Connianatu
How wonderful it is to see this fine actress carry a film and carry it so beautifully.
Dirtylogy
It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.
Catangro
After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.
Philippa
All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.
Robbins Judge
There seems to be some interest in this old tale, with the relatively recent BBC drama staring Rebecca Night, which was well made, even though it was devoid of the erotic content of the John Cleland work that I got my hands on soon after. Having caught the Fanny Hill bug, a quick search on a well known on-line retailer, a few purchases and I soon had in my possession two DVDs of two different Fanny Hill productions. One stars Cheryl Dempsey in a Valentine Palmer production, and the other is this production starting Lisa Raines. I am impressed by both, but let's focus on this.Much of what I had thought of writing in this review have been written by many other reviewers here already, so I shall not repeat, criticise nor support. This production is an extremely good production of an extremely explicit erotic novel. It is done with brilliant details of the period, tackling erotically explicit subjects in good humour, and without turning it into a pornographic movie, which it could easily have done. Of course there are naked people, and some scenes can be explicit but not in a hard-core manner, this is, after all, a movie of Fanny Hill, but I don't feel that any nudity was uncalled for.There are some well known actors in the movie, notably Oliver Reed, Wilfred Hyde-White and Shirley Winters, but they were in the movie as mere characters, and I did not feel they were particularly good in the movie, perhaps simply to provide gravitas? The star is the unknown, and sadly, still unknown Lisa Raines Foster. An extremely pretty girl, and a surprising good actress. I didn't think I would say so, but she did carry the movie. Having read the book, and seen the BBC version before watching this movie, I thought Lisa Raines Foster made this movie a memorable one. OK, the cynics amongst you would say that I am swayed by the nudity, by the numerous full-frontal nude scenes of a beautiful woman. To a point, yes, she is very very sexy. But thinking for a moment, this has not been the reason. Lisa Raines Foster is a very good actress. She could act, with or without her clothes on, her smiles, her eye expressions made me feel her feelings, and this is special. It is such a shame she has not made more movies.Overall, a thoroughly enjoyable movie.
MARIO GAUCI
When I chanced upon FANNY HILL at the local DVD rental shop, I only had a vague notion of either this version existing or of what the "classic" novel was about – but since American sexploitation maverick Russ Meyer had made it into an intriguing movie himself back in 1964, I figured it was a bawdy period romp and, since I had been in a costume picture state-of-mind for a while now, I decided to give it a spin.The presence of three veteran film stars (Oliver Reed, Shelley Winters and Wilfrid Hyde-White) was also enticing but, unsurprisingly, they are only there for marquee value: Reed's almost incoherent Popeye-ish accent is simply embarrassing, likewise watching flabby madam Winters being surrounded by all that petite naked flesh (not hers, of course, but that of her charges and their consorts) flailing about, but it's octagenarian Hyde-White (in his last film, no less) who tops both of them by snuggling in bed with the title character…who is all of 19 years of age; I've seen Hyde-White in several of his earlier films and I'm positive he never performed a love scene in any of them! Indeed, it's gorgeous leading lady Lisa Foster – who, thankfully, indulges in much full-frontal nudity by shedding her clothing completely at every possible opportunity – which, even in the heavily-censored variant I've watched, makes this consistently raunchy period piece tolerable; it's a pity that she didn't get much ahead in her acting career as one would certainly have liked to see even more of her. Interestingly enough, she later switched to doing animation work and was also involved in the digital restoration of Walt Disney's SNOW WHITE AND THE SEVEN DWARFS (1937)! The orphaned innocent Fanny Hill soon falls in with some ladies of ill-repute as she reaches London to better her prospects, and is immediately instructed in what is expected of her by a more experienced companion Phoebe (Maria Harper) by jumping into bed with her, and later spying on their fellow co-workers in action through hidden holes in the wall BELLE DE JOUR (1967)-style! In fact, the film's plot line is very similar to that of Jess Franco's MARQUIS DE SADE'S JUSTINE (1968) and it's small wonder that the producer of that one, Harry Alan Towers, is also behind this production but, while I'd say FANNY HILL is a more agreeable picture, ultimately it's just too blandly made to stick in one's mind for much longer after it's finished.
Jackson Booth-Millard
I can't remember seeing the entire film, or the reason for the rather amusing sexual sounding title, but I do remember that there were a couple of good moments of female nudity and sex. Oliver Reed starred in it somewhere, but he obviously wasn't my concern when I saw it. I only cared about it because of the amusing named title, and the mention of quite a few sexual references. There are no scenes I can really remember that well, but I think there was one where two girls are seeing many people have sex through their above windows. I did not see any of Oliver Reed as far as can remember, but I don't think this is his type of film anyway. Okay!
Stefan Kahrs
This version of the once banned Fanny Hill story clearly had a budget to burn: we have various familiar faces in the supporting roles. Most of them just show up to pay the rent, but Shelley Winters' portrayal of a madam is convincing. Also, a lot of money has been spent on sets and costumes. This alone makes it a lot more watchable than the average erotic B-movie, not to mention that the general light-heartedness in which the film approaches its subject is much more suitable for creating eroticism than the Erotic Thriller US style which so often combines sex with violence and death.Still, this film has not managed to become a genre classic and it is not hard to see why. Most importantly, there is the actress playing the title heroine, Lisa Raines. While she's undeniably pretty (with or without clothes), her acting range is rather limited; it was probably impossible to get an established actress play such an exposed role. The 'innocent young girl' Lisa has to play at the beginning of the film is not completely believable, but much worse she completely fails to exude any sensuality in the later stages. This becomes especially obvious when we compare her to Maria Harper, the vampish actress playing the whore Phoebe. One gets the impression that Lisa/Fanny loves sex as a nice physical exercise in nice company. A similar criticism applies to her love interest: no charisma, no depth, and an instantly forgettable face. This being a British film it doesn't come as a surprise that the sex scenes do not come across as very erotic, and that seems more of a cultural problem than a problem with censorship. The notable exception are the scenes involving the already mentioned Maria Harper. I suppose, there must be some Italians in her recent ancestry.