Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade (1740-1814) has a long and complex relationship with cinema. From the revolutionary eyeball-slicing and extravagant anticlericalism of Buñuel’s ‘Un Chien Andalou’ (1929) to the sexual imagery of costume dramas like Stephen Frear’s ‘Dangerous Liaisons’ (1988) or Dunmore’s ‘The Libertine’ (2004) or the ritualistic death tableau of ‘Hostel’ (2005). Sade has become a brand and ‘sadism’ a convenient hook to entice audiences, but the term represents a gross oversimplification of Sade’s ideas. The term ‘sadeian’ is better used to describe Sade’s cultural legacy, a debate about how erotic relationships reflect the exercise of political power over the individual.

Sade’s tales are ostensibly a scaffold to support his masturbatory tableaux and this makes them difficult to adapt into conventional narrative cinema. Some filmmakers (like Jess Franco) take Sade’s writing at face value: Franco rifled Sade’s work for inspiration but erotic fantasies like ‘Eugenie’ (1974) are now dated period pieces, redolent of seventies porn theatres. Instead, most filmmakers select from a common toolbox of tropes and images to approach the Marquis. Sade adored the theatre, and many films contain this element. Both Brooks’ ‘Marat/Sade’ (1967) and Kaufman’s ‘Quills’ (2000) are plays adapted to film and both feature sadiean theatricals. Jacquot’s ‘Sade’ (2000) and Svankmajer’s ‘Lunacy’ (2002) also work theatrical performance into their storylines.

Some of Sade’s ideas have become an accepted part of modern social and political theory. Following the controversial work of Michel Foucault and other cultural theorists his writings have been interpreted as statements about sexual and political power. Some filmmakers have explored these facets of Sade’s work. Pier Paolo Pasolini uses Sade’s most controversial work ‘120 Days of Sodom’ as a lexicon to deconstruct fascist ideology and to express his own sense of political disillusionment.

Surrealists like Luis Buñuel and Jan Švankmajer admire Sade’s penchant for blasphemy and social transgression. Švankmajer borrows images and ideas from Sade for his films ‘Conspirators of Pleasure’ (1996) and ‘Faust’ (1994) before engaging him directly in ‘Lunacy’ (2005). Luis Buñuel’s films are profoundly influenced by Sade’s discourse on the relationship between sex, power and politics. His work is perhaps the purest expression of Sade’s philosophy in cinema and has been described extensively elsewhere. In keeping with Sourdust’s interest in the more obscure corners of cinema this article examines a selection of films about Sade and assesses their value as introductions to the philosopher’s work.

Sade spent many years in prison and confinement is a frequent motif in sadeian cinema. Philip Kaufman’s ‘Quills’ (2000) takes as its factual starting point the arrival of doctrinaire doctor Royer-Collard (Michael Caine) at Charenton Asylum in 1806 where his harsh treatment methods clash with the more liberal regime of Director Francois Coulmier (Joaquin Phoenix). Royer-Collard has been tasked by Napoleon with stifling the constant stream of scurrilous pornography written by Sade (Geoffrey Rush) and smuggled out of Charenton by laundress Madeleine (Kate Winslet).

Kaufman and Wright are uncomfortable with the more anarchic implications of Sade’s work and choose instead to explore the relationship between freedom of expression and social responsibility. Sade’s work is dismissed from the outset as frivolous fantasy with its repetitive masturbatory phrases and clichéd language (‘pikestaffs’, ‘crimes of love’) and the film instead champions the right to publish as does Milos Forman’s ‘The People versus Larry Flynt’ (1998). As Sade’s means of expression are systematically censored, he uses ever more extreme methods to communicate. When ink is taken away Sade uses his own blood and faeces to write and when denied paper he writes on his own flesh, literally becoming his own ‘body of work’. Doug Wright’s screenplay transforms Sade into a martyr for artistic freedom. Although his right to expression may be sacrosanct, ‘Quills’ suggests that Sade’s prose is a threat when it unleashes too much freedom. The sexual anarchy unleashed by Sade’s writing ends in murder and the destruction of a liberal utopia, a reactionary dénouement that may serve the dynamic of the plot but which negates any philosophical interpretation of Sade’s work.

