Vixen [1968] [DVD]

Vixen (1968) is the most intelligent film to date in that uniquely American genre, the so-called skin-flick.

The movie directed by Russ Meyer is a celebration of zestful direction, photography and moral/political issues, and a lot of the time it's very funny. In a field filled with cheap and dreary productions, Meyer is the best craftsman and the only artist. He has developed a directing style so open, direct and good-humoured that it dominates his material.

It's done with such droll dialogue and high humour that even the most torrid scenes somehow manage to get outside themselves; coming across rather well given the movies genre. Meyer is also heavy on the redeeming social value department. His characters debate communism, Vietnam, draft dodging, civil rights and airplane hijacking, deciding in favour of civil rights.

The story line is barely strong enough to hold the scenes together; it involves a bush pilot and his wife (Vixen, portrayed by Erica Gavin) who take another couple on a fishing weekend in Canada. Also present are Vixen's brother Judd and his black friend Niles (aka Rufus), a draft evader protesting what he believes is a racist war. An Irish Marxist wanders in later from somewhere. There is also a Royal Canadian Mounted Policeman who wanders off somewhere.

The acting is barely competent, the list of credible actors includes a young Harrison Page (in the role of Niles Brook), as the black draft dodger who also stars in Russ Meyer's Beyond The Valley of the Dolls. Niles comes-off as a politically correct black American who is against the Vietnam war (and has a say in other social political issues for that matter).

Vixen, I guess, can best be described as good unserious fun. It is frankly presented as a skin-flick, and if you object to that kind of entertainment, stay away. It's approach to sex is more healthy and some-what rational compared to other movies of it's kind. And, to that end Vixen offers small morsels of rationality, the incestial shower scene involving Vixen and her brother Judd is one example, whereby Judd protests to showering with his sister by saying "We stopped doing that when you were twelve, you said yourself it wasn't right."

If you're looking for a sixties skin-flick look elsewhere, this movie has more substance than style (the style that is present in the movie is Russ Meyer's unique blend of photography and direction). In comparison to his previous movies this is the one that put Russ in the Hollywood spot-light, and lead to him directing Beyond The Valley of the Dolls (1970).

DVD extras: Trailer reel, director's audio commentary, Erica Gavin interview, photo album & scene selection.
Aspect ratio: Full frame

It is the first Russ Meyer film I have seen and I suppose while it may appeal strongly to fans of his work, there will be others, who will find it downright attrocious. As seen in reviews of some of his other works, the first question is whether it is porn or not. I guess it might be seen as a late 1960s version of soft porn and there is certainly nudity aplenty (the sex scenes will appear relatively quaint and funny to a modern viewer).

The movie revolves around the life of Vixen, a Canadian woman of voracious appetite (not of hte food kind) and for the time, I guess, empowerment. And while everything from racial relations, to free love, to communism, the Vietnam war and gender roles in disarray is thrown in, and in some way addressed, sex is probably the element used to shock the viewers; admittedly the shock would have been greater at the time than it is for a viewer today, although the impropriety of some relationships still has the power to surprise even today.

In some ways Russ Meyer was trying to push the boundaries in similar ways as Robert Heinlein (Stranger in a Strange Land) did in science fiction, or Frank Zappa (Have I Offended Someone) did in music for freedom of speech and expression. And in some ways, in spite of portraying women mostly scantily clad, busty and lusty, he possibly does more for their empowerment than many a feminist tract.

Whether he succeeds with it in this movie, will be very much up to the viewer to judge. But I guess his real classic - Faster Pussycat... Kill! Kill! [1966] [DVD] - compared by some to Pulp Fiction [DVD] [1994], is the one he should primarily be judged on.