What the power of love can do. The Marquis de Sade couldn't be smiling from ear to ear if he could have access to this movie, see it from start to finish, rewind, see it again, ad nauseum. It isn't as though this couldn't have been penned by him -- the Sadean delicacy is all over the place, demanding to be seen, savored, and digested. Because of course, Our Heroine, completely minding her own business, crosses paths with The Villain (who has a perpetual scowl on his face to rub it in and reveals himself to be impermeable to injuries and holds quite a laughable surprise much later in the movie) who shows his appreciation for her by planting a big, sloppy one on her alabaster face. In public. Where everyone can see. She, predictably, doesn't quite reciprocate and even demands an apology, and her boyfriend reveals himself to be a flaming eunuch in disguise, so what happens next? She gets framed for a petty act of theft. It seems that laws "out there" function at a different level than in our country because she gets thrown into a brothel and is forced to become meat for the asking. All the time, The Villain just watches and watches and watches a bit more, for amusement, behind a mirror. And is such, this tale of exploitation seems to indicate she will be there until she is too old to care -- and where are her parents who could quite easily bail her out of her predicament? What universe is this story taking place in? -- when the story decides it wants to take us, the hapless viewers, into a Different Place and reveal what it's really trying to tell us all along: that Love can actually flourish with the person who's been responsible for your debasement. And why not?