Barbarella

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Barbarella – Roger Vadim directed his then-wife Jane Fonda in a cornball sexy space-romp through the galaxy as virginal space pilot Barbarella. The film starts off with two cheezy minutes of Jane Fonda in full Barbarella gear, waking up in zero gravity, changing out of one outfit into another, flinging typography of the credits about, a weird period song strikes up, with then some lyrics: “Barbarella, psychedella, there’s a kind of cockle shell about youuuuu…” Cockle shells are supposed to look sexy, right? Ha ha… The naked Barbarella gets a video call from the President of the Earth Federation:

Love
Love
Just a minute while I slip something on…”
Don’t trouble yourself, my dear. Have you ever heard of a young scientist called Duran Duran?

One day we must meet in the flesh.

A robot gives her a valve of liquid: “Prepare to insert nourishment.” Crazy, man, crazy. Barbarella gets propositioned for sex, and in an easy going way she says “Well, all right. But I don’t see what good it will do.” She’s felt up by bird angel Pigar, she sleeps with him, helping him recover his will to fly. An old man addresses her: “You are of female gender, aren’t you?” Anita Pallenberg enters the picture: “Hello, Pretty Pretty.” Barbarella hears screaming: “A good many dramatic situations begin with screaming.” Jeez!!

Well, the plot is silly – Barbarella is tasked with finding Duran Duran, she flies through space, crash lands on a planet (twice), she gets into one dangerous situation after another, she is saved from death on many occasions by the intervention of others. Like Kim on 24 she’s basically pretty useless, gaining advantage in situations by her mere presence and little else. She meets Duran Duran, but doesn’t realise it’s him, fights the Evil Queen in Sogo, the city of evil (named after Sodom and Gomorrah, not the Japanese department store chain).

Note – there are plenty of promotional shots by Jane Fonda in a variety of space outfits and suggestive poses (this one, below, is one of the tamer ones)

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Here are the damm-funky opening titles!

And the oh-so-groovy trailer too!!

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