Your Ticket Is No Longer Valid

I remember I saw this film in 1981. Being in my early twenties, it had an impact in me. It deals about obsessions in a man that having not aged to well due to a excessively free lifestyle, has to coupe with the fact that his own sexual capabilities are fading. Now, he can only get his act together, sometimes, after he watches his beautiful girlfriend being fondled by other men. On one occasion, he even hired a guy to be with her while he watched from a closet. The case is, his girlfriend,trying to help him so that he could perform, agreed to the thing. For the man, not going all the way while making love was a personal trauma. The circumstances about his descend are very well shown, almost in a classy way.

Your ticket is no longer valid explores something that recent surveys have shown all to well: it is a fantasy of many men to watch their partners doing it with another man. Whether that comes true or not is another issue.

The surroundings of the film are great as well as its locations. It has its funny moments also.There is a short part from that great actor, George Peppard.

I have the VIZ Movies VHS copy, strangely it has a misprint. In the US it's known for "Your Ticket Is No Longer Valid", here in Europe it's called "A Slow Descent Into Hell" but on the VHS and cover it's written Decent. So for that reason alone it's a collectable. But is it a collector for other reasons. Well, it's a strange flick to watch. It has some for that time being big names in it, George Peppard and Richard Harris, both no longer with us and Jennifer Dale still in the business as an actress and producer. It was up to now never released on DVD. But it's easily to obtain. It's all about a man on top of a national which empire is decaying and has to sell it. But not only that, he has some sexual problems too due his age. He can't take it and is as the title says descending into hell. It's a really slow movie but somehow I kept watching it because you want to know what will happen. Richard is the main lead and did an excellent job as did Jennifer. George doesn't appear that much and is so typical himself, it could have been Hannibal from the A-team. There is some nudity in it from Jennifer and full frontal from some stripper at a bar. Not that it was sexy because in the eighties full bush was the way to go. And admit it, seeing the stripper in a sexy costume and seeing pubic hair coming out is really a turn-off. There isn't any action in it, it's all blah blah and as I said some weird scene's in it like the one with the thief in a dressing room. And the last minutes are strange too, the story about a sex slave...The movie ended suddenly and things are still left open to discuss what is happening next. It's exactly 30 years old and it is what it is, it's a bit slow and lame for times being but if you're into those actors then I recommend it.

Canadian film producer Robert Lantos has basically proclaimed himself the savior of English-Canadian filmmaking, though if you look at his filmography you'll see that he has set many of his films in other countries as well as using Canadian taxpayers' money as funding for these foreign-set films, this movie included. An early effort by Lantos, this movie has subsequently been almost totally forgotten, with good reason. The central story isn't much of one, being somewhat short but stretched out to 91 minutes. The movie also has some unintentionally amusing moments, from dialogue that has lines like, "Don't underestimate the value of a partial erection", to goofy sequences of a sexual nature. Though speaking of those sexual scenes, it does give Richard Harris the opportunity to take off his clothes and get into sweaty sex sequences, so if you've ever wanted to see Harris do that, this is the film to watch.

Your Ticket Is No Longer Valid is a strange title for a film, but it works as a metaphor. The ticket is Richard Harris's penis, and the reason it is no longer valid is that he can no longer get an erection.

The film is about a business mogul named Jason (Harris) who has a younger lover called Laura (Dale). As the pressures of his deteriorating business begin to tell on him, Jason discovers that his sex life is also affected. He is losing his ability to get an erection and satisfy her in bed. To make matters worse, he begins to have dreams about a gypsy stud having sex with her, and finds himself shamefully excited by these dreams. In the end, he contemplates suicide in order to spare his lovely lady the unhappiness of a sexless relationship.

It's a bizarre and often tasteless film, with the most unusual cast you could ever hope to find in such a project. However, the performances are pretty good, especially Harris who somehow manages to convince in one of the most near-unplayable roles of his career. George Peppard is good too as a racist rival banker, who uses dirty language like "f@ck" and "c*nt" as if it's going out of fashion. Beyond the performances, there isn't that much to recommend the film. It tries to deal with its themes seriously and meaningfully, but it ends up playing like a campy sleazefest, mixed in with some fake overtones of tragedy.

I totally recommend this movie if you are a Richard Harris fan (who isn't?), if you don't dig him, nix this as it is somewhat shameless. Once again, Richard is being his usual exhibitionist self...the way I like it. He is so utterly not self-conscious about his shameless parading, he becomes attractive for that very reason. Too bad there was no full monty a girl can be curious, right ).