Delphine Seyrig

Donkey Skin

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The princess in her donkey skin coat

A big thing in France but barely talked about anywhere else, Jacques Demy’s Donkey Skin (Peau d’âne), sometimes known as The Magic Donkey, possibly owes its failure to ring cultural bells globally to its plot, which is about a king trying to marry his own daughter – incest, in other words. It’s Catherine Deneuve as the daughter, trying to put the king off with one ruse after another. Jean Marais as the king, Delphine Seyrig as a fairy godmother reinforcing the young woman’s belief that sleeping with daddy is wrong, and Jacques Perrin as the prince of a neighbouring kingdom who falls for the disguised young woman after she goes on the run … Read more

Daughters of Darkness

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Close up of the countess

Going only off the title, I thought Daughters of Darkness was going to be a typical early 1970s vampire movie, featuring breasty young goths with prosthetic teeth wafting around in chiffon. My prejudices. I was partly right – it is from the early 1970s, and it is about vampires of a sort. There are breasts too. But the tone is not the cartoon gothic of many a Hammer horror film. Instead this Belgian cult item goes in for a sort of chilly giallo – Northern Europe just isn’t as warm-toned as Italy. It’s all set in an out-of-season hotel in the Belgian port of Ostend, where a rich young man and his new … Read more