The sexploitation flick Exponerad, which premiered in Sweden today in 1971 and is known in English as Exposed and Diary of a Rape, is an exceedingly serious movie considering its genre. That would normally be a sin in our book, but this stars Christina Lindberg, so we figured okay, it’s worth a gander. Lindberg, in one of her earliest roles, plays Lena, a high school girl torn between her twerp of a boyfriend Jan and an older, depraved sociopath named Helge. She prefers Jan, but Helge has taken nude photos of her and is using them to blackmail her into servicing guests at his wild parties.
When Jan learns that Lena has been sharing her fuzzy favors, his caveman side comes out and he slaps her. Lena promptly runs away to the country. Here we learn that the wall between reality and fantasy is a thin one for her, and she crosses between it multiple times. She’s raped by a stranger, tries to seduce a man who picks her up hitchhiking, dies in a fiery automobile crash, and has other imaginings the audience only knows are in her head once the movie leaps back to the point where those scenes began.
If we consider these fantasies closely it’s possible Lena is coming to grips with her sexuality and her place in a sexualized world. A particularly insightful review we read suggested that all of these waking dreams represent the male gaze, which is why they’re creepy and violent. It’s a theory we like, but we aren’t sure if it actually holds up—unless daydreams can leave physical artifacts behind. We know we’re being vague. This is when that no spoilers promise we made a while back is inconvenient.
In any case, what the filmmakers wanted to do here was make thought-provoking erotica, and they definitely accomplished that. We picture the producer shaking hands with director Gustav Wiklund and saying, “Well done, lad. Despite all the nudity there’s no possibility anyone will get a boner.” Whether the film makes any sense is a different issue. We recommend that if you watch Exponerad, you watch with full attention or you’ll get lost long before the double twist ending that’ll make you say either, “Aha!” or “Huh?” Fans of ambitious sexploitation, this movie is your jam. We have some promo images beow, and you can see more here and here.
