Malizia

Laura Antonelli...

This is the movie that made italian actress Laura Antonelli an international sex star and features the famous scene where she's standing on a ladder in a short skirt and no underwear, but frankly she's a lot more memorable in other films I've seen like "Venus in Furs", "The Divine Nymph", "The Venetian Lady", and even Lucio Fulci's "The Eroticist". This also doesn't really quite make it as a comedy (although these dark and perverse continental variations are almost always preferable to the painfully unfunny American and British variety). It functions somewhat as a coming-of-age film I guess, even if the disturbed young protagonist isn't necessarily a very sympathetic character. You could do worse I suppose. 

What it's gonna be? the boy or his daddy?

Just the right amount of lighting.

The action takes place in an upper-class family in Sicily, where the mother has died and is supplanted by a young housekeeper, Angela (Laura Antonelli). Although she becomes engaged to the widower rather quickly, she is no tramp or gold digger. She really enjoys being a housekeeper and mother to the three boys, although she isn't much older than some of them, and seems genuinely attached to the cavaliere. Her role is very complex and subtle -- she is attractive and coy, a girl who has taken on a very mature role. While the benjamin still misses his real mama, the teenage sons and the father are enthralled and spellbound by her.

This boy needs some sexual teachings.

I can see uranus.

What could be a beautifully shot erotic fluffpiece then takes a twist towards a much darker side. Realising that he won't win her over romantically, the middle son, Nino, begins to harass, blackmail and eventually dominate Angela, by exploiting her precarious social position as someone who is just a servant and at risk of being socially ostracised. I think that Angela also feels protective of her ward, and is not least not entirely unreceptive to his advances. And at the time, blowing the whistle on sexual harassment just wasn't socially acceptable -- the perpetrator was thus always at an advantage. But eventually, Angela manages to turn the table and break free from Nino.

Do you like my maid dress?

Let's not beat around the bush.

This is not only the most erotic, it is one of the best movies I have seen, ever. It's perfect. Don't let the fact that Laura Antonelli is drop-dead gorgeous or that this is an erotic movie filmed in 1973 fool you into lumping this masterpiece in with softcore flicks from the same era.  

And now, to your connoisseur pleasure here the film in its entirety since it's public domain material: