Barbarella (1968, Fr./It.)

In director Roger Vadim's psychedelic cult classic - it was an infamous, 'adult,' erotic science-fiction fantasy-comedy and suggestive sexual satire about the sexploits of a female space adventuress in the 41st Century. Its taglines were:

• Who can save the universe?
• The space age adventuress whose sex-ploits are among the most bizarre ever seen. (See BARBARELLA Do Her Thing!)

The semi-incoherent screenplay for the original, unrated science-fiction spoof was written by co-scripters Terry Southern and Roger Vadim. When the film was re-released in 1977, it was retitled: "Barbarella: Queen of the Galaxy" and edited down to receive a PG-rating. Based on the serialized French comic by Jean-Claude Forest in 1962 that was republished as standalone graphic novels beginning in 1964, it contained many sexual references and sexual innuendo. The satire made fun of the 'love and peace' era of the late 1960s, and also the early Bond-styled action-adventures of the time period.

In the plot very appropriate for the mid-1960s, the sexually-liberated and emancipated title character journeyed on a mission to a distant galaxy with a blind and winged angel to save humanity from an evil scientist named Durand-Durand in an evil city who possessed a laser-powered, positronic death ray. Barbarella often demonstrated her exceptional interstellar love-making to keep the peace, although she was confronted by wild feral children with killer dolls, pecking birds in a cage, a deadly lesbian Black Queen, a lava-lamp substance that was energized by evil deeds and thoughts, and a literal organ designed to provide fatal sexual pleasure.

Newly-wed wife Jane Fonda (married in 1965) was directed for the third time by her French husband Roger Vadim. [Note: Fonda's two previous Vadim films were Circle of Love (1964, Fr.) (aka La Ronde), and The Game Is Over (1966, Fr./It.) (aka La Curée). In-between, she played Catherine 'Cat' Ballou in the wildly popular western Cat Ballou (1965).] She accepted the role after the intended sexy icon Brigitte Bardot refused to play the role, and thus solidified her reputation as a "sex kitten" (sex symbol or sex goddess) by being one of the first American actresses to appear nude in a foreign film.

• during the film's slow-motion, teasing opening title credits sequence, an inflight and weightless, 41st century comic-strip heroine Barbarella (Jane Fonda), wearing a protective dark spacesuit, began a slow striptease while floating and suspended in mid-air (in zero gravity) inside her Alpha-7 spaceship; she first removed her gloves (to reveal beautifully-manicured fingers and hands) and then her leggings; after touching (with both hands) an unseen control on her spherical helmet, her face appeared after a tinted or opaque-reflective shield in the glass slowly lowered; when her helmet was removed and she shook her full head of hair, white letters were let loose to spell her name
• further letters for the credits were released as more coverings were freed from her body; by the end of the credits when the screen read: "DIRECTED BY ROGER VADIM," she was completely naked with the letters often strategically dancing around or coalescing to try and mask her private parts

The Opening Title Credits Sequence

• after her strip-tease in zero-gravity, Barbarella restored artificial gravity by floating to a control panel with gravity controls (a set of four transparent, underlit yellow buttons); she pressed down on one of the buttons, causing her to drop onto the cushioned floor protected with soft carpet
• Barbarella's Alpha-7 spaceship was ripe with sexual references: it was shaped like three pulsating breasts and its outer circular-shaped door-aperture resembled a sphincter; the interior of the four walls of the spaceship was lined with brownish shag carpet, with a statue of the half-naked Greek goddess Artemis (that doubled as a video-screen portal); the cockpit was a seating area in front of a wide-angled view portal on one wall, with a keyboard below that functioned as a piloting control panel; she also conversed with a computer named "Alphy" - a vertically-positioned computer-display panel with moving metal tiles (whose background color, normally yellow, changed depending upon the mood)
• the intergalactic astronaut Barbarella also communicated with an autonomous computer screen (a crescent-shaped extension of the Artemis statue's hair) when she viewed an incoming video-phone message from the black boa-wearing, lisping President of Earth Dianthus (Claude Dauphin) and the "sun system"; they greeted each other with the standard 'hand-shake' word: "LOVE"
• while she remained naked, he instructed her to travel the cosmos to the star system of Tau Ceti to search for a scientist named Durand Durand, who was thought to have invented a dangerous, laser-powered positronic death ray - a doomsday weapon that might endanger the entire galaxy if an intergalactic war broke out between tribes; both worried that in their pacified world and star system of Tau Ceti, the inhabitants could easily be accused of living naive lives "in a primitive state - of neurotic irresponsibility"
• without any conceptions of war or weapons for 100s of years, Barbarella asked judgmentally and negatively: "A weapon? Why would anybody want to invent a weapon?...I mean, the universe has been pacified for centuries!"; her mission as a "five-star, double-rated Astro-Navigatrix" was to find Durand-Durand and use her "incomparable talents" (her sexuality and non-violent free love) to complete her mission; she was the universe's greatest hope since the President had no other means of finding celestial peace: ("I have no armies or police, and I can't spare the presidential band")
• he teleported a number of items or devices to her on his atom transmitter: (1) a portable brainwave detector worn on her wrist to help her to identify the 25 year-old inventor, (2) an energy box indicator to be worn on her boot, (3) a wrist-mounted tongue-box (to translate language), and (4) a hand ray-gun-weapon for self-preservation (borrowed from the Museum of Conflict); she claimed she felt uncomfortable - like a "naked savage" with all the unnecessary deadly weaponry and devices in her arms

