Adam and Eve (1983)
One of my big goals for 2026 is to read more. Another is to get a bit fitter and lose some weight. The final one is to expand my cinematic horizons.
A wise person on Twitter caught my attention by simply stating “there’s a whole world of cinema out there”. We used to talk about penny drop moments in school and this was absolutely one of those. I’ve spent the best part of 30 years watching UK or US produced films. Partly born of choice and partly due to what I was exposed to. It’s quite weird because I’ve always been brought up in a multi cultural environment with openness being a trait of mine I’m most proud of. The more I thought on it, the more insane it seemed that I wasn’t gobbling up world cinema on a bigger scale.
Unlike most resolutions I’m going for it at the moment! This year already I’ve watched films from Japan, France, Phillipines, South Korea, Hong Kong, Russia and Italy. Italian cinema is a genre of film I’ve dipped in and out of but have, more often than not, felt was a bit of a novelty. You know what you’re in for. However, some recent first time watches such as The Church, City of the Living Dead, Burial Ground and Cemetery Man have made me completely reevaluate my view of the Italians take on cinema. Maybe there’s more to these films than blood, boobs and bad dubbing?
Step up Adam and Eve. Whether you’re religious or not, you must know the story of Adam and Eve. Gods first foray into human production. They inhabited the Garden of Eden until Eve decided to scoff a forbidden apple after a bit of cajoling from a serpent. God gives them the old heave ho and they continue their lives in banishment. It’s the story of original sin.
An Italian exploitation film isn’t necessarily a toe in the water to test the cinematic capabilities of this story, rather, a full cannonball into the shallow end.
We open on a montage of the planets through space backed by electric guitar. God clearly shredding on the seventh day. The credits list Adam and Eve, Mark Gregory and Andrea Goldman. The first crew member listed is the costume designer, which based on the Severin Films cover, could potentially be the most redundant role imaginable. A narrator begins to reel off, what seems like, real verses from the bible and you can’t help but wonder when the film is going to splinter off from the biblical text.
As I’ve said previously, I’m not religious so I wouldn’t deem myself to be an expert on religious scripture. However, I am quite confident that if I revisited the Old Testament, I wouldn’t find Adam being birthed from an embryonic sack like an insect, Eve being created by Adam playing with sand, cannibals fighting tribesmen, iceberg vessels or Pterodactyls being punched to death.
It’s wild in every sense. We see humans interact with animals in a way I’ve not seen since watching Roar (1981). We’re treated to numerous, genuinely, stunning shots of vast open spaces across frozen, rocky, forest and beach terrain. There’s a beauty to this film that I wasn’t expecting at all.
However, there’s also a very ugly side. I found the treatment and writing of Eve to be pretty repulsive. She is painted in possibly the most sexist light I’ve ever seen of a character. A one dimensional, nagging, whining, impulsive, arrogant, ignorant woman. Her sole motivations for tasting the forbidden fruit seems to be boredom and a bit of parseltounge from the hissing snake. The sexism is extended to the final scene where Eve seems to invent the water birth. It’s a film so there does have to be an element of belief suspension, but the lack of any real strain or effort to give birth, against the back of the rest of the film, suggests a complete lack of thought towards women.
It’s further compounded with the way every other character treats Eve. She’s seen as an object and that’s the extent of it. There feels something telling in the fact that Goldman didn’t star in anything else after this. A one and done career. Adam’s not necessarily painted with watercolours but there’s a little bit more there. The tagline suggests this is “the first love story”. I’d suggest not. There’s no relationship build or any exploration of romance.
It’s a truly bizarre cinematic experience. Reading this, you may think this is a ‘must see’. For a film that has so much happening, it also feels like not a lot happens. These flashes of action are weighed down by a large amount of long shot moments that follow Adam and Eve walking around doing nothing. It’s hard to pinpoint because it’s not a horror film. It’s not a fantasy film. It’s not a romance film.
It’s an Italian exploitation film. There are so many other films I could recommend instead but just for the sheer nerve and inspiration to have a go at making this film, you have to check it out. Just don’t expect biblical accuracy or anything life affirming. It’s also not deterred me from exploring more world cinema. This film just simply would not get made now and I’m sure wouldn’t have been made by a major UK or US studio. That’s part of the beauty.
As I mentioned above, I watched this on Severin Films recent Blu-Ray release and it was a great restoration. I picked it up as part of their Black Friday sales alongside a load of other titles that fit into this category of world cinema and cult classics. I’ll definitely be covering some more of them over the coming months and I hope I’ll see you back here!
