Submission (1976) Scandalo

Director: Salvatore Samperi
Writers: Ottavio Jemma (screenplay) (as Ottavio Gemma), Salvatore Samperi (screenplay & story)
Stars: Franco Nero, Lisa Gastoni, Raymond Pellegrin

1940 France just before the great invasion. Eliane is a pharmacist who is married to her dull husband and has a teenage daughter. Eliane is an attractive woman who has let her passion fall dormant. One evening, the pharmacy clerk makes a pass at her when he thinks she is another girl. Soon she lets the passion overtake her and she soon becomes his sex slave.

This is perhaps the sexist movie I have ever seen, not only because of the truly believable performance of the beautiful Lisa Gastoni, but also because of the movie's undercurrents of tension between submission and control, and between explicit and implicit sexuality. The 1940 setting creates an atmosphere of tension; the professor-husband's indifference adds realism; and Eliane's descent into complete emotioanl and sexual submission–as evidenced so exquisitely by her midnight walk outside the pharmacy–throbs with excitement. Although originally titled Scandal, the title Submission is more fitting, since it captures the film's ironic portrayal of a strong woman's submission not only to her lover but also to her fate as wife and mother.

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