Saturday Night Live took a stab at skewering them in a sketch a few weeks back. If the sex scene in the Francis Lee-helmed Ammonite was considered to be rooted too deeply in the “male gaze,” then Paul Verhoeven’s Benedetta,Dutch director Verhoeven is behind erotic and camp classics including Basic Instinct, Showgirls, and Elle (for which Isabelle Huppert was Oscar-nominated).
Verhoeven’s past attempts at depicting women together have raised eyebrows for many reasons. If the trailer for Benedetta is any indication, it’s on a completely different level from Basic Instinct and Showgirls.
The film’s official synopsis reads:“In the late 15th century, with plague ravaging the land, Benedetta Carlini joins the convent in Pescia, Tuscany, as a.