Re-release of ‘OLIVIA’ from 1951 : hothouse lesbian passion in an upper class French girls school

As it is Film Fest time, all of Queerguru’s team of reviewers are knee deep in (hopefully the best) new queer cinema as they flit around the Globe so we can share with you what’s hot.  And what’s not.  Its also very  important to us that we keep an eye over our shoulders to see if any of the great early queer films reappear. And we have just spotted a gem.

Way back in 1951 OLIVIA a movie by Jacqueline Audry, one of France’s first ground-breaking female filmmakers, was considered way too hot by many quarters and has been languishing on a dusty shelf until now.  Vito Russo the lengendary queer critiic who never beat around the bush described it as “Hothouse lesbian passion in an upper class French girls’ school.”  which is one good reason why Icarus has now re-released it on VOD 

Set in a 19th-century boarding school for young girls, one divided into two camps where all the shots, even the most underhanded, seem allowed. The two mistresses of the house, Miss Julie (Edwige Feuillere) and Miss Cara (Simone Simon), are engaged in a true turf war, and a war of the heart; competing for the affections of their students, they rouse passion, hatred and unexpected reversals of loyalties. 

OLIVIA does not address female homosexuality directly, and the director passes no judgment on her characters but instead explores the students’ discovery of love and attraction and the awakening of their senses. Only the two temptresses, Julie and Cara, are presented as manipulative, and power seems to animate them as much as suppressed carnal desire.

It’s visually stunning (albeit a world almost without men), but how Audry managed to ever get it made when homosexuality was still largely considered deviant,  is all power to her.

Available online from: