Sex, Violence, And Saints' Images: Paul Verhoeven's 1985 Film Flesh + Blood (Critical Essay‪)‬

The medieval cult of the saints and sex-and-violence action movies do not normally intersect. One interesting example where they do is the film Flesh 4-Blood (1985) by the Dutch director Paul Verhoeven. Verhoeven established his European reputation with such innovative films as Turkish Delight (1973), Soldier of Orange (1978), and The Fourth Man (1983). Flesh + Blood represents a transitional work in his career before a move to Hollywood where he would create such popular pictures of the late 80s and 90s as Robocop, Basic Instinct, Total Recall, and Starship Troopers. In 2006 he returned to his roots with the Dutch-language World War II story, Black Book. Flesh + Blood is Verhoeven's sole feature film dealing with medieval subject matter, though he had earlier directed a popular Dutch medieval TV series called Floris. For comparison, other important medieval films of the same decade are John Boorman's Excalibur (1981); Richard Donner's shape-shifting love story Ladyhawke (1985) and Jean-Jacques Annaud's atmospheric attempt to capture Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose on film in 1986. Verhoeven's film is by far the most violent and erotic of the lot, and its particular and extensive use of a saint's image is far from a trivial Hollywood appropriation.