La Papesse (Mario Mercier, 1975)
Mercier was just thirty years old at the time he made La Papesse, his third and last film. He continued to write for many years (his book The Diary of Jane is, apocryphally, the basis of the Breaking Benjamin song of the same name), but never made another movie. After watching this one, I can see why.
I'm not even going to try and give you a plot summary, partially because the film is almost entirely incomprehensible (it has something to do with Satanism, and the country, and a bunch of, um, orgies or something, and symbolism--if you fast-forward thirty years, it got done a whole lot better in Sheitan), and partially because if I did, it would sound a whole lot like a far more sexually explicit, and not nearly as good, The Wicker Man. It doesn't become entirely obvious until relatively late in the movie, or maybe I just wasn't paying enough attention, but once you get far enough it's obvious (especially given the timeframe of the film's release) that Mercier had either seen Robin Hardy's film or read the novel upon which it is based. Unfortunately, when he was adapting it, he decided to sacrifice such niceties as coherence, characterization, and even the meager budget enjoyed by Hardy for more breasts. Which does not translate into more erotica; there's more of that in the first banter between Edward Woodward and Britt Ekland than there is in this entire movie. You might have a good time with it given the right ingestables, but please, don't try to watch it sober. I kept having to check to see if my eyes were bleeding. (half)
