The Summer of Rollin continues...but this time, Jean takes a detour.
Episode 576 moves away from vampires and into two radically different films from Rollin's early career: Schoolgirl Hitchhikers (1972) and The Iron Rose (1973).
One is a bizarre softcore comedy packed with nudity, slapstick, sexual liberation and some decidedly uncomfortable attitudes towards women. The other is, in my humble opinion, one of Jean Rollin's greatest achievements — a haunting, beautiful descent into dream logic, death and romantic nightmare.
First up is Schoolgirl Hitchhikers, released under the pseudonym Michel Gentil. Trading gothic castles for an isolated rural house, Rollin embraces softcore cinema with a strange mix of nudity, slapstick and increasingly uncomfortable sexual politics.
It's perhaps the hardest film to reconcile with the poetic filmmaker seen elsewhere in his work. Freedom, sexuality and liberation collide awkwardly with sexual violence, questionable agency and moments of outright misogyny.
Yet even here, Rollin's fingerprints remain: isolation, decaying locations, sexuality, fantasy and characters cut adrift from reality.
Then comes The Iron Rose. And everything changes.
Two characters. Minimal dialogue. A cemetery that slowly transforms into an impossible labyrinth.
What begins as gothic romance becomes something far stranger as passion gives way to fear, mistrust and disorientation. Are the paths changing? Are they losing their minds? Or were they ever supposed to escape?
The Iron Rose is Rollin at his most confident and hypnotic. Powered less by plot than atmosphere, emotion and dream logic, reality dissolves as the cemetery becomes its own beautiful, terrifying and inescapable world.
We'll explore:
- Rollin's strange sidestep into softcore cinema as Michel Gent
- Nudity, sexual liberation & uncomfortable misogyny
- Female agency and the collision of sex, fantasy & absurdity
- Why Rollin's signature obsessions remain without vampires
- The beauty and isolation of The Iron Rose
- Dream logic and the cemetery as nightmare labyrinth
- Françoise Pascal's remarkable performance
- Gothic romance, sex, death & the impossibility of escape
- Rollin's visual poetry, cinematography & haunting music
- Why The Iron Rose may be the definitive Rollin movie
This episode takes us from one of Rollin's strangest diversions to one of his most perfectly realised visions.
Schoolgirl Hitchhikers shows a filmmaker chasing another market, but The Iron Rose reminds us exactly why Jean Rollin matters.
By 1973, he isn't simply experimenting with style.
He has mastered his own. Beautiful. Isolated. Erotic. Melancholic. Dreamlike.
And utterly impossible to escape.
So step inside the cemetery, follow the paths, and whatever you do...Try not to get lost.
The Summer of Rollin continues...
The following texts and documentaries were used in this series:
* Lost Girls: The Phantasmagorical Cinema of Jean Rollin - Samm Deighan
* Orchestrator of Storms: The Fantastique World of Jean Rollin (2022) - Kat Ellinger and Dima Ballin
* Indicator 4KUHD Releases of Girls without Shame & The Iron Rose - Street date May 2025.
The grading follows the Netflix rating style of 1 = Hated It, 2 = Didn’t Like It, 3 = Liked It, 4 = Really Liked It & 5 = Loved It
Girls without Shame:
Duncan: 2.5
The Iron Rose:
Duncan: 5
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Timecode For Episode 576:
00:00:00 - Intro
00:03:51 - Girls without Shame
00:23:15 - The Iron Rose
00:38:43 - The Indicator 4KUHD's
00:43:22 - Closing the Show
