Mr. Freedom
With Delphine Seyrig, John Abbey, Sami Frey.
France, 1967-68, 35mm, color, 104 min.
Banned by the French government, recut by its producer, and misunderstood by the critics, Mr. Freedom is Klein’s garish, color-coded satire of Yankee imperialism. The title character is a superhero—part James Bond and part Buck Rogers morphed with a football fullback—who is sent to Europe to eliminate French leftists and avenge the death of his French counterpart, Capitaine Formidable (Yves Montand in a cameo). Adrift in a foreign land, Freedom falls for the counterinsurgent bombshell Marie-Madeleine (Seyrig), a union that leads to both sexual and political mayhem. Made in France at the height of 1960s anti-Americanism, Mr. Freedom mixes puppets, agitprop, comic books, pinpoint satire, and outlandish design with a political ferocity that would become Klein’s artistic signature.