Big Picture Big Sound

Disney This Ain't

Attention all older gentlemen. If you ever decide to write and star in a movie and are looking for a way to live out your fantasies on screen, you could do a lot worse than mimicking what Vadim Glowna has done with his "House of the Sleeping Beauties". Glowna is an accomplished writer, actor and author in his native  Germany and has attained some international success as well, including his appearances in Sam Peckinpah's "Steiner – Cross of Iron" and Claude Chabrol's "Quiet Days in  Clichy". Yet it is here that Glowna gets to live out what could well be a fantasy for him.

Edmond (Glowna) is a wealthy businessman in his late 60's that is having great difficulty adjusting to his life after losing his wife and only child many years earlier to a car accident. His friend Kogi (Maximillian Schell) suggests that he should visit an apartment to help him deal with his hopelessness. It is unclear exactly what is in this apartment but it has something to do with being in bed naked next to beautiful young women who will remain asleep while he spends the night with them. Hell, I'd do go for it and Edmond agrees to give it a try.

Edmond's chauffeur drops him off in front of a non-descript building and a knock on the door brings Madame (Angela Winkler), a woman probably in her fifties, who is serious, mysterious and fairly attractive. She is almost scary, but not quite. Almost motherly, but not quite. She is very difficult to pin. Madame tells Edmond of the house rules which are pretty simple. Edmond will spend the night next to a beautiful young girl who has been drugged to sleep through the night. He may touch her but not sexually and most importantly he should not attempt to awaken her. His gratification will be getting the comfort of holding on to a young pretty thing in order to make him feel younger.

Edmond enjoys his evening and becomes a regular of the establishment. Each time he sleeps with a different beautiful young woman. And believe me, these are all 10s. With each one he pulls back the sheets and admires their near perfect bodies and he cannot resist touching them. Most of the time he is with them we hear his thoughts. The problem is that these thoughts seem like a very vain attempt to somehow justify what we are watching by imbuing his lechery with extremely "heavy" thoughts and self-realizations. At first it sort of works. After a while it just seems like an elderly man getting his jollies and it becomes a borderline soft-core adult film, not that there is anything wrong with that.

"House of the Sleeping Beauties" is artfully made with fine direction and it looks very professional. Some of the scenes are visually stunning, especially the ones in Kogi's office but by the time the credits rolled, all I could think of was how do I get someone to fund a film where I get to endlessly grope a whole herd of beautiful young women. If anyone reading this would like to underwrite such a project please let me know. Assuming (safely) that this will not occur, you still have the option of going to see "House of the Sleeping Beauties" or you could also choose to view a soft-core adult film on television. If that is what you are looking for, neither choice will disappoint.