On the women’s ship Orlando the flags of attack, leather, weapons, lesbian love and death are raised with a beauty which dispenses with a total domination of the viewer’s gaze.
The aesthetic is strictly stylized, exhibiting itself without overwhelming us.
Ulrike Ottinger’s rarely seen first feature, follows the notorious pirate queen Madame X as she gathers a group of women, bored with their everyday lives, to join her on her ship Orlando. Subverting the traditional male-centered pirate tale, the womens’ postmodern search for self-transformation routes through conflict and destruction and places them at odds with the rituals of the outside world. This highly aestheticised adventure about love, death and utopia, stars choreographer and filmmaker Yvonne Rainer, among others.
