''Candy'' is a 1968 sex farce film directed by

Christian Marquand Christian Marquand (15 March 1927 – 22 November 2000) was a French actor, screenwriter and film director. Born in Marseille, he was born to a Spanish father and an Arab mother, and his sister was film director Nadine Trintignant. He was often cas ...

from a screenplay by

Buck Henry Buck Henry (born Henry Zuckerman; December 9, 1930 – January 8, 2020) was an American actor, screenwriter, and director. Henry's contributions to film included his work as a co-writer for Mike Nichols's ''The Graduate'' (1967) for which he re ...

, based on the 1958 novel of the same name by

Terry Southern Terry Southern (May 1, 1924 – October 29, 1995) was an American novelist, essayist, screenwriter, and university lecturer, noted for his distinctive satirical style. Part of the Paris postwar literary movement in the 1950s and a companion to ...

and

Mason Hoffenberg Mason Kass Hoffenberg (December 1922 – 1 June 1986) was an American writer best known for having written the satiric novel ''Candy'' in collaboration with Terry Southern. Biography Hoffenberg was born in New York City into a wealthy Jewish ...

, itself based on Voltaire's 1759 novel ''

Candide ( , ) is a French satire written by Voltaire, a philosopher of the Age of Enlightenment, first published in 1759. The novella has been widely translated, with English versions titled ''Candide: or, All for the Best'' (1759); ''Candide: or, The ...

''. The film satirizes pornographic stories through the adventures of its naive heroine, Candy, played by

Ewa Aulin Ewa Birgitta Aulin (born 13 February 1950) is a Swedish former actress who appeared in a number of Italian and some American films in the 1960s and 1970s. She is remembered for playing the title character in the cult film ''Candy'' where she appea ...

. It stars

Charles Aznavour Charles Aznavour ( , ; born Shahnour Vaghinag Aznavourian, hy, Շահնուր Վաղինակ Ազնավուրեան, ; 22 May 1924 – 1 October 2018) was a French-Armenian singer, lyricist, actor and diplomat. Aznavour was known for his dist ...

Marlon Brando Marlon Brando Jr. (April 3, 1924 – July 1, 2004) was an American actor. Considered one of the most influential actors of the 20th century, he received numerous accolades throughout his career, which spanned six decades, including two Academ ...

Richard Burton Richard Burton (; born Richard Walter Jenkins Jr.; 10 November 1925 – 5 August 1984) was a Welsh actor. Noted for his baritone voice, Burton established himself as a formidable Shakespearean actor in the 1950s, and he gave a memorable pe ...

James Coburn James Harrison Coburn III (August 31, 1928 – November 18, 2002) was an American film and television actor who was featured in more than 70 films, largely action roles, and made 100 television appearances during a 45-year career.AllmoviBi ...

John Huston John Marcellus Huston ( ; August 5, 1906 – August 28, 1987) was an American film director, screenwriter, actor and visual artist. He wrote the screenplays for most of the 37 feature films he directed, many of which are today considered ...

Walter Matthau Walter Matthau (; born Walter John Matthow; October 1, 1920 – July 1, 2000) was an American actor, comedian and film director. He is best known for his film roles in '' A Face in the Crowd'' (1957), ''King Creole'' (1958) and as a coach of a ...

, and

Ringo Starr Sir Richard Starkey (born 7 July 1940), known professionally as Ringo Starr, is an English musician, singer, songwriter and actor who achieved international fame as the drummer for the Beatles. Starr occasionally sang lead vocals with the ...

. Popular figures such as

Sugar Ray Robinson Walker Smith Jr. (May 3, 1921 – April 12, 1989), better known as Sugar Ray Robinson, was an American professional boxer who competed from 1940 to 1965. He was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 1990. He is often regarded ...

Anita Pallenberg Anita Pallenberg (6 April 1942 – 13 June 2017) was a German-Italian actress, artist, and model. A style icon and "It Girl" of the 1960s and 1970s, Pallenberg was credited as the muse of the Rolling Stones: she was the romantic partner of the ...

Florinda Bolkan Florinda Bolkan (born Florinda Soares Bulcão; 15 February 1941) is a retired Brazilian actress and model. Biography She was born in Uruburetama and lived in Fortaleza and Rio de Janeiro until she moved to Italy. A former flight inspector fo ...

Marilù Tolo Marilù Tolo (born Maria Lucia Tolo; 16 January 1944) is an Italian film actress. She appeared in more than 60 films between 1960 and 1985. Life and career Born in Rome, Tolo, at a very young age, worked as an assistant of Mario Riva in the ...

Nicoletta Machiavelli Nicoletta Machiavelli (1 August 1944 – 15 November 2015) was an Italian film actress, also known as Nicoletta Rangoni Machiavelli and Nicoletta Macchiavelli. Life and career The daughter of a Florentine father and of an American mother, Mach ...