‘Quills’ also serves as a parable about books and readers. The repeated use of the musical motif from ‘Au Clair de la Lune’, a song infamous for its innuendo involving pens, writing and coitus signposts this theme. Kate Winslet’s Madeleine corresponds to Sade’s Justine, an archetype who is judged and punished as immoral by society although pure of soul. Royer-Collard’s oppressed child bride Simone (Amelia Warner) is transformed by Sade’s literature from a timid convent girl into a sexual libertine more like Sade’s Juliette. Madeleine and Simone are both empowered by reading Sade but for one it ends in escape and for the other disaster. The notion of female sexuality being set free by erotic writing remains at the heart of many current debates about pornography but ‘Quills’ feels much closer to male fantasy. Both women become no more than means to an end; Sade uses Madeleine to ensure his writing reaches his readers and Simone to attack his oppressor, Royer-Collard. Angela Carter and Simone De Beauvoir have examined Sade through feminist eyes and their response to his ideas is much more sophisticated than anything found in Kaufman’s film.

Geoffrey Rush delivers an entertaining performance as Sade but is rather too camp as he delivers lines full of fruity double entendre and knowing humour. The constant flow of smutty humour and a largely British cast make the film feel very much like ‘Carry on Sade’. ‘Quills’ present archetypes rather than characters and this leaves competent actors Joaquin Phoenix and Kate Winslet struggling to make the best of sketchy roles. Winslet clearly enjoys the opportunity to work with Billie Whitelaw and their scenes have a pleasing chemistry. In a reversal that Sade would have appreciated Sade’s supportive and devoted wife Renée Pélagie (Jane Menelaus) is portrayed in ‘Quills’ as a masochistic schemer alongside those other sadiean archetypes like the knowing maid, the sadistic doctor and the tempted priest. As in Sade’s writing the narrative reaches physical extremes in pursuit of its themes. It succeeds as an entertaining fantasy about Sade rather than a serious study of his life or ideas. ‘Quills’ may be one of the most fanciful and least effective cinematic attempts to examine Sade but its reversals, melodrama, sex and blood would have appealed to Sade’s sexual imagination. Tongues are ripped out; victims are flogged and tortured but ‘Quills’ deploys its bloody imagery to illustrate themes that bear little relation to more radical interpretations of Sade’s philosophy. ‘Quills’ does the Marquis a disservice in its reluctance to examine the political or social challenges of his writing too closely. This is a conservative film for conservative times; shy of frightening away potential viewers it offers some mild titillation whilst sidestepping issues confronted directly by braver filmmakers.

Sade has always seemed more at home in France than in England or America. ‘Marquis’ (1989) presents him as an intellectual and cultural icon as well as a monstrous pervert. Roland Topor and Henri Xhonneau have created what feels like a potted guide to Sade’s philosophy for children’s television. It’s impossible to suggest in good conscience that cheerful scenes of udder torture and talking genitals are appropriate material for minors but this is the only way to describe such a unique and curiously endearing film. Set on the cusp of the French Revolution Sade is imprisoned in the Bastille where he attempts to curry favour with the prison authorities so that they leave him alone to his writing. He is reluctantly drawn into nefarious and increasingly desperate plots by the ailing regime to conceal its corruption and revolutionary attempts to spark popular rebellion.  If this sounds rather dry, please consider that ‘Marquis’ is performed by a cast of skilled mimes wearing animal costumes and reconsider. The animal symbolism works on multiple levels to encompass cultural, historical and linguistic tropes with pleasing aplomb. Juliette and Justine are cows (with generous udders); the masochistic prison governor is a cockerel, the chaplain a randy old goat and Sade a mournful spaniel. Short and sweet, the film is shot using very few sets and some quaint period exteriors. The writing is sharp and concise, almost epigrammatic. Topor and Xhonneau let the imagery and some surreal animated dream sequences handle most of the philosophy. They also offer another, unique perspective on sadiean discourse: Sade has philosophical debates with his penis. This organ appears as mournful as its owner and is called Colin. Together, Sade and Colin discuss the relationship between ideas and action, the sexual imperative and political expediency. These debates are found elsewhere but they seem more resonant coming from a talking erection. ‘Marquis’ playfully engages with Sade’s anticlericalism, his interest in theatre and the subversion of social power: Virtue is punished and vice rewarded. There is also a scene where Spaniel Sade sodomises his ratty Jailer with a lobster. Spaniel Sade remains a detached observer throughout the sexual action which leads eventually to a painful divorce; the member feeling too constrained by his master’s obsession with writing rather than doing. Sade sets out at the end of the film for a life of literary contemplation with radical cow Juliette whilst Colin ambles off into the opportunities of a new revolutionary dawn. It’s a shame that Colin didn’t go on to a career in television, perhaps introducing ‘The X Factor’ (perhaps he did). Ultimately this is a film that must be seen, descriptions cannot do it justice. Despite all kinds of lewd behaviour, the overall impression it leaves the viewer is gentle sweetness, a very unusual response to Sade.

