Emmanuelle

Emmanuelle is the lead character in a series of French erotic films based on the protagonist in the novel of the same name, by Emmanuelle Arsan, written in 1959 and published in 1967.

Emmanuelle originated as the pen name Emmanuelle Arsan, used by Marayat Rollet-Andriane, a French-Thai actress who wrote a 1957 book, The Joys of a Woman, detailing the sexual exploits of a bored housewife. The first Emmanuelle film debuted in 1974 and starred Sylvia Kristel, who became synonymous with the role. The film embraced its X-rating and became a success, with an estimated audience of 300 million. It remains one of France's most successful films. The films' explicit content varied from softcore to full hardcore, though no penetration or oral sex made it to publicly available releases.

It spawned a film series with multiple sequels, and a video game. The original series consists of six theatrical films and seven made-for-television films, while a reboot was released in 2024. Emmanuelle was also the inspiration for several unrelated films and series, including the Italian series Black Emanuelle, or the American series Emmanuelle in Space, as well as many unofficial productions using the Emmanuelle name, capitalizing on the craze.

Character history

Emmanuelle appeared as the pen name of Marayat Rollet-Andriane, a French-Thai actress (1932–2005). Her 1957 book The Joys of a Woman detailed the sexual exploits of Emmanuelle, the "bored housewife" of a French diplomat. Rollet-Andriane's book caused a sensation in France and was banned.

The producer of another Arsan/Rollet-Andriane film Laure, Ovidio Assonitis, claimed that all books published under the pen name Emmanuelle Arsan were written by her husband Louis-Jacques Rollet-Andriane, rather than by Marayat.

Development

The first Emmanuelle film was the 1974 French theatrical feature Emmanuelle starring Dutch actress Sylvia Kristel (1952–2012) in the title role. She came to be the actress best identified with the role. This film pushed the boundaries of what was then acceptable on screen, with sex scenes, skinny-dipping, masturbation, the "Mile High Club", rape, and a scene in which a dancer lights a cigarette and puffs it with her vagina. This film was created and directed by French director Just Jaeckin.

Unlike many films that tried to avoid an X-rating, the first Emmanuelle film embraced it, and became a success with a viewing audience estimated at 300 million. It remains one of France's most successful films, and played in the Arc de Triomphe theatre for over eleven years. In France and the US the film was uncut, but British censors balked at masturbation and explicit sex. Heavy cuts were made to the film including the complete removal of the opium den rape and the infamous 'cigarette' sequence in the club.

Several sequels starring Kristel followed, beginning with Emmanuelle 2 known as Emmanuelle: The Joys of a Woman in its U.S. release, and also Emmanuelle l’antivierge in some European press materials, including the soundtrack LP and CD. Kristel sold her interest for $150,000, missing on a share of the film's $26m domestic gross. She was paid $6,000 for her role but negotiated a $100,000 contract for the sequel, Emmanuelle 2.

Kristel stepped away from the role in the 1980s, yielding to younger actresses, but returned for the seventh feature film. In 1992 and 1993, Kristel reprised the role of an older Emmanuelle for a series of made-for-cable films with titles such as Emmanuelle's Love and Emmanuelle's Perfume, which featured Marcela Walerstein as a younger version of Kristel's character. Kristel did not take part in any love scenes for this series, which also co-starred George Lazenby, also in a non-sexual role. Kristel also appeared in films throughout her career that capitalized on or parodied her Emmanuelle image, such as the American sex comedy Private Lessons.

A number of unofficial productions in Italy, Japan and the United States cashed in on the Emmanuelle craze, changing the spelling of the title. In a number of cases, the character's name was spelled "Emanuelle" suggesting these films were not authorized. Among the best known were Italian "Black Emanuelle" films starring Laura Gemser, who became the second most popular actress to play Emanuelle in the 1970s. The 1978 spoof Carry On Emmannuelle (with double "N") starred Kenneth Williams as the French ambassador to London. Having lost his libido by landing on a church spire during a parachute jump, he discovers his sex-starved wife, Emmannuelle Prevert, has seduced a string of VIPs. It starred Suzanne Danielle in the title role.

