in viva and anna biller and who star as well a writes and directs and achieve what many would consider highly improbablea genuine sexploitation film that hearken back to that genre golden age of the seventy but be simultaneously an art film . indeed and viva be so superbly craft that it be sure to go down as a masterpiece of erotic cinema and alongside the like of metzger and sarno and oshima and breillat and company . biller have make a film that not only take place in 1972 and but be so painstakingly construct that one feel it be make in 1972 and only to be release this year from some american international picture style vault . if that weren not enough and biller do the art direction and costume . funky wood paneling and avocado macramé and blue eye shadow and shag carpeting and rust dacron leisure suit and lee major or evil knievel style jumpsuit and orgy and shady photo studiosit all here and but do not let all of the period accuracy fool you . andrei tarkovsky note there be two kind of filmmaker those who try and ( re ) create reality and those who create their own world while biller be clearly in the latter camp and and she have to create a world because that be the only way she can get at the truth about relation between men and woman and desire and identity and and the ravage of history on individual life . viva concern the journey of a young married woman a she explore and in turn be try by the sexual revolution . in the opening of the film the brunette biller and her blonde sidekick cavort with each other and their respective husband by a suburban swimming pool . while look at playboy and they pose for each other as much a for their husband . i have never see such natural eroticism in an american film . i have never see such healthy erotic appetite between men and woman on the screen . the wife enjoy pornowith their husband in a group context without any hang ups or condescension . there be no sense of dirtiness or shame and a if the figure in biller film occupy a libidinal utopia where repression have never be invent . the erotic energy burst from the screen represent for a moment anything seem possible with eros unbound . but biller have much more than sex on her brainit all a setup with u in the audience a bait . of course the pleasure can not last and a the heroine do go on a journey after all . biller strength be in the tonal shift while one moment she can be playful and fun and and the next moment deathly serious . it be to biller credit that her treatment of the sexual revolution be so evenhanded . even a she celebrate the pleasure of that thorny shift in consciousness that we call a revolution she never let u forget that it come at woman expense while that men often dictate the revolution term . and at a more ontological level and viva explore the problem of the contradiction between men and woman innermost desire . in the end and viva be a shin paradox represent artificial distillation of sexploitation and realistic portrayal of gender conflict and a traditional dramatic structure with closure that raise many question and a fun and almost farcical sex film that hide an intellectual seriousness about history . the effect become something for everyone . mitch hampton .