Sade’s significance in French culture is explored further in Benoît Jacquot’s ‘Sade’ (1999). Daniel Auteuil plays Sade as a libertine set within the philosophe tradition, a pragmatist rather than an ideologue. Jacquot attempts to rediscover the humanity hidden inside the monstrous accretions of Sade’s reputation. He explores the Marquis’ long-term relationship with his mistress Marie-Constance Quesnet (Marianne Denicourt) and places him firmly within the context of French Revolutionary events and ideas. This calm and balanced approach offers a refreshing antidote to the hysterical fervour of ‘Quills’.  Although Sade is ostensibly a supporter of the revolution his aristocratic lineage and pornographic writing make him appear suspect in the eyes of the increasingly paranoid authorities and he is imprisoned. The film is set not in the lunatic asylum at Charenton where he spent his final years but a revolutionary prison at Picpus on the outskirts of Paris. Sade describes Picpus as a paradise in his letters, the aristocrats confined there await judgement by revolutionary tribunal and, perhaps death by guillotine but the daily regime is comparatively humane. Despite the outward civility of Picpus the inmates live with constant fear and uncertainty. This is a paying prison and those who can no longer afford to pay will be returned to the horrors of overcrowded city prisons. ‘Sade’ is set in 1794 and the frenzied violence of the revolution is always close. Outside the prison walls the revolution has entered its most bloody phase. Overworked revolutionary committees attempt to suppress violent social disorder amidst turbulent, deadly factionalism. Robespierre and his supporters plan a ‘Festival of the Supreme Being’ to celebrate the triumph of reason whilst order is enforced with the brutal extermination of dissent. Andrzej Wajda also dramatizes the violence and confusion of this period (known as ‘The Terror’) to great effect in his film ‘Danton’ (1983). Marie-Constance Quesnet courts the favour of Fournier, one of Robespierre’s zealots (Grégoire Colin) in an attempt to save Sade’s life. Jacquot emphasises the youthful inexperience of this character, struggling to wield power in a world where chaos holds sway, his naïve purity burnt to a crisp by long hours and constant conflict. Jacquot presents Sade’s sexual pathology without melodrama: Auteuil portrays Sade’s obsession with lists and counting, his fascination with obscene language as a matter of fact alongside his passion for voyeuristic theatricals and bodily mortification. Sade’s philosophy is interpreted here as the indulgence of sexual fantasy to free the human spirit from confinement (be it physical or emotional). He teaches young, virginal aristocrat Emilie (Isild de Bosco) to let go of her fear of death by embracing her sexuality in the safe confines of role-play like an anachronistic psychotherapist. Placing Sade within the context of the Terror puts his sexual practices into perspective for modern audiences. Sade’s interest in flagellation pales into insignificance beside mass graves filled with decapitated corpses and labourers playing catch with severed heads. The only real sexual violence in the film comes from Quesnet’s young revolutionary lover who is driven to rage by her continuing interest in the libertine. Mouth bloody, she tells Fournier that Sade, despite his violent reputation never did her any physical harm as if to confirm that his zeal is much more dangerous than Sade’s debauchery.