Barbarella On Icy Planet 16 After Crash-Landing Her Red Spacecraft

Evil Feral Twin Girls: Stomoxys and Glossina

Barbarella Attacked, Bound, and Bloodied by the Twin Girls With Evil Razor-Toothed Toy Devil Dolls

• after a journey of 154 hours, Barbarella was awakened from hybernation, and was nourished by a tall glass of an unspecified purple liquid; soon after, her space-craft crash-landed on icy Planet 16 (with Earth-like atmospheric conditions) in the planetary system of Tau Ceti, due to planetary disturbances; upon exiting the ship, she thought she was being greeted by two "marvelous little girls"
• however, she was knocked unconscious (with a snowball hardened by a crystal) by the pair of feral twin girls: Stomoxys and Glossina (Catherine Chevallier and Marie Therese Chevallier). [Note: Their names were the titles for two types of fly insects, the stable fly and the tsetse fly.] afterwards, she was taken away on their sled pulled by a sting-ray creature across the icy arctic terrain; they came upon the crash site of an earlier spacecraft known as Alpha 1, piloted by scientist Durand-Durand during his intergalactic mission to the North Star; their hide-out was the crash-remains, populated by strange blue bunnies
• Barbarella was tied up, attacked and bitten by a group of aggressive mechanical, razor-toothed robot devil dolls unleashed by about a dozen feral children at the crash site; the youngsters were gleeful and smiled when blood was drawn from her arms and legs; she was rescued and untied after a net was dropped onto her tormenters
• her rescuer was bearded Mark Hand (Ugo Tognazzi), known as the Catchman; he was on patrol for errant feral children sent away from SoGo to be raised outside the city, where they were terrorizing the area with their dolls; as the keeper and captive-herder of these wayward children, they were led away (by his guards with whips) to the forests of Weir to grow up and reach "a serviceable age" before returning to civilization
• the Catchman informed Barbarella that information about Durand-Durand could only be found in the city of SoGo; he proposed giving her a ride there in his wind-propelled ice-craft (a large sled structure with sails); the grateful Barbarella offered her thanks, but when he asked for compensation in the form of old-fashioned sex, she responded: "Make love, did you say?...What do you mean? You don't even know my psycho-cardiogram!"; she explained how in the futuristic society on Earth, intimate human sex was now accomplished in non-physical ways

Barbarella Reluctantly Convinced to Have Old-Fashioned Sex With the Catchman - Mark Hand (Ugo Tognazzi)

