BEYOND LOVE AND EVIL (1969) – Beyond Redemption

Greg Goodsell here. Eegah!! So detested this film, he denounced it as something akin to the work of the Occupy Wall Street protestors! True, it has a hippie-dippie mentality and tons of face paint and attempts at profundity, but you can’t deny the psychedelia of the film’s soundtrack. Does a certain Iron Butterfly song spring to mind?

It appears they didn't want to pay the Frederic Nietzsche estate any royalty rights, so they titled this opus BEYOND LOVE AND EVIL in lieu of BEYOND GOOD AND EVIL! As we see, this film has little to do with Nietzsche, or anything else for that matter –

Far out, man! You know you're in for a good time when the first thing you see in a picture is someone torching a laboratory skeleton with flames shooting out its nose!

Here is our Master of Ceremonies, who claims that he set the skeleton on fire in order to do away with archaic notions of morality and good taste, in order for man to live as a fully sensual being! What does setting fire to an anatomy class skeleton have to do with that, you may ask? Who indeed, knows why?

HA! As you see, this little occultist ritual amounts to little more than a typical summer afternoon in Mobile, Alabama, circa 1964!

Remember that line you're supposed to shout out at at THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW (75) when the Creature escapes into the pouring rain? "Oh, now let's not bring the dogs into this!" In actuality, this here opus does bear a resemblance to that Midnight Movie favorite – squares wander into a castle full of oddly attired idiots and are transformed along the way. I don’t think ROCKY HORROR creator Richard O’Brien saw this turkey, however.

This gay hippie “street performer” is seen frequently teetering around in a Pope costume. I presume his character is intended to reflect the hypocrisy that is endemic to organized religion, but only one thing is certain -- DIS FREAK GETS ON MY NERVES!

This is our erstwhile hero, who looks upon all the orgiastic excess with puritanical disdain. Dressed as he is in a see-through lavender blouse and tight black leather pants, let's just say he isn't a model spokesperson for masculinity OR propriety!

Dig the crazy hippie gal as the living candle holder! Poor thing, I bet she was sweet-talked by a Donovan lookalike who said -- "You must come to this party! -- It will BLOW YOUR MIND!" Instead, she got stuck with candle holder duties!

This is the lavish banquet spread out before the masked and naked revelers, and as they say about orgies and swinger's parties, you SHOULDN'T go through the buffet line! There are some live animals squirming around the many dishes. Bleah!

The makeup artist had only 15 minutes to get this gal ready for the camera, so -- sometimes you just have to take what you can get!

The hero tries to console the poor, misled hippie girl as in regards to her future in motion pictures!

Taking a hand to the mind’s eye?

Now, one of the main activities at this here villa is letting naked girls run all over the estate as the rest of the partiers chase after her on horseback in the manner of a British fox hunt! The thing is, once they catch them -- NOTHING HAPPENS! The prey just gives a smug, satisfied look, like here.

Guys, if we hurry up we can see Carol Channing's farewell concert at the Fontainebleau! Let's hope Russell isn't there, that chirpy bitch!

This is such a compelling image -- so, so, so BLANK!

Looking through a beveled window for a cheap, in-camera optical effect is sure to wow them at Cannes!

So you don't have to watch the actual movie, this guy is composing a brilliant work of art -- while ON THE CRAPPER! Hoo-boy, hilarious, no? No.

This screen grab is in actuality of a scene that is actually even less interesting than it actually is –

WHOOPS! If we were to raise the maggot-ridden corpse of Andy Rooney, he would doubtlessly croak between chapped lips, "DON'T YOU JUST HATE IT when water from the tub or shower gets on the bathroom floor and you take a tumble right on your face?"

YOU DON'T want to know what happens here. Think of a certain scene in THE DEVIL AND MISS JONES.

All dewy-eyed and sentimental, our hero bemoans the fact that his profile will be captured on a Web site brimming with snide comments some 42 years into the future, to be mocked by thousands.

A lakeside procession by candlelight, in order to fill up screen time...

An archaic occult ritual, involving silver makeup, a skull, a candle and two extras pressed into speaking roles!

It appears that this film may have inspired THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW as well as Pasolini's SALO: 120 DAYS OF SODOM (both 1975). There are acres and acres of trashy, transvestite imagery akin to ROCKY HORROR's and the garish hags in this flick certainly seem to have inspired the ones in SALO!

Actor KEIR DULLEA (no, not really) paying his dues before he appeared in Kubrick's 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (1969).

"I wish I could quit you, Ennis!" This film’s director, Jacques Scandelari is highly obscure. This was his first film, and then he dipped his toe into American filmmaking with MONIQUE aka FLASHING LIGHTS in 1978. In that film, a woman discovers that her husband is gay and begins stalking all the leather bars with a butcher knife! As good as it sounds. Scandelari would drift into XXX-rated porn before leaving the earthly plain in 1999.

Here is our nominal, a few pounds heavier than normal heroine, searching for direction from Scandelari that doesn’t appear to be forthcoming. What happens is that all the grease-painted performers’ gather in a courtyard for some torture and murder (in yet another nod to SALO) and she rides off into the sunset with the hero. That’s all, folks!

And so ends our nebulous tale. BEYOND LOVE AND EVIL can be described thusly: "It thinks it's Las Vegas, when in fact, it is Reno."

What was I supposed to do, sumbitch broke his chains and escaped!! We now have Mr. Goodsell sedated again and back in his cell, so the world should be safe again for at least a week or two!! - Eegah!!