Umberto Orsini Umberto Orsini (born 2 April 1934, in Novara) is an Italian stage, television and film actor. Born in Novara, Orsini gave up his career as notary to attend the Accademia Nazionale di Arte Drammatica Silvio D'Amico. In the late 1950s, he emerged ...

, and

Enrico Maria Salerno Enrico Maria Salerno (September 18, 1926 – February 28, 1994) was an Italian actor, voice actor and film director. He was also the voice of Clint Eastwood in the Italian version of Sergio Leone's Dollars Trilogy films, and the voice of Ch ...

also appear in cameo roles.

Plot

High school student Candy Christian wakes up from a daydream where she seemingly descends to Earth from space, in her father's social sciences class, causing much embarassment. Following a poetry recital at Candy's school, eccentric Welsh poet MacPhisto offers her a ride home in his limousine. En route, MacPhisto forces himself on her but is unable to proceed after becoming too inebriated. With the help of her Mexican gardener, Emmanuel, Candy takes MacPhisto inside in order to help him out of his liquor-soaked clothes. In the basement, MacPhisto drunkenly recites poetry while humping a mannequin, inciting Emmanuel to sexually assault Candy. Scandalized upon walking in on the scene, Candy's uptight father decides to send her away to live with his twin brother Jack and his wife Livia in New York City. At the airport, the family is accosted by Emmanuel's three vengeful sisters, who accuse Candy of corrupting their brother. During the scuffle, Candy's father is rendered unconscious due to a head injury. The Christians escape by boarding a military plane commanded by General Smight. In exchange for a blood transfusion for her father, General Smight orders Candy to undress, intending to impregnate her. Meanwhile, he accidentally pushes the button that signals his

paratrooper A paratrooper is a military parachutist—someone trained to parachute into a military operation, and usually functioning as part of an airborne force. Military parachutists (troops) and parachutes were first used on a large scale during World ...

s to leap from the plane. Realizing this, General Smight jumps as well, only to slip out of his parachute harness. Upon landing in New York, Dr. Krankheit meticulously performs surgery on Candy's father in front of an audience. When Uncle Jack attempts to seduce Candy during a post-operative cocktail party, the hospital's executive director, Dr. Dunlap, berates her for her perceived lewd behavior, causing her to faint. Dr. Krankheit takes Candy to another room and tricks her into sex by pretending to examine her. While searching for her father, Candy wanders back into the operating room to find that Dr. Krankeit has branded all the nurses with his initials, as he prepares to do so to Livia. When he attempts to have Candy captured so that she is next, she flees the hospital. Roaming the streets of Manhattan, Candy ends up in a Sicilian bar in

Greenwich Village Greenwich Village ( , , ) is a neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City, bounded by 14th Street to the north, Broadway to the east, Houston Street to the south, and the Hudson River to the west. Greenwich Village ...

, where she is beset by a group of mobsters. An offbeat underground filmmaker, Jonathan J. John, then takes her into the men's room and shoots her for a film. As the room floods due to broken pipes, two policemen arrive and assault Jonathan, whereupon a drenched Candy escapes. In

Central Park Central Park is an urban park in New York City located between the Upper West Side, Upper West and Upper East Sides of Manhattan. It is the List of New York City parks, fifth-largest park in the city, covering . It is the most visited urban par ...

, she meets a

hunchback Kyphosis is an abnormally excessive convex curvature of the spine as it occurs in the thoracic and sacral regions. Abnormal inward concave ''lordotic'' curving of the cervical and lumbar regions of the spine is called lordosis. It can result fr ...

who takes her into a deserted mansion later that night. A gang of thieves walk in and proceed to ransack the place, while the hunchback rapes Candy on top of a grand piano. After arresting Candy, the two policemen maliciously plan to frisk her. However, they lose control of their squad car and crash into a club full of

drag queen A drag queen is a person, usually male, who uses drag clothing and makeup to imitate and often exaggerate female gender signifiers and gender roles for entertainment purposes. Historically, drag queens have usually been gay men, and part o ...

s. As mayhem ensues, Candy escapes again. The next morning, Candy asks for a ride in the back of a

semi-trailer truck A semi-trailer truck, also known as a semitruck, (or semi, eighteen-wheeler, big rig, tractor-trailer or, by synecdoche, a semitrailer) is the combination of a tractor unit and one or more semi-trailers to carry freight. A semi-trailer ...

, which turns out to be the sanctum of Grindl, a sham

guru Guru ( sa, गुरु, IAST: ''guru;'' Pali'': garu'') is a Sanskrit term for a "mentor, guide, expert, or master" of certain knowledge or field. In pan-Indian traditions, a guru is more than a teacher: traditionally, the guru is a reverentia ...

