Alain Delon’s ‘Swinging London’ film, even though it was shot in France, Germany, Belgium and Switzerland. On one level, the whole film is about putting Marianne Faithful in and out of a leather catsuit, and fulfilling a sexual fantasy for a generation of young men. It must be why this quite bonkers work became one of the most popular film of the year in the UK in 1968. It was also the first movie to be awarded an X rating in the US and had to be re-edited to obtain an R rating. The film begins with a psychedelic dream in which Rebecca (Marianne Faithful) is sleeping next to her husband (Roger Mutton) but is dreaming of Daniel (Alain Delon) as circus ringmaster whipping the clothes off of her in a circus as she’s standing on a horse/ riding her Harley. Faithful is the film’s object of desire. Daniel (Delon) is Rebecca’s (Faithful).

The initial dream

GIRL ON A MOTORCYCLE is about Rebecca leaving her boring husband to be with the cruel but sexy University Professor (Delon, who wears glasses, like Streisand – also a professor discoursing on love – did in THE MIRROR HAS TWO FACES; though Delon also waves a pipe about). It is mainly a subjective account – Faithful in voice-over tells us why she’s on the road for him and how she met him – cueing a series of  flashbacks. It’s a certain type of masochistic discourse on free love: Delon wouldn’t marry her but gave her a Harley; she leaves her husband on the Harley, ditching respectability for sexual fulfilment. The dialogue is ludicrous. ‘Your body is like a violin in a velvet case’. ‘Skin me!’.  What was it about sex symbols in catsuits in this period (Yvonne Craig, Diana Rigg, Honor Blackman, Eartha Kitt); and for that matter sex symbols in Harleys, e.g. Brigitte Bardot? It’s a kind of psychedelic ‘Swinging London’ precursor to 50 SHADES OF GREY (‘Daniel allows me nothing, treats me like a slave…a Doctor of Pornography!’) One is tempted to laugh at much of it, and I certainly did, but there’s also a seriousness of intent that elicits a kind of a respect. It’s easy to laugh at but hard to dismiss. And certainly evokes a certain period’s ideas of sex, freedom, the road the bike, free love vs respectability, etc as well as any other film I can think of.

Some images from the film. Faithful’s catsuit is by Lanvin and an erotic work of art in its own right