The French Sex Murders



As a longtime B-movie fan you would think I’d be used to movies that deliver on their titles, yet I was still surprised by how boring The French Sex Murders (1972) was. This Italian giallo (so no French people or much sex) is about a series of murders that start at a Paris bordello. The obvious suspect in the first murder is arrested, tried and sentenced to death. Before the sentence can be carried out the man escapes, but is decapitated in a motorcycle accident while on the run. That should be the end of it, but more people connected to the bordello are murdered, and the detective in charge (played by an actor who looks like Humphrey Bogart) tries to figure out what the hell is going on.


"You will mistake me for the real Humphrey Bogart. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon, and for the rest of your life."

Mostly, this movie is just boring. Most of the plot is just an excuse to introduce gazillions of red herrings. There are three noteworthy things:

- Each one of the murders is replayed five or six times, each time tinted a different color.

- The music is trippy.

- There is a scientist friend of the detective who asks the detective to procure the dead convict’s head. Apparently in France the police have the power to pass out body parts to anyone who asks nicely, because the detective hands the head over. Later the scientist’s assistant claims he saw the head’s eyes move. This wonderfully creepy subplot goes nowhere after that.

Posted: Tue - October 4, 2005 at      

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