Unusually Jacquot’s film addresses Sade’s relationship to women in realistic terms. Francine du Plessix Gray’s detailed studies of Sade’s relationships with Marie-Constance Quesnet (whom he nicknamed ‘Sensible’) and his wife Renée Pélagie present a very different picture of Sade from the clichéd imaginary portraits of a leering monster who cowers over a timid virgin, whip in hand. In ‘Sade’ Quesnet is clearly the stronger partner and it is her influence that saves him from the guillotine. For Sade Quesnet represents the liberty that the revolution is unable to deliver, offering him freedom to pursue his philosophy without rancour or prejudice. Sade’s ingénue Emilie is also an assertive presence. Unlike the simple victim of Sade’s ‘Justine’ she is both virtuous and wise beyond her years. She regards much of Sade’s philosophical posturing with a knowing smile and raised eyebrow. Ultimately, she overcomes her fear of the unknown and needs only Sade’s confirmation to step outside convention and find spiritual liberation. Auteil’s low-key performance presents Sade as a normal man in abnormal times, whose ability to honestly confront sexuality is ahead of its time. ‘Sade’ is a sober and balanced study which offers some biographical material, a little philosophy but a heavy sense of Sade’s historical context.  Jacquot’s Sade is too modern and too likeable a figure here, in keeping with the more nuanced view of Sade found in French culture. The brutal mechanics of the revolution appear more destructive than Sade’s anticlericalism and penchant for dildos. The image of Robespierre’s broken jaw falling open as he is guillotined is more shocking and memorable than any of Sade’s sexual games.

Sade’s passion for transgressive imagery and his extreme anti-clericalism endeared him to surrealists; Luis Bunuel depicts the Castle of Silling from ‘120 Days of Sodom’ in his 1930 film ‘L’Age D’Or’. In this spirit veteran Czech surrealist Jan Švankmajer brings Sade into the present to renew his assault on convention, propriety and intellectual lethargy in his film ‘Lunacy’ (2005).  Švankmajer introduces his film to the viewer in person and explicitly acknowledges Sade’s influence. Distancing himself from what is to follow he describes his ‘horror film’ as ‘degenerate’ and ‘infantile’. Švankmajer claims that he is directing a piece of theatre about ‘how to run a lunatic asylum’. With ironic deadpan he prosaically reminds us that this central metaphor is also about ‘the madhouse we live in today’. Švankmajer’s poised detachment reinforces the film’s sadeian tone and Sade often prefaces his own writing in a similar manner. In his introductions to ‘120 days’ and ‘Justine’ he makes it clear to his readers that he is merely an observer directing the action for their enlightenment and describes his own characters as vile. Švankmajer is a master of somatic imagery and utilises it to maximum effect. Detached tongues writhe and crawl like caterpillars; glistening brains wander in procession and meat puppets dance in a cardboard theatre. Always partial to frightening food, Švankmajer revels in coprophilous chocolate and offal. He also has a keen eye for artistic detail; look out for the Marquis’ ornamental cane which is based on an imaginary portrait of Sade by Gévaudon.  Jan Třίska plays Sade with leering, erratic intensity. He loves practical jokes and laughs uncontrollably at the misfortunes and lazy thinking of others. Švankmajer places Sade in modern France (actually Czechoslovakia) but keeps him anachronistically in 18^th century costume. Sade observes a world of chaos and confusion from the comfort of his carriage like the characters in Goddard’s ‘Weekend’ (1967), the film suggests that Sade the libertine would feel very much at home in the twenty-first century. Jean (Pavel Liška), who drifts into Sade’s orbit, is very much a modern man and his dialogue emphasises the fragility of those comfortable preconceptions that continue to govern ‘civilized’ human action. After witnessing an orgy of sadeian excess that includes flagellation, coprophilia and blasphemy Jean confronts Sade over breakfast. The great libertine takes this opportunity to expound his rejection of the maternal principle, personified in the cruel mother of nature: God is impotent, blasphemy is the rejection of false morality and rebellion is a creative duty. After he has systematically demolished all Jean’s beliefs on religion and human goodness Sade guffaws hysterically and apparently chokes to death on a banana. Švankmajer is suspicious of dogma in any form and finds Sade’s pedantry as risible as the conventions that he mocks.

‘Lunacy’ eventually returns to the asylum of Charenton where Sade indulges his penchant for lunatic theatrics and social experimentation. These sequences recall Juan Lopez Moctezuma’s ‘The Mansion of Madness’ (1972), an eccentric adaptation of Edgar Allen Poe’s ‘The System of Dr Tarr and Professor Fether’ (1845) which boasts costume design by Leonora Carrington (another surrealist).  Charenton’s lunatics may be running the asylum but when order is finally restored Švankmajer is keen to show us that the authoritarians are much, much worse. Švankmajer’s film reflects the playfulness of ‘Marquis’ and the theme of sanity from the mouths of the insane found in Brooks’ ‘Marat/Sade’. It celebrates the long and fertile interplay between Sade and surrealism. Some viewers may find Švankmajer’s meat and dessert imagery easier to digest than the explicit torture and degradation of Pasolini’s ‘Salò’.

