Sacred Flesh - Lilith Likes to Watch Nunvember 2022

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Title: Sacred Flesh
Year: 2000

Starring: Sally Tremaine, Eileen Daly, Kristina Bill

Director: Nigel Wingrove

Synopsis: Taunted by visions of Mary Magdalene, who reveals the confessions of the younger nuns at the convent, the Mother Superior’s mind is filled with the violent, sexual acts of her fellow sisters. - via Letterboxd.com

Lilith's Notes: The other Nigel Wingrove nunsploitation film.

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"Sexual purity is the apex of my spirituality."

Currently, in my non-erotica-consumed life I am rewatching the show Community, because if there is a God, he abandoned us all and I need something that makes me laugh.

I just watched the Christmas Musical episode in which Annie Edison (Allison Brie) dresses sexy and turns dumb. Jeff Winger (Joel McHale) points out, and I quote "look, eventually you hit the point of diminishing returns on sexiness."

Well, if that doesn't perfectly describe Sacred Flesh.

Mother Superior (Played by Sally Tremaine) is haunted by two beings: visions of Mary Magdalene (Played by Kristina Bill) who challenges the patriarchal, controlling ideas of the Church, and a skeletal figure called Repression (Played by Eileen Daly) who, in a barely comprehensible voice, tells Mother Superior to, well, repress her sinful thoughts as she reads the confessions of her sisters.

What we are then given is a barely held together string of sinful scenes that fail at almost every moment.

When the nuns get naughty, it is the most awkward music-video ramp-editing ever. Quick cuts, slow motion, and cross-dissolves are on the menu here! The physical contact between performers is reminiscent of spreading mustard on a piece of bread rather than intimate touching between two or three lustful bodies.

Here's the thing, I went into this knowing it would be bad. But I thought it would at least be mildly tantalising. Especially since we have experienced this director’s track record. There's no way he can fuck this up.

Oh, but he can.

There is merit to the notion that what you don't see can be better. That the mind's eye can fill in a lot of blanks. But in Sacred Flesh we see everything, and it's bad.

It came across as if the performers were trying to provide both a hard-core and soft-core experience and it all just ended up a flailing mess. You don’t look like you’re in the throes of sinful ecstasy, you look like you’re having a seizure.

The ideas here aren't bad, and have great potential, but the execution is dismal. And, frankly, after seeing what Wingrove is capable of with Visions of Ecstasy, this is depressing and offensive by comparison.

There were two scenes that were almost good. One featured an innocent novitiate being groped and fondled by two priests. Unfortunately they touch her like petting a dog, or feeling the plush of a carpet. They don’t even squeeze a breast or spank, or if they do it’s so brief or fake that it flies under the radar.

The second is a torture orgy between a handful of nuns. Any hands or mouths on genitals is purely incidental. It’s all just bodies sort of writhing against one another but with plenty of room left for Jesus.

You can’t make porn and also respect not touching each others no-no-zones. Don’t do it. It’s embarrassing for all involved.

Best Moment: I guess when the nun was tied to the cross in the orgy, but that’s not saying much.


Worst Moment: The squandered potential. This is such a fall from grace.

LILITH'S SCORE: 1/5

Until next time, my voracious voyeurs. I’m Lilith, and I’m always watching.