Customer Reviews

Bluebeard [VHS]

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Burton plays Baron Kurt Von Sepper, a wealthy Austrian upper crust aristocrat with a dark blue beard. He marries Greta (Karin Schubert), but she dies in a tragic hunting "accident." He meets street smart American showgirl, Anne (Joey Heatherton, who has a semi nude scene) and marries her after a whirlwind romance. One night alone at the Baron's palace Anne makes the ghastly discovery of a secret freezer chock full of former wives. Smart Anne tries to buy time before she becomes the newest addition to the freezer by convincing Bluebeard to tell her how all the women met their fates. He starts to tell her the tale of how each former wife met her fate.

Before I go any further, let me say that this film is overdone, campy, and sometimes, well, bad.

But that is what makes it fun.

The various ways that Bluebeard got rid of his other wives is absolutely hilarious. Virna Lisi, Nathalie Delon (along with her lesbian lover Sybil Danning), Raquel Welch, Marilu' Tolo, and Agostina Belli all die in some very interesting and campy ways. This is fiendishly fun black comedy at it's over the top best.

The color on this copy is gorgeous and rich, and the musical score is perfect for this macabre mischief.

If you like campy black comedy, check it out!

I was surprised to be entertained by this film since I'd heard it was bad. This dark comedy, dismissed in its initial theatrical release by critics and audiences alike, deserved better. It's a hoot! There is some beautiful cinematography, gorgeous sets, some fine acting, suspense and masterful segues between drama, horror, and comedy. The women, Bluebeard's doomed wives, are gorgeous, especially the lovely Joey Heatherton, who steals the movie from one of my all time favorite actors, Richard Burton. The murder scenes are graphic but so bizarre they both repel and make you laugh at the same time. They illustrate the absurdity at the core of Burton's sexually dysfunctional villain, a man of vast power and wealth who cannot acquire the most important thing in life, the love of any of his wives. Don't take it too seriously, just enjoy it.

When Bluebeard was made, its sole intent seemed to be to get an international cadre of actresses out of their clothes while providing an unsettling mixture of sex and death (two elements bound to pack 'em into the theaters). Though pretty hot in its day, nearly 30 years later, it seems fairly tame in terms of exposed flesh, but retains a campy charm that was completely missed in the early 70s. Burton's hammy performance is not to be believed and the (nearly offensive) dizziness of his seven wives will have lovers of low humor chuckling more than watching Vincent Price at his most extreme in similar Roger Corman vehicles. Today, Bluebeard plays like a particularly mean-spirited Punch and Judy Show, and Joey Heatherton's turning the tables on Burton at the end is something you'll never forget. It's even more fun once you realize that semi-respectable director Edward Dmytryk probably took the whole thing seriously--but that doesn't mean you have to. Sure to get a reaction.

I'll keep this short: this movie is great! I love the story, actors and actresses, the sets, and the overall feel of the movie itself. The presentation is excellent: great print and color in widescreen.

This movie is a great example of the awsome weirdness coming out of cinema in the 70's and reminds me of the type of genre defying pictures that Tim Burton would become famous for years later.

Though this wretched movie is not the nadir of Richard Burton's career (check out "The Klansman" for that dubious distinction), it comes mighty darn close. The script, the acting and the general tone of this movie is beyond repulsive, it is tawdry, inane and ultimately, quite pathetic. However, there is one overwhelmingly redeeming feature to "Bluebeard:" it is so bad it is unintentionally hilarious!

Burton sleepwalks through this silly film with a cheap, stick-on goatee. As always, he overacts to a ridiculous degree and one eternally wonders why his directors never took him aside and said, "Richard, you don't need to scream every single line." Alas, Burton is magnificently dreadful here, his attempts at lovemaking become bombastically embarrassing to watch, his few, brief attempts at some decent acting are wickedly futile. One real-life moment to ponder: following one love scene with one of the no-name Italian starlets, the director yelled, "cut!" but Burton and the starlet continued kissing and then walked off the set to Burton's waiting limousine. Hmmm, where was Liz?

This is a great movie to enjoy with a few beers and a readiness to make fun of every scene and hurl collective invective against Richard Burton. If you are up to the challenge, then "Bluebeard" is your movie.