• she told him: "Well, on Earth, for centuries, people haven't made love unless their psycho-cardiogram readings were in perfect confluence"; and she asked: "Do you have any pills?" - but then she happened to produce her own; she was referring to an alternative way of having sex, via an "exaltation transference pellet" or sex pill:
  • "Well, on Earth, when our psycho-cardiogram readings are in harmony and we wish to make love as you call it, we take an exaltation transference pellet and remain like this. Here, let me show you (she stretched out her arm and hand and closed her eyes) - for one minute or until full rapport is achieved"
• Mark knew nothing about and was disinterested in both of her suggested new sexual techniques, and suggested that they bed down together in his ice-boat instead; she exclaimed:
  • "But nobody's done that for centuries! And nobody except the very poor who can't afford the pills or the psycho-cardiogram readings....cause it was proved to be distracting and a danger to maximum efficiency. And, and because it was pointless to continue when other substitutes for ego support and self-esteem were made available"
• however, he was able to convince her to have physical sex in his large sail-equipped snowship with him (he removed his outer garment and revealed extensive body hair) - and she reluctantly consented, laid back, took off her torn garments, and covered herself in another full-length fur: ("Well, if you simply must insist, I guess so. And I can assure you, there's really no point at all in doing it like this"); after having primitive sex with him, she was apt to agree with his stated question that it was enjoyable: "Now, Barbarella, don't you agree with me that in some things, the old-fashioned ways are best after all"; she concurred: "What? Oh, that. Yes, I must admit it was rather interesting. Still, I see what they mean by saying it's distracting"
• the Catchman again informed Barbarella that Durand-Durand would be located in the city of SoGo; after bidding him goodbye and thanking him for "everything," she flew off in her repaired spacecraft, but realized it had been repaired "in reverse" - and her trajectory was to crash-land near where she had just launched from; her spacecraft tunneled into a rocky Labyrinth where exiled outcasts (who weren't evil enough) from the city of SoGo (the City of Night) had been forced by evil rulers to live there
• in the Labyrinth, she was discovered lying unconscious outside her spacecraft by a blind, beatific winged angel Pygar (John Phillip Law) ("the last of the ornithanthropes" or bird-men); he had been blinded in the city of SoGo by an evil Black Queen, aka the Great Tyrant (Anita Pallenberg, with voice by Joan Greenwood or possibly Fenella Fielding) who ruled the debauched city of SoGo; afterwards, he had apparently lost the will to fly; he suggested that she could have her questions answered about Durand-Durand by visiting with his friend - kind, orchid-chewing Professor Ping (French mime Marcel Marceau dubbed by Robert Rietty)
• as they walked to meet with the Professor through the maze-like Labyrinth, Barbarella was shocked by the appearance of the mostly-unclothed, dazed inhabitants who were wandering in the rocky outcroppings; the Professor recognized Barbarella as a female-gendered earthling; he repeated how the Great Tyrant had imprisoned all of the outcasts in the Labyrinth and oppressed them, including Pygar: ("All that is not evil is exiled to the labyrinth"); Professor Ping offered to repair Barbarella's damaged spacecraft to travel to SoGo to find Durand-Durand, but it was unpredictable how long his repairs might take
• Barbarella suggested having Pygar fly her there, but Ping reiterated that the winged angel suffered from "atrophy of the greater alea muscle," and although Ping judged him to be "aerodynamically sound"; it was "all a question of morale" and the lack of Pygar's will to fly
• on the way to Pygar's nest (she called it "marvelous"), the angel and Barbarella were assaulted by one of the Great Tyrant's Black Guards with an animated armored shell but without a body underneath (described as robotic "leather men...without fleshy substance"); Barbarella directed Pygar to the location of her gun and he blasted the Guard to nothingness; for saving Barbarella's life, Pygar was repaid with love-making in his nest: (she said it was "just heavenly"); he had regained his will and agreed to fly Barbarella to SoGo to continue on her mission - to the City of Night ruled by the Great Tyrant (a derivative of the evil debauched Biblical cities of Sodom and Gomorrah)
• during their mid-air flight, Barbarella helped to protect them with blasts from her mini-missile projector when they were attacked by an air-patrol of Black Guards in flying pods; fortunately they made it although Barbarella's energy box had been depleted of power by destroying all of them; for future use, she hid her gun inside Pygar's loin-cloth
• once they landed in the City of Night, they were observed warily before two rough-looking thugs threatened to rape Barbarella, and Pygar was taken away and abducted; Barbarella was saved when her two attackers were stabbed in the back by a figure behind them with a twirling knife in each hand; Barbarella briefly met her rescuer - her tyrannical dominatrix and shadow/rival - the eye-patched, one-eyed Great Tyrant; the diabolical villainess was delighted by Barbarella and called her "Pretty-Pretty" as a way to proposition her:
  • "Hello, Pretty-pretty....Do you want to come and play with me? For someone like you, I charge nothing. You're very Pretty-Pretty-Pretty!"
• instead of accepting the free sexual offer, Barbarella ran off to look for Pygar; she rescued him from being surrounded by a jeering and ridiculing mob, by shielding his body and urging him to back up into a room behind them - a walk-in suicide (or euthanasia) death chamber known as The Chamber of Ultimate Solution; they found themselves locked into the chamber with a bubbling, pulsating liquid slime (similar to a lava lamp's psychedelic interior at the time!) under the room's transparent floor - known as Mathmos

