Cinecenta, the prospective distributors of Le jouisseur, were mainly
specialising in French porn films at the time of this ban.
They had the rights to 2 French soft-core films with extremely similar titles in 1975. Both of these films were released in France on the same day, June 11
th 1975:
Les jouisseuses (Lucien Hustaix, 1975) which translates as The Pleasure Seekers
Le jouisseur (Jess Franco, 1975) which translates as The Pleasure Seeker
The company also had the rights to The Gatekeeper's Daughter which was rejected only 6 days later on 17/11/1975. They managed to sneak Les Jouisseuses past the BBFC with cuts. If the BBFC database is correct, this was in
February 1975, 4 months before its French cinema release. This submission was under the original French title.
When they came to submit Le Jouisseur (the Franco film) later in the year they clearly had to change the title to avoid
confusion with their other film. So they gave it an English title and changed it slightly to make clear that it was a sex film. The Pleasure-Seeker wouldn't have conveyed that, but Mates for Pleasure does.
Coincidentally,
they did exactly the same thing when they submitted L'Essayeuse to the BBFC in the following year. They used an English title and since The Trier means very little they gave it the more alluring title of She Tries Every Man . That was
rejected too of course.
Incidentally, the treatment of these two similarly-titled films shows how censorship standards changed between the Stephen Murphy and James Ferman eras. Murphy passed Les Jouisseuses in February 1975 and
Ferman rejected Le Jouisseur in November 1975. Ferman would also have rejected Les Jouisseuses (the Hustaix film) had it been submitted to him. Although it's a fairly silly sex comedy which was probably hard to take seriously even at the time, the basic
premise concerns a scientist who discovers a molecule with causes sexual excitation. This passes around in pill form in the film, and there are numerous examples of characters slipping pills into other people's drinks and causing them to lose control and
have sex with whoever is around when they otherwise wouldn't. So none of the sex is consensual.
So Mates for Pleasure is Le Jouisseur (Jess Franco, 1975). This may have been Ferman's first experience of a Franco film, and he
rejected many of them subsequently.
The plot -- Count Roland loses interest in his new wife who turns out to run a porn company and approaches sex too clinically. (She refuses to sleep with him on their wedding night before
measuring his dimensions and checking that he's free of STDs). While she's on a business trip he leaves and rediscovers his playboy past, accompanied by his manservant. This mainly involves sleeping with as many women as possible.
The whole thing is played for humour but there would have been several problem areas for the BBFC:
We're shown a flashback to his first sexual experience when he seduced the family's maid by showing her his penis. A voiceover tells us that he was 15 at the time.
The count's first conquest is the 15
year-old virginal daughter of a wealthy industrialist. This part of the story lasts for more than 30 minutes and the BBFC would likely have taken exception to all of it. He flies a helicopter close to her house so that he can spy on her sunbathing nude
on the verandah, peers through her window while she pleasures herself, and poses as a butler so that he can have sex with her during a house party. The actress was clearly over 18, but the BBFC have never liked age play in sex films.
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There is a conversation between three characters which involves a verbal misunderstanding. The girl's father says that he's been having sex with a female for 10 years already. Everyone thinks (wrongly) that he's referring to his
(then) 15 year-old daughter. It does get resolved eventually, but the audience is given several minutes to think about the less savoury interpretation.
Rape is featured in a flippant way throughout. Two different women
threaten the count that they will accuse him of rape unless he has sex with them, and the industrialist tells his young daughter that she would enjoy being raped.
One of the count's later conquests involves a character played
by Lina Romay. They first meet when she gives a graphic striptease performance in a club, complete with zooms and close-ups of genital areas.
Romay's character tells us that her breasts are covered in glitter, but in fact it
looks much more like they're covered in bruises. This is significant as her breasts appear quite frequently in the rest of the film.
There's a rather seedy atmosphere in the last part of the film due to all of the sex scenes
being watched by voyeurs. At one point the voyeurs are spotted and they are rendered unconscious by being bashed over the head with a cosh. These scenes of violence are intercut with the sex scenes.
The BBFC would not have
liked the excessive focus on sex toys. Vibrators, dildos and novelty condoms are shown and used repeatedly.
The generally misogynistic atmosphere -- the female characters are frequently referred to as whores, sluts and cunts.