My friends often accuse me of not liking comedy. I think this movie proves them wrong. I think I have now seen Richard Burton at his very best. ( Perhaps "The Wild Geese" could be an exception. ) I loved this move. It made me laugh over and over again. And the women were wonderful and beautiful. Raquel Welch was stunning. She alone was worth the watch. However I have to say that Joey Heatherton made this movie for me. She was never the best actress on the big or small screen. BUT if she is not the sexiest I will eat my hat. Girls today wish they had the sex appeal, even one tenth of the sex appeal that Ms. Heatherton carried with her. WOW! How I miss the days of my youth ogling and drooling over Joey Heatherton. This movie reminded just how twitterpated she got me as a very young man just beginning to notice women. Perhaps I should say just beginning to notice what women like Joey Heatherton could do to me. I didn't understand it then but I sure do now and wish I had many more movies of her.

Anyway. I say buy this movie and watch it over and over again and enjoy every second of it. The could try a remake of this movie and in today's world they may make it seem better with special affects, but they will never improve on the fun and enjoyment one receives form watching this movie with this cast. It is simply the best.

David C. Maughan

aka: TheWallruss

Bluebeard

Before watching "Bluebeard", I expected a campy, trashy, and entertaining film. It certainly was trashy, campy at times, but not really entertaining. But, let's start with the good things: The film is very nice looking, with great, campy set designs, Ennio Morricone's soundtrack is very good and there's also some nice 1920s music such as the Charleston. The movie is reviewed in the excellent book "Bad Movies We Love". The authors panned Heatherton's performance but I thought she was pretty good. Richard Burton gives a routine performance and it's always nice to see Raquel Welch, although she, despite getting second billing, only has a small role.

What makes "Bluebeard" a disappointment for me is the story, or rather, the story structure. It starts with Burton marrying a girl, who's then killed in a hunting "accident". He then marries American night club dancer Joey Heatherton. It's not long before Heatherton finds a number of Burton's ex-wives in a freezing room in his castle. Burton tells her since she knows his secret he'll have to kill her too, and proceeds to tell about his previous wives and how he killed them. These are told in flashbacks and while there are some good scenes, it's very slow paced and it's not long before it starts to get pretty dull to watch. I think the movie could have been pretty good if they'd trimmed it down about 20 minutes or so. I also wish the filmmakers could have decided what type of movie they wanted to make. Apart from drama "Bluebeard" has elements of horror, thriller and comedy, but it doesn't really succed as any of it.

The story is silly and the plot ridiculous, but this film is very campy. I rate it 4 stars because of all the nudity, especially Joey Heatherton's. I remember her from TV shows in the 50's and 60's, and she's stunning. Raquel Welch shows a lot, but is not nude--her story is funny, though.

I am so glad that lions gate has just put this bacck in production i have been trying to get a copy of this movie for so long........great film vibrant and artistic...Beware do not be robbed by these prices for a movie that is no longer out of production....cheers.

Richard Burton was one of those actors who just couldn't be bothered to show any discrimination in what roles he picked as long as he got a paycheck (and maybe a bottle of good Scotch and a comely starlet into the bargain). When he was good, he could be great; when he was bad, he could be a real gas. Consider "Bluebeard", where Burton plays the legendary killer of beautiful women while wearing one of the silliest stage beards of all time. It's a perfect example of the big-budget bad movie. The director couldn't seem to decide whether to make a Big Statement about Nazism (Burton's Bluebeard is a pseudo-Nazi leader, who probably would have been an actual Nazi except that the production ran afoul of German laws prohibiting the use of Nazi regalia in entertainment and had to use clumsy substitutes) or smack his lips over Bluebeard's seductions and murders of six gorgeous wives (and one lovely but unfortunate girlfriend of one of the wives). It ends up being unintentional and rather smutty black comedy.

Actually, I need to rethink the phrase "big budget"; the production apparently didn't have the money to be able to keep the actresses around to impersonate corpses in the Big Scene where Joey Heatherton, playing Bluebeard's latest wife (an American flapper who makes one glad that the Roaring Twenties ended with the Crash of '29) discovers the frozen bodies of the previous entries in the Wife-of-Bluebeard Sweepstakes. What she actually sees when she opens the door of Bluebeard's cleverly hidden freezer are seven department-store mannequins inexpertly dressed up to look like the previous victims. If they were able to get Karin Schubert to play dead for the disturbingly necrophilia-themed scene where Burton takes photos of her body as it lies laid out for her funeral, surely they could have collected the various actresses together to have them imitate Popsicles for this key scene. It's emblematic of how clumsy this production is.

Do yourselves a favor and Google for bad-movie maven Jabootu's review of "Bluebeard". It's a classic and says just about everything else I could have said here. Or you could, if you have a DVD player capable of playing Region 2 discs, look for the Italian comedy "Le sei mogli di Barbablu", which stars rubber-faced comedy legend Toto and features Sophia Loren in one of her very first roles.

All that said, should you get this movie? If you're a fan of bad movies...oh heck, YES!