Fruits of Passion (French: Les fruits de la passion; Japanese: Shanghai Ijin Shōkan – China Doll / 上海異人娼館/チャイナ・ドール) is a 1981 French–Japanese co-production directed by Shūji Terayama and starring Klaus Kinski. It is loosely based on Retour à Roissy by Anne Desclos (better known under the Pauline Réage line of authorship for Story of O)—the literary sequel that sends O back into Sir Stephen’s orbit. For BDSM film history, it is one of the stranger international attempts to put the O mythology on screen: casino colonialism, brothel “training,” and Kinski as sadistic master.
Plot
The film relocates Sir Stephen and O from the French chateau imaginary of the novels into southern China, where Sir Stephen owns a casino. He places O in a Chinese brothel for “training.” There she endures a string of humiliating trials meant to prove unconditional obedience—the same erotic-slavery thesis as Story of O, restaged as exoticized period erotica. A subplot follows local resentment toward Europeans and a young man desperate to afford O’s favors at the brothel, braiding political unrest into the sexual commerce of the house.
Cast
- Isabelle Illiers as O
- Klaus Kinski as Sir Stephen
- Arielle Dombasle as Nathalie
- Peter as Madame
- Keiko Niitaka as Aisen; Sayoko Yamaguchi as Sakuya; Hitomi Takahashi as Byakuran; Miyuki Ono as Kasen; Yuka Kamebuchi
- Kenichi Nakamura as the young man, Ogaku; Akiro Suetsugu as Obana; Renji Ishibashi as Kato; Takeshi Wakamatsu as the house guardian
- Georges Wilson as the narrator (voice)
Production Notes and Kinski
In a 2017 interview with French magazine VSD, Arielle Dombasle looked back with regret: the experience “hurt me terribly,” she was “too young to do that,” and of Kinski she said he was “crazy”—“a guy who crushes the weak, the ugliest thing in the world, someone who loved power, who absolutely wanted to be loved, and who did everything to make sure we did not love him.” In his autobiography, Kinski claimed all sex scenes he participated in for the film were unsimulated. That claim, true or performative, has kept the production in the same contested zone as other early-80s art-erotica that blurred hardcore and prestige casting.
Release
France released the film on 3 June 1981 as Les fruits de la passion. Japan released it as Shanghai Ijin Shōkan – China Doll in November 1981 with pubic areas censored. The U.S. release as Fruits of Passion, with English dubbing, came in November 1982. A Japanese-language version with English subtitles appeared on VHS and DVD as Fruits of Passion – The Story of “O” Continued on 20 June 2000. A digitally remastered Japanese release in Japanese, English, and French with Japanese subtitles followed in December 2005.
Reception
Critical reaction has been mixed. Roberta Novielli called it “shallow and decadent.” Jasper Sharp labeled it “minor Terayama,” charming mainly in cosmetics—costuming, sets, cinematography. Thomas and Yuko Mihara Weisser awarded three stars out of four but credited the “look” more than narrative or coherence. For kink viewers hunting O adaptations, the film is less a definitive Story of O screen version than a Terayama–Kinski curiosity: brothel obedience theater, sequel-novel DNA, and colonial Shanghai fantasy wrapped around the same unconditional-submission premise that made Réage’s original a BDSM literary landmark.
Related topics: Story of O and Retour à Roissy, BDSM in films, Shūji Terayama, Klaus Kinski erotica, and international art-house SM cinema of the early 1980s.