After the last official Emmanuelle theatrical feature film, Emmanuelle au 7ème ciel (the seventh film for which Kristel returns as the main character), ASP began to produce further films, all featuring the character of Emmanuelle, albeit played by a series of actresses. These included a science fiction series in the 1990s called Emmanuelle in Space starring American actress Krista Allen in one of her first roles. Following spinoffs included TV series Emmanuelle 2000 starring Holly Sampson, TV and video series Emmanuelle's Private Collection starring Natasja Vermeer, and a one-off, Emmanuelle in Rio, starring Ludmilla Ferraz in her only acting credit.

At the 2008 Cannes Film Festival, Alain Siritzky said he was looking for a new Emmanuelle, with production on the first film scheduled to begin in September. It was announced at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival that Allie Haze (performing under the alias Brittany Joy) had been chosen. The direct-to-video series that starred Allie Haze was titled Emmanuelle Through Time.

It was announced at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival that a new reboot of the series was to get a cinematic release, written and directed by Audrey Diwan and featuring Noémie Merlant playing Emmanuelle. This version is set for release in 2024 with a distribution deal confirmed for several countries including France and the United States of America.

Box office

The film played to packed houses in Paris, running for years. Emmanuelle was also an international hit and has played to 300 million. French distribution company Studio Canal has acquired home video rights for a number of Emmanuelle movies and has released remastered DVDs of the films. Taking video and DVD into account revenue is estimated close to 650 million.[citation needed]

Explicit content

The sexual explicitness in Emmanuelle films varies from arty softcore to full hardcore, although no penetration or oral sex made it to public versions. Many question the place of hardcore scenes in Emmanuelle and ASP never attempted to mix the two genres after experimenting in the late 1980s.

• Emmanuelle 4 (1984), starring Kristel and new Emmanuelle Mia Nygren, had hardcore scenes shot, but they were never used. These scenes, which did not involve the main actors, were included in television versions and turned up as extras on European DVD editions of Emmanuelle 4 and in a version called "Emmanuelle 4X" on a VHS in France in the 1980s.
• Emmanuelle 5 (1987), directed by Walerian Borowczyk, was released in two versions: one with softcore love scenes, and a French home video version that extended several scenes with hardcore sex directed by Borowczyk (apparently[citation needed] Borowczyk said that he had not directed them). The scenes are the Love Express and dance studio segments, embellished with penetration, ejaculation and a woman urinating. This VHS version omits several minutes of footage seen in the public version (including dialogue and plot).
• Emmanuelle 6 (1988) also had two hardcore scenes (one short without ejaculation, but with fellatio and penetration, between a man and a woman whom Emmanuelle watches in a horse box, and the second longer, with fellatio, penetration and ejaculation, starring the same couple entering the place where Emmanuelle is being held prisoner at the end of the movie), directed by erotic horror specialist Jean Rollin. However, they were not used in the theater version, but were included on a hardcore VHS version in France.

Film appearances

Notes

Video game

The character of Emmanuelle is also featured in a video game of the same name, released by Coktel Vision in 1989.

In popular culture

• The American sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live aired a parody of the Emmanuelle films titled Danielle: A Free European Woman in their 01/19/2013 episode hosted by Jennifer Lawrence. The sketch featured Lawrence as the titular character, a free-spirited, sexually promiscuous, easily distracted French woman in a poorly dubbed to English film where she visits Italy with her lover, played by Fred Armisen.
• In the American television sitcom Seinfeld, the fictional movie "Rochelle, Rochelle", with the tagline "a young girl's strange, erotic journey from Milan to Minsk", is mentioned several times.
• In season 5, episode 4 of the American detective drama-comedy show Psych, Shawn Spencer references the franchise stating that he has seen them all, "even the one where she turns Black."

External links

• (by Alex Cox, The Guardian, Friday 15 December 2000)