The remake of the classic erotic drama Emmanuelle returns 50 years after it shocked audiences worldwide with its steamy scenes. But the revival of the French film, which stood out for its X-rated storyline, is one big anticlimax, critics say.
The 1974 cult film starring Sylvia Kristel tells the erotic story of a young French woman who travels to Bangkok, Thailand, to enhance her sexual experiences.
The adult classic, directed by French filmmaker Just Jaeckin, caused quite a stir, with millions of people turning up to see Kristel, who was depicted half-naked on a poster with a string of pearls over her breasts.
The film played for more than a decade on the Champs-Élysées in Paris. Spaniards, living under the Franco dictatorship and having banished the scandalous Emmanuelle, flocked to France to see the racy film.
But the latest version, directed by Audrey Diwan and starring French actress Noemie Merlant, tells a revised story of Emmanuelle’s sexual awakening during her trip to Hong Kong.
Poster for the 1974 French film ‘Emmanuelle’
Scene from ‘Emmanuelle’ from 1974, starring Sylvia Kristel
Poster for the 2024 film adaptation of ‘Emmanuelle’ starring French actress Noemi Merlant
The French erotic film was known for introducing soft pornography into mainstream media.
Leading actress Kristel also rose to fame for her steamy nude scenes in another 40 films, including leading roles in X-rated versions of Lady Chatterly’s Lover and the World War I spy drama Mata Hari.
But in the MeToo era, Diwan’s version, which premiered last weekend at the San Sebastian International Festival in Spain, seems to have stripped away the racy sex scenes and instead strives to keep female sexuality and pleasure away from the male gaze.
Speaking with The Times, Diwan said the film is “about how we deal with pleasure in our society, not just sexual pleasure,” when talking about the film’s surprising lack of explicit sex scenes.
“If people want to see sex scenes, they have the Internet,” she said.
But as reviews for the film trickle in, the general consensus is that the long-awaited remake of the French erotic drama “can only be considered a disappointment from Diwan,” according to Variety, who called the film “one big anticlimax.”
The American magazine wrote that “the most surprising departure from the 1974 film is the significant reduction in sexual content,” adding that “it is difficult and possibly impossible to say anything new and meaningful about female desire while honoring the film’s signature spirit of superficial, transparent lust.”
Scene from the 2024 version of Emmanuelle, which has been described as an ‘anticlimax’ by critics
The 1974 French erotic drama was directed by Just Jaeckin. The storyline tells the story of a woman who travels to Bangkok to improve her sexuality
Screenshot of the new version of Emmanuelle, which is said to be devoid of the racy scenes its predecessor became known for
A scene from the 1974 version of ‘Emmanuelle’. The film was the first in a series of French softcore pornography
In France, the film sold 8.9 million copies at the box office. It also became hugely popular in the rest of Europe, the US and Asia.
Scene from the new version of ‘Emmanuelle’
‘Emmanuelle’, 2024, premiered last weekend at the San Sebastian International Film Festival in Spain
As for Screen daily, The reimagining of the 1974 soft-core classic is a “cripplingly pointless imitation” of the original film, while IMBD called the revival “disappointingly hollow.”
In the meantime, The Hollywood Reporter has said that the “erotic drama Emmanuelle is more or less the embarrassing exercise in pointless revisionist filmmaking that most expected it to be.”
French newspaper Le Figaro said the film will not be shown on the Champs-Elysees for the next ten years.
However, some critics praise the feminist slant of the new film, Cinema Europe in which he praised the film for “placing the woman at the forefront as a desirable subject, full of beauty, cinematic power and sensuality.”