Peter Brooks ‘Marat/Sade’ (1967) adapts Peter Weiss’s play which follows Sade (Patrick Magee) as he directs his fellow inmates in his own dramatization of the assassination of revolutionary journalist Jean Paul Marat. The play offers Sade an opportunity to dissect the failure of revolutionary politics in the context of his own subversive sexual and social philosophy. Brooks keeps the viewer in a state of tension like the audience at Charenton as sexual frustration and lunatic rage simmer constantly beneath the surface of the performance. The regime at Charenton is keen to present itself as enlightened and rational in its treatment of social deviance but reverts to type when dissent becomes a physical threat at the end of the film. Sally Jacobs’ austere production design ensures that ‘Marat/Sade’ looks and sounds like it is being performed in a public latrine but also creates an arena for debate with very few distractions. Left with no space for complacency or comfort the audience is receptive to the political discussion at the heart of the film. This strategy constantly risks the opposite effect of alienating the viewer but allows Weiss’ fine text room to work and results in some compelling performances. Patrick Magee is a brooding, melancholic presence, calm and steady as he expounds the socio-political ideas at the centre of Sade’s work whilst engaging in debate with Ian Richardson’s hollow-eyed and sickly Marat. Glenda Jackson’s languid Charlotte Corday is provoked to violence by the bloodshed of the revolution and becomes both victim and executioner. These central performances are supported by the outstanding cast of the Royal Shakespeare Company production, actors familiar with the play and who thrive on its experimental performance style. The viewer will recognise many faces from English television and cinema including Michael Williams, Freddie Jones and the wonderful Jeanette Landis.  ‘Marat/Sade’ is an exercise in ensemble performance as both actors and crew work together to present Sade’s arguments and confront the viewer directly with the implications of his philosophy.

Adrian Mitchell’s screenplay refuses to patronise and repeatedly challenges the viewer to question their own prejudices and suppositions. It refutes the view that history and progress are synonymous and rejects revolutions where basic rules remain unchanged leaving the powerful to feed on the weak. Sade identifies the unchallenged supremacy of market forces, compromise and expediency as the true governors of human society. Weiss uses the same example that Foucault uses in his book ‘Discipline and Punish’ (1975), the elaborate execution of the regicide Robert-François Damiens in 1757, to make the link between violence and political power found in Sade explicit.  Both play and film explore the changing nature of political power as it is enacted on the body of the individual. The exercise of force through extermination on an industrial scale seen in the Terror of the French Revolution prefigures subsequent and equally devastating holocausts. Sade welcomes revolutionary change but is frustrated by the failure of human revolutions that end in mass bloodshed and the rebirth of conservatism. Instead, he longs for a transformation of human consciousness. In Sade’s view the power relationships expressed in human sexuality act as metaphor for the power of state over the individual. Social change will only occur by understanding and subverting these relationships, but Sade is too pragmatic to believe that this can ever happen. In contrast to his more fashionable contemporary Rousseau, he sees nature as a cruel uncaring mistress rather than a nurturing mother. Her ‘natural order’ is for the strong to oppress the weak and this remains true in both the human and natural worlds.

Weiss’ Sade delights in exposing the contradictions and fallibility of the human condition. Although he finds violence sexually arousing, he is horrified by the political violence of the revolution. He enjoys the sexual theatrics of judgement and punishment but refuses to sit in judgement over others; Sade’s refusal to serve in a revolutionary tribunal was one of the reasons that he was imprisoned. Sade can offer no comfort and no easy solutions, only an eternal, subversive question. Despite the bleak prognosis and currently unfashionable political stance the film never comes across as a depressing polemic. The play has a strong anti-war message (both film and play were produced during the Vietnam War) and this remains as relevant now as it was in 1967. Weiss presents both sides of the arguments and leaves the audience to decide for themselves (or choose not to decide at all). ‘Marat/Sade’ is scurrilous, funny and has great sing-along musical numbers. Its confrontational stance seems strange to viewers forty or so years after it was released; audiences used to comfort media and soothing infotainment will be horrified. At Charenton the superintendent frequently steps into the action to censor Sade’s play or moderate language when it clashes with ideas that have become distasteful or unfashionable. The play is set 15 years after the revolution as a new enlightenment is already creating a revisionist view of the past. Viewers at the beginning of the 21^st Century are so comfortable with the machinery of authoritarian control that we may find his interventions reasonable rather than offensive and leave Brooks, Weiss and Sade shaking their heads in weary resignation.

‘Marat Sade’ introduces many of the questions and prophetic elements of Sade’s work that Pier Paolo Pasolini explores exhaustively in ‘Salò or the 120 Days of Sodom’ (1975). In Brooks’ film we are introduced to Sade as an intellectual principle rather than a human character. Pasolini goes much further and constructs a narrative based entirely on sadeian principles. He follows Sade’s tendency to take ideas to their logical extreme, physically expressing intellectual concepts in the flesh. In his ‘Philosophy in the Boudoir’ (1795) Sade expresses his rejection of the reproductive principle by physically ‘sealing up’ the mother figure. Literalists see this as extreme sexual fantasy; modern literary and social theorists see it as a metaphor. Canadian director David Cronenberg works in a similar way and his work has provoked similar shocked responses. Whereas ‘Marat/Sade’ presents sadeian ideas for debate ‘Salò’ acts them out in a torrent of somatic imagery and Sade’s socio-political discourse becomes flesh. The power of the state over the individual is expressed by its power over the body of its subjects and this relationship is dramatized in the punishment of the body through humiliation and physical mutilation.

In ‘Salò’ Pasolini takes Sade’s most notorious work as inspiration and confines four fascist ‘worthies’ with a ready supply of victims for a structured programme of violent sexual degradation and social experimentation. Salò was, in fact, a miniature fascist state established during the closing days of the Italian fascism in 1944 and this environment provides the perfect setting for the sexual extremes catalogued in Sade’s novel. In choosing to update the narrative to recent history Pasolini implicitly acknowledges the continuing resonance of Sade’s ideas.  He examines the mechanics and philosophy of fascism in an environment where state control over the body is absolute. Sade’s presence is everywhere in ‘Salò’: He regularly uses numbers, lists and schedules in his writing and organisation is an integral part of his sexual fetishism. In his novel we find complicated, iterative lists of victims, syllabi of degradation. Pasolini’s ‘Salò’ is divided into neat sections; as in Dante’s description of Hell these ‘circles’ are progressive, ordered and rational. Each segment of the film is announced with formal black on white inter-titles and the film ends with a bibliography. Such formal structures and schedules reflect fascist preoccupation with order and routine much like the rail timetables that governed deportment to the concentration camps. Bureaucratic order masks the messy chaos of political violence and the irrationality of hatred. Fascism often deploys aesthetics in the service of the state. The eccentric and disturbing rituals found in ‘Salò’ display the same delight in bizarre costumes and theatricality recorded by Leni Riefenstahl and other propagandists.

Despite all its horrors, ‘Salò’ is beautifully designed by Dante Ferretti and meticulously shot by Tonino Delli Colli (both regular Pasolini collaborators). The elegant aesthetics accentuate the viewers’ role as voyeur. Framing remains formal, composed, and flat. Colour and line are consciously deployed to heighten this distancing effect. The square forties cut of formal clothing works to the same end as actors move through the frame or are placed like cut-outs in a toy theatre. ‘Salò’ includes coprophilous feasts and theatrical executions, but the spectacle mocks the sweaty intimacy of pornography and makes the viewer an observer rather than participant. Pasolini reinforces this effect by showing us the climatic atrocities from the viewpoint of a spectator watching through binoculars who then reverses the lenses to distance us still further. As in the modern world of global communication and real-time news we must experience suffering through a distorted infinity of filters. Sade’s writing creates a similar effect with its stiff, stagy descriptions of sexual violence and leaves the reader curiously uninvolved. Try reading a passage from any pornographic novel that you may have handy alongside some of Sade’s ‘120 Days’ to test this assertion. Despite the moral outrage provoked by ‘Salò’ the film is anti-pornographic and feels more like a scientific documentary than a narrative film. Pasolini describes a holocaust performed in pompous, vacuous ritual, a holocaust where we can watch but never intervene. ‘Salò’ reminds us that fascism gains and maintains power by feeding on our own social and political lethargy.