Blind Pygar Rescued From a Jeering Mob	The First View of the Slimy Liquid Substance Under the Floor - the Mathmos
The Three Doors in the Chamber of Ultimate Solution (A Self-Service Suicidal Death Booth)	Suicidal Female (Maria Teresa Orsini) Before Her Gruesome Fate in the Chamber

• a recorded female voice informed them that now that they were inside the Chamber, there were three doors to help choose a method of death: ("Three exciting and surprising forms of death, one of which awaits beyond each of the doors you see before you"); if one failed to make a death-choice, a person would be "given to the Mathmos," and there would be no appeal; they watched as a Suicidal Female (Maria Teresa Orsini) chose a hidden fate behind one of the doors - and listened to screaming as she disappeared
• after giving Pygar a kiss, Barbarella decided to open one of the doors, but was saved from making a deadly choice by the Great Tyrant's Concierge (Milo O'Shea in a dual role) who was accompanied by two Black Guards; the Concierge ushered them out of the Chamber and explained that he was only following orders: ("That was so ordained by the Great Tyrant"); he explained about the Mathmos under the floor - it was a powerful but corrupting life and energy force (or sentient liquid intelligence), energized by evil deeds and thoughts (mostly supplied by the Black Queen and her minions) that produced light and warmth:
  • "Well, you see, the whole city is built over a lake. A very curious lake, composed like you and I of living energy, but energy in liquid form. And it watches us. It is magnetic, and being positively charged, it feeds on negative psychic vibrations, what you would call 'evil.' Yes, it thrives on evil thoughts, deeds and flesh. And, in return, it gives us warmth, light and life itself. But, it has a terrible appetite. Perhaps you'll see some other time"
• as the Concierge finished his description, Pygar was captured in a net and raised up into the air - to be separated from Barbarella; she also found herself pushed down a long and smoke-filled chute into the presence of the Great Tyrant - who greeted her once again: ("So, my pretty-pretty, we meet again"); Barbarella realized she had already met the evil Black Queen and sneered: "You, the little one-eyed wench"; the ruler was revealed to be the Aunt of the feral Twin Girls Stomoxys and Glossina

Barbarella Pushed Down a Chute Into the Presence of the Black Queen - Again	The Great Tyrant: "So, my pretty-pretty, we meet again"
"You, the little one-eyed wench"	"So, I am your little one-eyed wench. I am also the Great Tyrant"

