At the start of the movie, I was thinking this was going to be one of Rollin's better films - and in a way it is - but, really, it's just bad in a different way. Typically Rollin's movies are just a mess of sexy vampires, and surreal moments that go nowhere. The Escapees makes sense, it's just slow, and told in a boring neorealist manner, similar to La Strada - which I hate, by the way... I hate every Fellini movie I have watched. Where the movie suffers most is with our two leads: they both escape from a mental asylum - I say "escape," but they really just walk out (I have to... it's super easy, barely an inconvenience). They are entirely one dimensional, to the extent that the fact that they were in an asylum had no bearing on the story; it seriously could have been cut out and it would have made no difference. Marie is supposed to be afraid of interaction, but that doesn't equate to being homicidal. Aside from the end, the girls didn't behave in a way that one would typically describe as insane - they, mainly Marie, just seemed like scared girls, in over their head, overreacting to bad situations. On that topic, I highly doubt after you murdered a room full of people, and shot at the cops, the police are going to simply allow you to walk right past them, even if you are "just kids." The only scene that really struck me as having any depth of emotion was when Marie was ice skating, and the conversation that followed.
The Escapees needed some scenes cut for pacing. The fact that these girls had been committed needed to inform their character more, or else just make them runaways or average teens who go looking for adventure in the wrong places. With this being Jean Rollin, I was surprised at how little nudity it has; it does have some, but not much, and it's mostly at the end - thanks Brigitte Lahaie. I would never recommend a Rollin movie to anyone who is not already a fan; that being said, despite its many flaws, this is one of his best.
Review by BronsonBlockedParent2022-07-22T07:36:06Z
At the start of the movie, I was thinking this was going to be one of Rollin's better films - and in a way it is - but, really, it's just bad in a different way. Typically Rollin's movies are just a mess of sexy vampires, and surreal moments that go nowhere. The Escapees makes sense, it's just slow, and told in a boring neorealist manner, similar to La Strada - which I hate, by the way... I hate every Fellini movie I have watched.
Where the movie suffers most is with our two leads: they both escape from a mental asylum - I say "escape," but they really just walk out (I have to... it's super easy, barely an inconvenience). They are entirely one dimensional, to the extent that the fact that they were in an asylum had no bearing on the story; it seriously could have been cut out and it would have made no difference. Marie is supposed to be afraid of interaction, but that doesn't equate to being homicidal. Aside from the end, the girls didn't behave in a way that one would typically describe as insane - they, mainly Marie, just seemed like scared girls, in over their head, overreacting to bad situations. On that topic, I highly doubt after you murdered a room full of people, and shot at the cops, the police are going to simply allow you to walk right past them, even if you are "just kids."
The only scene that really struck me as having any depth of emotion was when Marie was ice skating, and the conversation that followed.
The Escapees needed some scenes cut for pacing. The fact that these girls had been committed needed to inform their character more, or else just make them runaways or average teens who go looking for adventure in the wrong places.
With this being Jean Rollin, I was surprised at how little nudity it has; it does have some, but not much, and it's mostly at the end - thanks Brigitte Lahaie.
I would never recommend a Rollin movie to anyone who is not already a fan; that being said, despite its many flaws, this is one of his best.