. He teaches her the "seven stages of enlightenment" as a pretext to have sex with her. After several days on the road, Grindl informs Candy that a different guru will guide her through the rest of her journey. Upon arrival in California, Candy is chased through the desert by the New York police officers, but she manages to outwit them. Shortly thereafter, Candy finds her new guru—a robed figure with a

toucan Toucans (, ) are members of the Neotropical near passerine bird family Ramphastidae. The Ramphastidae are most closely related to the American barbets. They are brightly marked and have large, often colorful bills. The family includes five ge ...

on his shoulder, his face covered with white clay. She follows him into an underground

Hindu temple A Hindu temple, or ''mandir'' or ''koil'' in Indian languages, is a house, seat and body of divinity for Hindus. It is a structure designed to bring human beings and gods together through worship, sacrifice, and devotion.; Quote: "The Hind ...

, which then partially collapses due to a cataclysm. As the two proceed to have sex, the guru's face is washed clean and Candy is shocked to discover he is actually her brain-damaged father. As Candy wanders across a field—surrounded by flapping banners and hippies playing music—she revisits many of the characters she met throughout the film, before finally returning to outer space.

Cast

Production

Coburn said, "That film could have been a lot more funny. Unfortunately, the director's timing was of a European nature. The jokes were always a beat behind. They were often a beat off. When you do comedy, you've got to be fast. I think (star) Ewa Aulin only did two films after ''Candy''. Then she married an Italian count or baron. That was also the only film that I made any money on. I had a percentage of the profits. Marlon Brando and Richard Burton had the same deal. It's very unusual for an actor to see anything extra. Of course, that was before the studios set up their Chinese bookkeeping system (laughs)." Regarding the scene where Grindl attempts to seduce Candy, production manager Gray Frederickson said that Marlon Brando tried to have actual sex with Ewa Aulin on camera.

Reception

''Candy'' was one of many

psychedelic film Psychedelic film is a film genre characterized by the influence of psychedelia and the experiences of psychedelic drugs. Psychedelic films typically contain visual distortion and experimental narratives, often emphasizing psychedelic imagery. Th ...

s that emerged as the 1960s ended, along with '' Yellow Submarine'', '' The Trip'', ''

Psych-Out ''Psych-Out'' is a 1968 American psychedelic film about hippies, psychedelic music and recreational drugs starring Susan Strasberg, Jack Nicholson (the film's leading man despite being billed under supporting player Dean Stockwell) and Br ...

'', and ''

Head A head is the part of an organism which usually includes the ears, brain, forehead, cheeks, chin, eyes, nose, and mouth, each of which aid in various sensory functions such as sight, hearing, smell, and taste. Some very simple animals may ...

''. The film opened to moderate box office, but later became a cult classic from the psychedelic years of film. It was the 18th highest-grossing film of 1968. According to ''

Variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...

'', the film earned North American

rentals Renting, also known as hiring or letting, is an agreement where a payment is made for the temporary use of a good, service or property owned by another. A gross lease is when the Tenement (law), tenant pays a flat rental amount and the land ...

of $7.3 million, but because of costs (including over $1 million paid out in participation fees), recorded an overall loss of $25,000. It was the 12th most popular film at the UK box office in 1969. Reviews were generally positive with a few misgivings. In a review representative of most professional reviewers at the time,

Roger Ebert Roger Joseph Ebert (; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American film critic, film historian, journalist, screenwriter, and author. He was a film critic for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, Ebert beca ...

found it "a lot better than you might expect" but missed the "anarchy, the abandon, of Terry Southern's novel". Renata Adler of ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' decried "its relentless, crawling, bloody lack of talent". John Simon wrote, "If you know someone you want to start the new year as nauseated as possible, send him to see ''Candy''." In 1969, the film earned Aulin a nomination for New Star of the Year – Actress at the 26th Golden Globe Awards. The film's soundtrack included " Rock Me", an original song from Steppenwolf which became a top-10 success for the band in the spring of 1969. On the

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

website

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

, the film holds an approval rating of 40% based on 10 reviews, with an average rating of 6.6/10.

Home media

''Candy'' was released on DVD by Anchor Bay on April 10, 2001, as a region 1 widescreen DVD, and was released on Blu-ray by

Kino Lorber Kino Lorber is an international film distribution company based in New York City. Founded in 1977, it was originally known as Kino International until it was acquired by and merged into Lorber HT Digital in 2009. It specializes in art house films, ...

on May 17, 2016, as a region A widescreen Blu-ray.

References

External links

* * * * {{Candide 1968 films 1968 comedy films 1960s American films 1960s English-language films 1960s fantasy comedy films 1960s French films 1960s Italian films 1960s satirical films 1960s sex comedy films ABC Motion Pictures films American fantasy comedy films American satirical films American sex comedy films Candide English-language French films English-language Italian films Erotic fantasy films Films based on American novels Films directed by Christian Marquand Films scored by Dave Grusin Films set in California Films set in New York City Films shot in New York City Films shot in Rome Films with screenplays by Buck Henry French fantasy comedy films French sex comedy films Incest in film Italian fantasy comedy films Italian sex comedy films Teen sex comedy films