Repulsion

1965 "The nightmare world of a virgin's dreams becomes the screen's shocking reality!"
7.6| 1h45m| NR| en| More Info
Released: 02 October 1965 Released
Producted By: Compton Films
Country: United Kingdom
Budget: 0
Revenue: 0
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Synopsis

Beautiful young manicurist Carole suffers from androphobia (the pathological fear of interaction with men). When her sister and roommate, Helen, leaves their London flat to go on an Italian holiday with her married boyfriend, Carole withdraws into her apartment. She begins to experience frightful hallucinations, her fear gradually mutating into madness.

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melaniealison2 Well filmed, but extremely sexist. It's about a woman who loses it/doesn't like men. Simultaneously. I mean being frigid must turn a woman into a dangerous psycho. Right? Wrong. This film really could be the #metoo Hollywood poster child - just by its story. I don't care if it was 1965. It' s not the woman in this movie who is evil, but the director for portraying her in a sick, distorted way. A truly repulsion movie for what it reveals of ' behind the camera'
jpclifford Years ago ( '70s) I saw this movie with some friends at the cinema. I was strongly impressed with a sense of awe (== terror). But there was no VHS or DVD so I put it in a drawer of my memory. Now I am retired and sometimes go back in time. Happily this movie was on DVD so I bought it. When you see it again after so many years "the penny finally dropped".I don't know much about Polanski (except from Wikipedia), but I think that he is a "gifted by nature".When you try to circumscribe (no! not geometrical, but Aristotelian) the main character, a woman, you soon find yourself immersed in what Wittgenstein called "the witchery of language". She appears not to be sensitive (a hot item these days) but sensuous (today this word is undefined!) so I use sensible in the original sense. This is not erotic but emotional (does this still exist??). And as she is very sensible she is apt to here environment. And I think that is just what Polanski does, addressing you (the audience)??? I think many people identify with here environment and expel here as "mad". But I think that if Polanski should have had "bad manners" he should have called this movie "Mirror".Enjoy,J.P. (Jan) Clifford
elvircorhodzic REPULSION is a psychological horror film about a young woman who is going through her own fears in her dark apartment, rejects her sexuality and gradually loses all contact with reality. This is a film about loneliness and anxiety between two extremes, in which the human tragedy is an inevitable fact.Carol, a Belgian manicurist, lives with her older sister Helen in their apartment in London. She, in contrast to Helen, interacts awkwardly with men. She is sleepy on her job and she continuously refuses her pretty-suitor. Carol hides her head in her pillow against her sister's sighs during sexual pleasure with her lover. It seems that Carol does not like men, moreover, she is trying to run from them. When Helen leaves on a holiday to Italy with her lover, otherwise a married man, Carol stays in their apartment and begins to hallucinate...Mr. Polanski reveals to us a deranged mind, or rather the dark side of the human subconscious, in this film. A young beauty behaves hostile toward men. It is intriguing enough without an eerie background and crumbling of her mind while she is staying in the apartment alone. Of course, we will look for the reasons for her behavior. Mr. Polanski has made a trap, precisely in that part. The reason is, probably, a trauma from her childhood, which is artfully displayed through the eyes of a little girl at a family photo, or is it a case of a "disturbed" sexuality, because the younger Carol is possessively attached to her older sister Helen.The atmosphere, in which objects symbolize the horror, is almost perfect. The characterization is excellent. An eerie sound is very striking.Catherine Deneuve (Carol Ledoux) has offered a phenomenal performance as an infatuated, depressed and eventually obsessed young woman. Yvonne Furneaux (Helen Ledoux) is quite convincing as a free and attractive woman, who knows how to enjoy sexual ecstasy. Ian Hendry (Michael) is provocative as Helen's lover and John Fraser (Colin) is a very tenacious and a bit rude as a suitor.A schizophrenic descent into madness. For me this is a little masterpiece.
BA_Harrison Repulsion is a very slow movie—probably too slow for many viewers. It's also far from what I would call a cheery experience, charting a sexually repressed young woman's descent into madness and murder. It's down to the sheer brilliance of Roman Polanski's direction and star Catherine Deneuve's powerful central performance that the film proves riveting throughout, even when there's (seemingly) very little happening on screen.The movie starts off like a typical '60s kitchen sink drama, with sulky Belgian beautician Carol (Deneuve) struggling to focus at work and trying to ignore the advances of interested males. At first, Carol merely seems mopey, but things gradually start to get weird: her behaviour towards her sister's boyfriend Michael (Ian Hendry) is unusually hostile, hopeful beau Colin is completely blanked, while a stolen kiss from the young man makes her feel violently ill. But it is when her sister Helen (Yvonne Furneaux) leaves with Michael for a holiday in Italy that Carol really loses it: left on her own, her psychosis rapidly worsens, and she begins to hallucinate, cracks appearing in the apartment walls and strange men attacking her in her room at night.When Colin visits the apartment to see why the phone rings but is never answered, Carol lumps him over the head with a candlestick and dumps his body in the bath. Later, the landlord (Patrick Wymark) also meets a sticky end after he tries to take advantage of the mentally unbalanced young woman, a few slashes with a cut-throat razor putting an end to his lecherous ways. Eventually, Helen and Michael return home where they find a scene of unimaginable horror, with Carol catatonic in the bedroom.While not a particularly pleasant viewing experience, Repulsion has to be admired as a work of art, as an intense character study, and as a master-class in movie making, every frame, every sound, every image carefully considered. Carol's misery and loneliness is contrasted by the cheerful laughing coming from a nearby school and the lively music from a trio of street entertainers, and Polanski heightens the feeling of unease with twisty-turning camera-work and excellent use of light and shade, turning an ordinary apartment into a claustrophobic prison. Also adding to the overall unsettling effect is Chico Hamilton's score, which begins light and jazzy but becomes more discordant as the film progresses.Certainly not a film that I'll be visiting again in a hurry (it's way too depressing for that), but one that any serious cineaste should ensure that they have seen at least the once.