(Andrzej Źuławski, 1975, France/Italy/West Germany, 109 minutes)

Polish director Andrzej Źuławski has been finding scores of new fans in recent years with the restoration and rerelease of his 1981 masterpiece Possession, but he has an impressive body of work that is ripe for rediscovery in total. Immediately preceding Possession is 1975’s The Most Important Thing is to Love (L’important c’est d’aimer), which he made in France after fleeing his native Poland when his prior film, 1972’s The Devil, had been banned there. Romy Schneider, who won a César for Best Actress for her work here, plays an actress with few options but to make softcore movies. A paparazzo named Servais (Fabio Testi) becomes obsessed with her and tries to launch a production of Shakespeare’s Richard III for her to co-star in. Alas, the proposed male lead of the production (Klaus Kinski) is a problem.

In French with English subtitles.