Artist Viva
Due in part to the casual frankness of dime-store paperbacks and Playboy magazine, sex became a legitimate subject for movies by the '60s, though scattered filmmaking outposts in Europe, Hollywood, and drive-ins and grindhouses handled the matter differently. Anna Biller's debut feature, Viva, combines all these elements, offering a painstaking recreation of the look and feel of campy retro sexploitation. Biller stars as a California housewife circa 1972, who changes her name to "Viva" and embarks on a journey through the sexual revolution after her husband moves out. Prostitution, nudist colonies, guerilla theater, furtive lesbian encounters, Hollywood orgies—Viva tries them all. But the movie lacks sexploitation's pervasive sense of shame.
Updated 10/28/2009
