Movie Review: Beyond Obsession (1982) directed by Liliana Cavani aka “Beyond the Door”
Matthew Jackson (Tom Berenger), an American oil worker in Morocco, takes a trip to Marrakesh. At a boring sex show, he meets an Italian woman, Nina (Eleanora Giorgi). She takes him to a slightly more exciting brothel, gets Matthew high, and hooks him up with a pretty male belly dancer before ditching him. This intrigues Matthew, who is not exactly the brightest of men. He soon learns that Nina has a day job at a travel agency, but her primary occupation is suckering men into thinking she’s attracted to them and getting them to shell out money for her while never delivering.
This turns out to be because she needs cash for her stepfather Enrico Sommi (Marcello Mastroianni), who is in prison for murdering Nina’s mother. The bribes allow Signor Sommi to have various luxuries, including unsupervised excursions outside the prison.
Nina and her stepfather are sexually involved, which may be why Enrico murdered her mother, or she committed suicide, depending on who you ask. There’s also some question about whether Mr. Mutti (Michel Piccoli), Nina’s mother’s first husband, is in fact her biological father or if Enrico’s affair with Mom bore fruit before the formal divorce.
Matthew is a little freaked by all this but obsessed with Nina, and eventually gets Enrico to a point where he can be pardoned and Matthew takes Nina off to Italy to live. But that’s not quite the end of the story.
This one’s honestly a stinker. Matthew’s a dope, Enrico’s creepy, and Nina is a user.
The sex show at the beginning is so boring it’s actually a bit funny. One of the audience members is a woman who’s writing something, and every so often flicks her eyes up at the center bed. It’s like she’s got homework to finish but social obligation requires her to show up at her friend’s “performance.”
Content stuff: Nudity and onscreen sex (no genitals); psuedo-incest (or just maybe real incest); Enrico is sometimes physically abusive towards Nina. Suicide is threatened, attempted and (off-scree) accomplished. A gory corpse is seen. Hashish use, and it’s implied Matthew had sex with the belly dancer.
Some dialogue in French and Italian does not get translated, but nothing you need to know for plot purposes.
Overall: Sleazy and snoozy, won’t be rewatching even with a riff crew.