• the Great Tyrant had taken Pygar away, and explained why she had apprehended him and would be punishing him for three crimes:
  • "He has escaped the Labyrinth. Crime."
  • "He has destroyed 12 of my Black Guards. Crime."
  • "And he dares to deprive me of a pleasure unique in SoGo: an earthling. Crime."
  thus, she rationalized, Pygar must suffer a mock crucifixion, as leverage in order to have her sexual way with Barbarella; however, the "Earthling" refused to be intimidated
• as she approached Pygar who was bound and strung up, Barbarella stealthily reached for her gun under his loincloth; she threatened the Black Queen by grabbing her and holding her at gunpoint, as she ordered Pygar to be freed from his torture: "De-crucify him or I'll melt your face"; however, due to the fact that her gun and power-buckle (on her upper cuff of her boot, visualized as a yin-yang symbol with red and white blinking lights) were depleted of power, Barbarella's words were harmless; she was disarmed, whisked away and the Black Queen ordered her Concierge: "Give her to the birds"
• after Barbarella was taken away, Pygar was questioned and seduced by the Black Queen, who attempted to both enrage and entice him:
  • "Tell me, my fancy, fuzzy freak, what do you think of when you make love to Barbarella?...If only you had one eye in your head you would see what a delight I am. My face, my body. All my things are a delight. An exquisite delight... I shall share my delights with you. You shall make love to me"
• Pygar refused her advances: "An angel doesn't make love - an angel is love" - she snapped back and exiled him to be consumed by the Mathmos: "Then you're a dead duck! Guards! To the Mathmos with this winged fruitcake"
• meanwhile, Barbarella was entrapped inside a glass "bird" cage, and threatened with being pecked to death by colorful finches, songbirds and parakeets: ("This is really much too poetic a way to die!")
• Barbarella was rescued from the pecking birds and propelled down another secret trap-door escape chute in the bottom of the cage; she was saved by goofy, bumbling underground revolutionary Dildano (David Hemmings), a member of the underground Resistance, in his HQs (with non-functioning equipment); he claimed he had saved her because: "A life without cause is a life without effect"
• for saving her, she expected (and hoped) that Dildano would be demanding to have physical sexual intercourse with her as a reward for saving her life; she began removing her coverings, but this time, the male objected and said that he preferred the hygienic and civilized form of futuristic earthly sex with a pill: ("No! Not like that. Like on Earth, the pill. I have the pill...I'm not a savage. The pill!...Five years I've waited for this experience"); she was disappointed but reluctantly agreed, even though she claimed they hadn't shared their psychocardiograms; they communed together without physical intercourse by reaching out and touching with one hand; the hand-to-hand form of intercourse caused her hair to curl, and their hands to exude smoke
• afterwards, she explained her mission to find Durand-Durand (the person who had given Dildano the pills), and he agreed to share his whereabouts and join her mission, if in the future, she lent him her spacecraft and weaponry to help combat the Black Queen; he was determined to defeat the evil ruler by ambushing her in the bedroom of her secret Chamber of Dreams to murder her; so that they could collaborate, Dildano gave Barbarella the Chamber's second, secret and invisible key (to open the invisible wall), and proposed that in six hours, he would lead an attack on the Great Tyrant during a military coup; the two spoke to Professor Ping on Dildano's secret radio-transmitter, and learned Barbarella's spacecraft Alpha-7 had been repaired; Ping watched as it was launched to a concealed place outside the Labyrinth to protect it from Black Guards; Dildano proposed a password to his ally the Professor: "Llanfair­pwllgwyngyll­gogery­chwyrn­drobwll­llan­tysilio­gogo­goch" [Note: It was the longest name of a town in Europe.]

Barbarella Urged to Smoke "Essence of Man" From a Giant Hookah Pipe

• after leaving Dildano's presence via another secret chute or tube, she was propelled upwards into a strange room with some of the citizens of SoGo wore S&M bondage costumes; an unclothed female was suspended by leather straps, and others were encased behind semi-transparent glass walls; she saw another group of inebriated, spaced-out females smoking "essence of man" from a gigantic water pipe attached to a bowl where a man was swimming; as she took an experimental hit from the hookah pipe, she was re-apprehended by the wicked Concierge
• the Concierge demonstrated his torture-device to Barbarella - he had her hooked up to a euphemistic pipe organ (or excessive pleasure machine) as he played a "Sonata for Execution of Various Young Women"; it was designed to provide extreme erotic pleasure and ultimately kill its female subjects by orgasmically "playing" them to death; he promised a swift but pleasurable orgasmic death, as he began playing, and her clothes were first expelled through an exhaust chute, he explained that the sexual pleasure would be fatal:
  • "Yes, it is nice, in the beginning. Wait until its tune changes. It may change your tune as well....When we reach the crescendo, you will die of pleasure. Your end will be swift, but sweet, very sweet"

The Concierge's/Durand-Durand's Defeated Pipe Organ (an Orgasmatron) By Barbarella's Powerful Orgasmic Heat

