance to that classic "Summer of '42" -the same nostalgic recollection format -enough that I suspect the Dutch film was influenced by that famous American hit from 1971 that made Jennifer O'Neill a star. (Note that Jennifer's co-star in that movie Gary Grimes was 15 years old when it was shot, but of course a crucial difference is that it did not show them in a sex scene, let alone a fully nude one.) Ultimately, the complex script manages to merge the political/social justice theme with the erotic one, as the mom and her sister finally bond after mom beats up a political opponent (over the topic of slumlords) at a court hearing accusing her of vandalism, winning her the support of the public. Yet young Levien ends up feeling betrayed by both his mom and aunt -clearly psychologically scarred by his childhood living with such volatile women, leaving him with lifelong guilt.
Watching this movie over 40 years after its release, I thought about the perils of censorship (DeSantis -you can stop reading my review at this point -you're beyond redemption). If the movie "Twee" had been made with self-censorship, that is, the filmmakers leaving out the sexual content, it would lose some of its force, yet would likely circulate and perhaps even be inducted into the Criterion Collection on DVD! But as is, it delivers on the courage of its convictions forcefully and without XXX hardcore content but is still basically unviewable. Certainly a Catch-22 situation.
"Twee" is based on two novels by Geert van Oorschot. It concerns an old man Levien, who visits his dying mother and narrates a flashback of his childhood, recalling his abusive mother (one vivid scene has her realistically beating the crap out of him as a young teen in front of all the other school kids after he's reported for an infraction by his phys ed teacher).
Movie's main storyline revolves around his mother's activities as an anarchist (also resorting to acts of violence including destruction of property), giving the movie a social and political slant. Also, as an older man his thoughts about applying euthanasia to put his ailing mom out of her misery is also controversial subject matter.
But the central theme of the picture, heavily emphasized, is the youngster's obsessive attraction to his aunt, who is suffering at the hands of a dominating husband. She eggs the boy on, teasing him, and in a memorable scene has him fondle her painted (nails) toes, highly erotic. He fantasizes her naked, and with melodramatic music frequently playing on the soundtrack is obsessed with auntie (played By Kitty Courbois, a striking but not beautiful actress). Casting 16-year-old Eric Clerckx as Levien in the flashbacks guarantees the movie's notoriety (and unavailability).
A key scene of the two of them going bathing on a secluded beach together is highly sexual, played with both actor and actress displaying full-frontal nudity. It's a scene of sexual initiation, softcore, but definitely over the line as she teaches him some highly kinky sexual activities including erotic asphyxiation and an armpit fetish. They run to the sea for a naked swim and the scene turns idyllic.
Later, auntie has them undress and takes Levien to bed and even caresses his bare cock -pretty strong stuff even though carefully softcore, as his fingers do the walking under the covers - any penetration kinkily left to his finger in her belly button, yet Eric gets to play with her pubic hair in closeup. At this poiint the movie shows her orgasmic reaction shot, and the filmmakers' intentions are revealed.
Even with so much censorable content, I was surprised that the film bore some resemblance to that classic "Summer of '42" -the same nostalgic recollection format -enough that I suspect the Dutch film was influenced by that famous American hit from 1971 that made Jennifer O'Neill a star. (Note that Jennifer's co-star in that movie Gary Grimes was 15 years old when it was shot, but of course a crucial difference is that it did not show them in a sex scene, let alone a fully nude one.) Ultimately, the complex script manages to merge the political/social justice theme with the erotic one, as the mom and her sister finally bond after mom beats up a political opponent (over the topic of slumlords) at a court hearing accusing her of vandalism, winning her the support of the public. Yet young Levien ends up feeling betrayed by both his mom and aunt -clearly psychologically scarred by his childhood living with such volatile women, leaving him with lifelong guilt.
Watching this movie over 40 years after its release, I thought about the perils of censorship (DeSantis -you can stop reading my review at this point -you're beyond redemption). If the movie "Twee" had been made with self-censorship, that is, the filmmakers leaving out the sexual content, it would lose some of its force, yet would likely circulate and perhaps even be inducted into the Criterion Collection on DVD! But as is, it delivers on the courage of its convictions forcefully and without XXX hardcore content but is still basically unviewable. Certainly a Catch-22 situation.
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