Quills (DVD)

Originally based on Douglas Wright's play, it makes no pretenses about its historical accuracy, but is more an imagined idea about De Sade's impact on society contained within the final years he spent at the Charenton Asylum under the famously liberal Abbe (played by Joaquin Phoenix). The obvious theme here is the argument over censorship and hypocrisy. These are shown through the stories main protagonists. These characters are flawed in some way, making them fall short of their own ideals. The Abbe's kindness, charity and liberialism are in complete contrast to the brutally puritanical Dr. Royer-Collard (played by the ever entertaining Michael Caine) and the ...  Read the complete review

Tackling a portrayal of the life of someone as controversial as the Marquis de Sade was always going to be a difficult task for writer Doug Wright, but that is what he set himself to do in 2000 `s Quills. The premise of the film is this, for various perverse crimes, de Sade (Geoffrey Rush) finds himself subject to incarceration. Due to his aristocratic status and the influence of his wife instead of the prison that he would expect, he is interned in an asylum. Here he is allowed his own room and a decent lifestyle, and under the direction of the Abbe de Coulmier (Joaquim Phoenix) is encouraged to write as a form of therapy, the idea being that writing his perverse ...  Read the complete review

Until sometime round about yesterday afternoon-ish, I was a naive, innocent little soul who knew nothing of *cough* ahem, sex *cough*. Yes, indeed. However, I was corrupted by Geoffrey Rush, Joaquin Phoenix and Michael Caine...shame on them. I should have never listened to my friends, who assured me that Quills was not only a good film but was perfectly nice and innocent-people-friendly. Well, apparently not. I know, I know, I should have clicked when I read it was a film about the Marquis De Sade, but apparently I got my wires crossed somewhere along the lines and for some ...  Read the complete review

"Imperious, choleric, irascible, extreme in everything, with a dissolute imagination the like of which has never been seen, atheistic to the point of fanaticism, there you have me in a nutshell, and kill me again or take me as I am, for I shall not change." From the Marquis de Sade's Last Will and Testament I like to think of myself as an open minded person. In truth there's little that I find shocking when it comes to the ol' bedroom stuff although of course we all have our own likes and dislikes. Some time ago I decided to read '120 Days of Sodom' by the Marquis de Sade. I was interested to know more about this man I had ...  Read the complete review

Last week my daughter suggested that we stayed up late to watch Quills which was showing on one of the Sky movie channels. I did not know a lot about it, other than it was about the Marquis de Sade. I was pretty sure that any film about the infamous Marquis was going to be, at the very least, a bit risqué, so I despatched my youngest daughter to bed. Quills won the National Board of Review's Best Film of 2000. The script was by Doug Wright and it was directed by Philip Kaufman. The thing that surprised me was the cast. This just had to be a film based on sex, it couldn't be much else if it was about the Marquis de Sade. However, its main parts are ...  Read the complete review