• he was aghast and reacted with enraged surprise that Barbarella's extreme tolerance for erotic pleasure was able to defeat his "Exsexsive Machine" (orgasmatron) by overheating it with her own orgasm, causing it to smoke and burst into flames:
  • "What is this? I don't believe it. It couldn't be. Wretched, wretched girl. What have you done to my excessive machine? You've undone it. You've undone me. Look! Energy cables are shrinking. You've turned them into faggots. You, you've burned out the excessive machine. You've blown all its fuses. My goodness. You've exhausted its power. It couldn't keep up with you. This is incredible! What kind of girl are you? Have you no shame?...Shame! Shame on you! You'll pay for this! I've got something in store for you. You'll wish you had died of pleasure before this day is done. Now you shall learn the wisdom of the lash"
• she begged for no more torture: "Oh, please, haven't you done enough to me?," but he continued: "I'll do things to you that are beyond all known philosophies"; at the moment that Barbarella's strong will-power defeated the Concierge's invented machine and blew its circuits, she received an alert from her activated, portable brain-wave detector (when the Concierge accidentally stepped on it) that the Concierge was the 25 year-old evil scientist she had been searching for - Durand-Durand!; not young anymore, he looked like he had aged 30 years due to the Mathmos and his evil intentions, although he espoused the positive effects of the Mathmos:
  • "Here in SoGo, I have learned truth and essence. I speak of the dignity, the nobility of pure evil...Humanism, morals, principles. It's rubbish, nonsense. I speak only of truth and of essence"
• Durand-Durand explained his "monstrous" plan - to take over power in SoGo with his deadly positronic ray gun, by using it to "deminimalize" his enemies and irretrievably send all of them to the 4th Dimension; his objective was to first destroy the Black Queen; he knew that the Black Queen was vulnerable and without any Black Guards while she slept in her Chamber of Dreams; he agreed to accept Barbarella's copy of the invisible key to the Chamber when she offered it to him, to postpone her own death
• Durand-Durand held Barbarella at gunpoint as they proceeded together to the chamber, where he locked both Barbarella and the Black Queen Tyrant inside; the crazed Durand-Durand gloated about his success to Barbarella:
  • "Yes, I will return to Earth as its conqueror. Thanks to you, the Queen, the last obstacle to my plans, has been removed. Thank you, Barbarella. Nothing can stop me now. Today, master of SoGo. Tomorrow, master of the Earth, master of the galaxy, master of the universe!"
• meanwhile, the Queen was sleeping in the Chamber - dreaming about her earlier attempted sexual seduction of Pygar; her dream was visible to Barbarella on the interior of the invisible wall of the Chamber; when awakened, the Black Queen was upset and warned that they were both "doomed" - the viscuous Mathmos substance could consume both of them:
  • "Wretched girl, what have you done? No one must enter while I sleep....It is said that unless I am alone in my Chamber of Dreams, the Mathmos will claim me"
• using a one-way screen inside the Chamber, Barbarella and the Queen viewed her Throne Room where Durand-Durand was proceeding with own coronation after his successful military coup and overthrow; however, Durand-Durand's take-over was interrupted by news of a major revolt of the creatures in the Labyrinth led by Dildano and Professor Ping, who obliterated the Queen's Black Guards as they advanced; Durand-Durand's plans were foiled by the Resistance movement's successful attack and approach toward the city of SoGo

The Black Queen Releasing Her Supreme Weapon - The Mathmos: Both Barbarella and the Queen Were Saved Inside a Protective Bubble

• to stem the tide of the conflict, Durand-Durand fought against the revolutionaries in the Labyrinth by sending them to the 4th Dimension with his positronic ray; he eliminated both Dildano and Professor Ping; the Black Queen then fought back by using her secret, apocalyptic "supreme weapon" - she released the life-sucking force known as the Mathmos that consumed everyone in SoGo and the city itself; before being consumed by flames himself, Durand-Durand watched on his viewer as Barbarella (who was immune with her extremely pure and good nature) was saved, along with the Black Queen next to her, by the formation of a bubble around them in the Mathmos

Durand-Durand Consumed by Apocalyptic Flames In His Control Room

Pygar Flying to Safety with Barbarella and the Queen Holding On

• in the film's conclusion, the very pure and "indigestible" Pygar was found vomited up by the Mathmos; the Queen suggested trying "mouth to mouth" resuscitation to revive him, although Barbarella had a "better idea" - she activated his wings by moving them; he saved both the Black Queen and Barbarella, by flying off with them grabbing on and clutching him on either side, to the safety of Barbarella's spaceship
• the last words of dialogue were from Barbarella and Pygar - she wondered why the angel would save such an evil but seductive Queen; he cryptically replied (without any resentment, grudges or retribution) with total forgiveness: "An angel has no memory"; Bob Crewe performed the closing song "An Angel is Love"