Welcome to London at the end of the swinging sixties, where peace and free love should reign supreme; in Skolimowski’s supreme puncturing of the sixties’ ideal, however, free love for most is like a bird: it’s in the air, sure, but still too far to reach, and apt to leave a stain. Awkward teenager Michael gets a job at a seedy public bathhouse, where most of the clientele request more than a simple toweling-off; he soon falls under the spell of his bewitching coworker Susan (Jane Asher, fresh from dating Paul McCartney), a vision of mod beauty and sexual cool. For Susan, the sexual revolution is indeed now; for everyone else, and especially Michael, it’s unattainable except in fantasy. The film’s grime-ridden, outsider’s vision of swinging London is both authentic and surreal (especially considering it was primarily filmed in Munich), and gains further impetus from a soundtrack that includes Cat Stevens and Can.

—Jason Sanders

• Written by Jerzy Gruza, Skolimowski, Boleslaw Sulik. Photographed by Charly Steinberger. With Jane Asher, John Moulder-Brown, Karl Michael Vogler, Diane Dors. (90 mins, Color, 35mm, From Paramount Pictures)