There is nothing like FLESH+BLOOD. It's a big-budget, gorgeous looking historical epic with major stars, but made with the lurid sensibilities of a sleazy Italian exploitation movie. Paul Verhoeven has never been shy about sexual nudity (SHOWGIRLS, BASIC INSTINCT) or extreme violence (TOTAL RECALL, ROBOCOP, STARSHIP TROOPERS), but FLESH+BLOOD's brutal (and probably realistic) look at the mercenary life-style in 1501 makes his other films look like Driving Miss Daisy. It is either the most exploitive Hollywood film or the biggest budget euro-sleaze exploitation movie. Either way, it's something to see.This unrated 2:08 international version really turns up the dial. Jennifer Jason Leigh's big rape scene, already jarring in the R-rated edit, is over-the-top. And the constant non-sexual violence is no picnic either. But it's not the content so much as the sheer gratuitous, seedy sensationalism of it all that boggles the mind.
Example: A beautiful young nun accidentally gets a sword stuck through her brain during a battle. While people try to save her she goes into convulsions, so she's tied to the bed spread eagle so she doesn't injure herself further. While people minister to the gravely injured girl, Verhoeven, classy guy that he is, chose to put the camera at the foot of the bed, so the young nun in convulsions is bouncing up and down naked with her legs open facing the camera. I ask you, who the heck sneaks in a "beaver shot" of a brain damaged nun having a seizure?
That scene is a perfect example of the difference between eroticism and prurience. (Like when Jayne Mansfield was decapitated in a car crash, and the rumor-probably true-was that she wasn't wearing panties and you could see up her dress in the police photos. That's prurience. Elton John's, "All the paper's had to say was that Marilyn was found in the nude" is a less extreme example.) I'm not necessarily knocking prurience. It's poor taste, but provokes a unique reaction. Making art is hard enough without limiting your palette in advance, and indiscriminate stimulation of the audience's base passions can be used to good effect. It's like when old-school comedians said, "Working blue is cheap. Anyone can get a laugh with bad language." You and I have seen enough comics to know that's not true. There are funny foul-mouthed comics and unfunny foul-mouthed comics. One can call Paul Verhoeven an exploitation film-maker, but he's a GREAT exploitation film-maker. (It's like saying THE SHINING is "just" a horror movie.)
Another example: when Jennifer Jason Leigh shares her first kiss with the handsome prince they happen to be standing beneath the rotting corpses of two hanged men. (Other than that, it's in an idyllic setting.) Last example: When the band of mercenaries take down a fortified town a looter pushes over a woman in the street and starts raping her. A little boy walks up and-in mid assault-starts stripping off the woman's gold jewelry like it's no big thing.
As vulgar as this film strives to be it doesn't bother me because vulgarity is part of Verhoeven's genius. You have to just roll with it. In between the Grand Guignol set-pieces it's a pretty good historical action epic. (Similarly, I have little use for slimy gross-out effects in movies but I accept them cheerfully in a David Cronenberg movie because they are not optional-icky biological stuff is part and parcel of Cronenberg's genius.)
The Plot: Leading man Rutger Hauer stars as a 16th-century mercenary hired by a Western European ruler (Fernando Hilbeck) to assault a neighboring kingdom. When the king reneges on his promises to Hauer and his men, they kidnap his son's fiancée (Jennifer Jason Leigh) and hole up in a nearby castle that's crawling with plague. Romance ensues between captive and captor which leads to a lot of jealousy within Hauer's gang, with good reason. (The bawdy camp follower who once had Hauer's attentions probably resents the fact that noble woman Leigh has the majority of her teeth. How are you supposed to compete with that?) Widescreen. Also released under the title The Rose and the Sword."
Directed by Paul Verhoeven; featuring Rutger Hauer, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Tom Burlinson, Jack Thompson, Susan Tyrrell.
