The Sex Thief (1973)

The Sex Thief is a 1973 British sex comedy directed by Martin Campbell (who went on to direct a couple of Bond movies including Goldeneye and Casino Royale).

Grant Henry (David Warbeck) is a writer of thrillers. He doesn’t make all that much money out of writing so he supplements his income by moonlighting as a cat burglar. He steals jewels from very rich women. They’re always home at the time and he seduces them as well. Or sometimes they seduce him. They’re married women and they’re mostly married to men who are either past it or just not up to the job of satisfying them. Grant Henry in his guise of cat burglar always satisfies them.

The women always report the burglaries to the police so that they can put in insurance claims but they always neglect to mention that the burglar bedded them after robbing them. They enjoy the sex so much that they don’t want to have to make awkward explanations to their husbands, and they’re so filled with admiration for the burglar’s prowess between the sheets that they don’t want him caught. After all, if he remains at large he might burgle them again and they’d be delighted by that.

To make sure the burglar doesn’t get caught the women give wildly inaccurate and conflicting descriptions of him. The police are baffled. Insurance investigator Judy Martin (Diane Keen) is worried. She might lose her job if the burglar cannot be caught.

Then an American actress named Jezebel, whose film career is going down the spout, decides that a publicity stunt might help. A phoney insurance claim might help as well. She claims, quite falsely, that she is the latest burglary victim but to garner extra publicity she claims that the cat burglar raped her. Seven times.

Grant Henry is outraged. He has certainly had sex with all his burglary victims but the women were always keen. He has never raped anybody. He decides to pay Jezebel back by actually burglarising her hotel room, and by seducing her. Of course in the interests of poetic justice he has to have sex with her seven times. Jezebel has a wonderful time but our cat burglar is a physical wreck after such a hectic night.

Judy Martin was suspicious of Jezebel’s claims right from the start. She’s starting to put two and two together.

Judy comes up with a plan to catch the burglar and there are a few little twists towards the end.

This movie has a slightly more substantial plot than you’d find in one of the Confessions movies. Those involved in the production wanted to make a sex comedy but they wanted it to be a real movie as well.

The 1970s British sex comedies were despised by critics at the time and to a large extent are still despised although in the last few years they have begun to attract a cult following. These movies need to be put in historical context. In the 70s the British film industry was a walking corpse. Over the course of the 60s cinema attendances had collapsed. At the end of the 60s the American money that had kept the industry afloat was withdrawn.

Making movies in Britain became almost impossible. Film companies went broke. By 1976 Hammer withdrew from film production in despair. In the early 70s the wave of sex comedies was almost the only thing keeping some semblance of life going in the industry. These movies ensured that at least some studios would keep going, that film crews would get some work and at least some cinemas could remain open.

The British sex comedies of the early 70s are interesting because producers were only prepared to go so far. These movies included plenty of frontal nudity and plenty of simulated sex but they’re not overly steamy. And combining sex with comedy made the sex seem less threatening. Producers were aware of the need to tread carefully. They were making movies for the mainstream market. They were not making ultra low budget backyard productions. So the sex comedies from 1970 to 1974 do pull their punches when it comes to the sex.

The Sex Thief was marginally more ambitious than most sex comedies. This is more of a lighthearted sexy crime thriller than a pure sex comedy. It is quite amusing but the focus remains on the actual plot. It’s not a sex film as such.

In The Sex Thief there’s frontal nudity and sex scenes but they do actually serve a purpose in plot terms. It’s a movie that doesn’t want to be seen as celebrating eroticism for its own sake.

The Sex Thief is fascinating as an example of the kinds of movies that British film-makers were making at the time in a desperate attempt to find ways to persuade people to tear themselves away from their TV sets and go to the cinema. It does have some funny moments and as a lightweight romp of a crime thriller it’s fairly entertaining. If you don’t set your expectations too high and accept it for what it is it’s recommended.