Sade’s novel holds up a distorted mirror to other structured story cycles like the Arabian Nights, Decameron and Canterbury Tales. For Pasolini ‘Salò’ is a logical progression after his own adaptations of these works in his ‘Trilogy of Life’, films that represent an optimistic attempt to engage with a particular kind of social cinema. These large-scale literary anthologies are cast mostly with non-professional actors and celebrate common themes of life, love and death through the process of storytelling.   Storytelling is an important part of the ritual in ‘Salò’ but here this most basic of human activities is corrupted when the fascists employ sexually experienced duenna to heighten arousal with obscene tales. This is art in the service of oppression and these stories offer sterility and slavery rather than enrichment and liberation. The corruption of creativity is central to the fascism of ‘Salò’ and some critics argue that this film reflects Pasolini’s increasing despair with art and politics.

Viewed in retrospect, ‘Salò’ feels like a purposive climax to the trilogy which acts as a balance to the films that precede it. Pasolini reminds us of the realities which govern all our lives and warns against the over-sentimentalization of culture. The tales that we tell can connect us with our humanity, but they can also enslave us in prejudice. Pasolini was a rigorous self-critic and, like Sade, utterly pragmatic about state power and control. Viewing ‘Salò’ requires a steady nerve and an open mind. The reaction of viewers is often as interesting as the film itself. Hysterical laughter and walkouts are common but more often the audience remains in stunned silence, perhaps the most fitting response to one of the most incisive and powerful pieces of political cinema ever created.

Sade’s themes of power, control, and submission have only increased in relevance. Whether or not the Marquis intended to make complex socio-political arguments in his work may be moot, but cinema offers an excellent entry point to a hoard of ideas and imagery that continues to provoke and shock. In a world where many are included in the illusion of democracy whilst real power remains in the hands of those who run the marketplace, we need Sade’s imagination to challenge our complacency more than ever.

Connections

Film

‘Un Chien Andalou’ directed by Luis Buñuel (1929)

‘L’Age d’Or’ directed by Luis Buñuel (1930)

‘Belle de Jour’ directed by Luis Buñuel (1967)

‘Marat/Sade’ directed by Peter Brook (1967)

‘Marquis de Sade’ directed by Cy Enfield and Roger Corman (1969)

‘Juliette’ directed by Jess Franco (1970)

‘Eugenie’ directed by Jess Franco (1974)

‘Mansions of Madness’ directed by Juan López Moctezuma (1973)

‘Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom’ directed by Per Paolo Pasolini  (1975)

‘Marquis De Sade’s Justine’ directed by Chris Boger (1977)

‘Dangerous Liaisons’ directed by Stephen Frears (1988)

‘Valmont’ directed by Milos Forman (1989)

‘Marquis’ directed by Henri Xhonneux (1989)

‘Quills’ directed by Philip Kaufman (2000)

‘Sade’ directed by Benoît Jacquot (2000)

‘The Libertine’ directed by Laurence Dunmore (2004)

‘Lunacy’ directed by Jan Švankmajer (2005)

‘The Lobster’ directed by Yorgos Lanthimos (2015)

‘Liberté’ directed by Albert Serra (2019)

NB. This is not a comprehensive list of sadeian cinema, merely a selection

Reading

Stephen Barber, Pasolini: The Massacre Game, Terminal Film, Text, Words 1974-1975, Sun Vision, 2013

Georges Bataille, Eroticism, Penguin, 2001

Georges Bataille, Story of the Eye, Penguin, 1979

Angela Carter, Sadeian Woman: An Exercise in Cultural History, Virago, 1979

Robert Darnton, The Forbidden Best-Sellers of Pre-Revolutionary France, Fontana, 1996

Rikki Ducornet, Entering Fire, Chatto, 1986

Rikki Ducornet, The Fan-Maker’s Inquisition: A Novel of the Marquis De Sade, Holt, 1999

Francine du Plessix Gray, At Home with the Marquis De Sade, Chatto, 1999

Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison, Penguin, 1977

Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality volumes q, 2 and 3, Penguin, 1979-1988

Stuart Hood and Graham Cowley, Introducing Marquis de Sade, Icon Books, 1999

Maurice Lever, Marquis De Sade: A Biography, HarperCollins, 1993

Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade; 120 Days of Sodom, Arrow, 1991 (NB. This edition contains Simone De Beauvoir’s introduction ‘Must We Burn Sade?’

Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade; Three Complete Novels: Justine or the Misfortunes of Virtue, Philosophy in the Bedroom, Eugénie De Franval and other writings, Arrow, 1991

Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade; Juliette, Arrow, 1991