Rating summary

Movie		2.0
Video		4.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		4.0
Overall		2.5

Divine Emanuelle Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman August 30, 2023

Note: This film is available on Blu-ray as part of Severin's The Sensual World of Black Emanuelle release.

Kier-la Janisse gave film fans one of the most outstanding boxed sets of the last few years with All the Haunts Be Ours: A Compendium of Folk Horror, a late 2021 release that ended up making my Best of 2022 list. Janisse is back now with another gigantic boxed set, one that's even bigger than the folk horror compendium, and one that may appeal to a certain niche audience who may not have been especially interested in that earlier set. Those who may remember the rating system of days of yore will probably recall the "M" designation, which meant "for mature audiences only", and if I may be permitted an orthographic joke that is admittedly a bit arcane, some might argue that Emanuelle gave up one of her "m"'s in favor of three x's, at least with regard to some cuts of the many Black Emanuelle films. For those not conversant with the history of this perceived franchise, and who may be scratching their heads at my "joke" (what else is new?), Black Emanuelle was a pretty blatant attempt to cash in on Emmanuelle, and in order to avoid any potential legal hassles one of those original "m"'s in the title character's name got dropped. Furthermore, as supplements on many of the discs included in this set offer, there were hardcore XXX inserts (in more ways than one) that at least some of the Black Emanuelle productions offered. Joke explained, hopefully. Perhaps even more comedically than my fitful attempt at humor, the Black Emanuelle series ended up offering many more films than its perceived progenitor, and 24 of them (with additional cuts) are aggregated in this at times overwhelming collection. This is a collection where the quality of the films may be highly debatable, though it's salient to note that the supplements both overtly reference and are in and of themselves examples of perhaps unexpected critical scrutiny this franchise has engendered, and anyone interested in this kind of bizarre franchise mash up of what might be called porno, mondo and gonzo will most likely find this an amazing set to dive into.

Divine Emanuelle is (another?) outlier in the Black Emanuelle set for a number of reasons, not the least of which Laura Gemser is not even playing Emanuelle this time, but rather a kind of High Priestess type for a cult whose main activity seems to be having orgies (so maybe this is a Black Emanuelle film, at least in a way). While bearing a production date of 1981, this film, which as mentioned below in some preambulatory text which I've reproduced was released under a number of titles not including the word Emanuelle, seems to have been inspired by the Peoples Temple tragedy in 1978. The cult's activities are thrown for a loop when the putative leader Dorian (Christian Anders, who also wrote and directed) gets involved with a United States Senator's daughter.

Divine Emanuelle and/or Love Camp and/or Love Cult or whatever you want to call it is kind of inherently bizarre enough, but it's the companion piece on this disc that may really generate the most interest, as it presents Anders' "original" vision for the film, which is more of a gonzo musical (even Divine Emanuelle has singing and dancing, rather incredibly).

Divine Emanuelle Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Divine Emanuelle is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Severin Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.66:1. Severin's almost overwhelming book The Black Emanuelle Bible included with this set offers a brief description of the transfer, as follows:

Source: 4K scan of original camera negative.

As briefly mentioned above, the presentation also starts with this text card:

The following presentation of Divine Emanuelle - under its first commercially released title Love Camp - is considered the official and final cut, although it was in fact the product of extensive reshoots and re-editing to turn what was intended as a mostly serious (albeit knowingly over the top) musical drama into the raunchy cult classic it would become.

To capitalize on star Laura Gemser's connection to the Black Emanuelle franchise, certain distributors marketed the film under the title Divine Emanuelle, which we have adopted for this release in keeping with the Emanuelle theme.

This is one of the more sumptuous looking presentations in the Black Emanuelle set, with a really nicely saturated palette that makes the most of the many outdoor locations, as well as some generally quite impressive detail levels throughout. There is still the tendency toward dewy soft focus at times, especially with regard to some of Gemser's High Priestess scenes, but on the whole this transfer offers a really nicely sharp and crisp accounting of the source element.

Divine Emanuelle Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Interestingly, Divine Emanuelle departs from the "tradition" of many of the other films in this set by offering French or English language versions (rather than Italian or English) presented in DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Mono. The French track has slightly more noticeable hiss but dialogue can be mixed louder in the French version, so it's kind of a trade off. Both tracks provide capable support for the goofy music and equally goofy dialogue. Optional English subtitles are available.

Divine Emanuelle Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Deleted Scenes (HD; 2:30) feature the following preamble:

  During the reconstruction of Christian Anders' original and unreleased Fanatico. . . version of Divine Emanuelle, its 35mm workprint was used as a reference for returning the long edited footage back to its intended place and order. While negative elements were located for all of the cut material, one brief shot was conspiculously missing in the trims despite being present in the workprint. As we were unsure if its absence indicated a loss of material or a creative decision to remove it from the first completed version of the film, we elected to include it here as an extra.

• Trailer (HD; 4:03)


• Fanatico. . .When the Goddess Calls (HD; 1:44:23) is offered here as the second feature on Disc Nine of the Black Emanuelle set, but it's actually an alternate cut of Divine Emanuelle, as is disclosed in the following preamble to the presentation:

  In October of 1980 when Christian Anders first completed shooting what would eventually become Divine Emanuelle, it was envisioned as a very different film. Anders' original cut remained the stuff of mystery and legend. . .until now!
  
  Through careful reconstruction of the original negative along with section of edited interpositive, Severin presents the worldwide debut - in any format - of Fanatico. . .When the Goddess Calls, at least allowing you to experience this demented masterpiece as its creator first intended.

Divine Emanuelle Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

This is one of the more interesting discs in the Black Emanuelle set, not necessarily for the actual feature film, but probably more so with regard to Anders' "original" version, which is almost gobsmackingly weird. Technical merits are generally solid (especially video).