The Films of Jess Franco seeks to address the scholarly neglect of this legendary cult director and to broaden the conversation around the director's work in ways that will be of interest to fans and academics alike.

Jess Franco was a Spanish director, cinematographer, writer, composer, editor, producer and actor in more than 150 fiercely independent films he made from 1959 to 2013. Kristofer Upjohn celebrates Franco in a collection of essays that examines his individual movies for the first time.

Forthcoming from the MIT Press

Pornodelic Pleasures is an illustrated document of the films of Jess Franco, the European cult director best-known for his lurid depictions of sex, obsession and horror with over 350 photographs and posters, more than 150 full-colour pages, a new introductory essay on Franco's career and work and a complete illustrated filmography. In the continued absence of a comprehensive critical evaluation of Franco's work, the book serves stimulating introduction to the world of one of cinema's most enduring and original visionaries.

With more than 180 films during a career spanning several decades, Jesus Franco (1930-2013) was an extraordinarily prolific and chameleon-like Spanish director, covering virtually every genre from horror to film noir, adventure and erotic, and adapting to all kinds of productions. A one-of-a-kind filmmaker, he was boldly original in the themes, style, and in his idea of cinema. This book examines his life and career between his first short film to the moment he cut his ties with his home country and became an "international" director, with a detailed production history and critical analysis of his films, placing his work within the social and political context of Spanish culture, politics, and cinema. Franco's most critically praised works are covered, namely such cult horror classics as The Awful Dr. Orlof and The Diabolical Dr. Z, as well as his working relationship with Orson Welles, whom he was to direct in a 1964 unfinished adaptation of Treasure Island. Detailed production history and critical analysis of his films are provided, placing his work within the context of Spanish culture, politics, and film industry. The book also includes plenty of never-before-seen bits of information and in-depth discussion of Franco's previously uncovered scripts, essays, and short films, as well as his unmade projects of the period.

The disturbing, exciting, and defiantly avant-garde films of Jesús “Jess” Franco, director of such films as Vampyros Lesbos and Lilian the Perverted Virgin. Jesús “Jess” Franco is an iconic figure in world cinema. His sexually charged, fearlessly personal style of filmmaking has never been in vogue with mainstream critics, but for lovers of the strange and sado-erotic he is a magician, spinning his unique and disturbing dream worlds from the cheapest of budgets. In the world of Jess Franco freedom was the key, and he pushed at the boundaries of taste and censorship repeatedly, throughout an astonishingly varied career spanning sixty years. The director of more than 180 films, at his most prolific he worked in a supercharged frenzy that yielded as many as twelve titles per year, making him one of the most generative auteurs of all time. Franco's taste for the sexy and horrific, his lifelong obsession with the Marquis De Sade, and his roving hand-held camera style launched a whole new strain of erotic cinema. Disturbing, exciting, and defiantly avant-garde, films such as Necronomicon, Vampyros Lesbos, Virgin Among the Living Dead, and Venus in Furs are among the jewels of European horror, while a plethora of multiple versions, re-edits and echoes of earlier works turn the Franco experience into a dizzying hall of mirrors, further entrancing the viewer who dares enter Franco's domain. Stephen Thrower has devoted five years to examining each and every Franco film. This book—the second in a two-volume set—delves into the latter half of Franco's career, covering titles including Shining Sex, Barbed Wire Dolls, Swedish Nympho Slaves, and Lilian the Perverted Virgin. Assisted by the esteemed critic and researcher Julian Grainger, Thrower shines a light into the darkest corners of the Franco filmography and uncovers previously unknown and unsuspected facts about their casts, crews, and production histories. Unparalleled in scope and ambition, Flowers of Perversion brings Franco's career into focus with a landmark study that aims to provide the definitive assessment of Jess Franco's labyrinthine film universe.