Sex film: Michel Houellebecq loses case against Dutch art collective KIRAC

French writer Michel Houellebecq has appealed against the Amsterdam court's ruling in a lawsuit against Dutch art collective KIRAC. The collective had made a sex film starring Houellebecq, but the author no longer agrees to the publication of the material.

The 67-year-old author had previously appealed to a French court, but the court ruled that the film KIRAC 27 did not violate his privacy. Houellebecq had to pay filmmaker Stefan Ruitenbeek a small compensation.

Houellebecq wanted the film, which some media outlets called a porno, banned after seeing its trailer. Among other things, the trailer showed the writer kissing a young woman in bed without wearing a shirt. Based on this trailer, he called the film "defamatory" and "an explosion of violence."

According to Houellebecq, the contract he signed with KIRAC is not legally valid. He claims that he was depressed at the time of signing, and furthermore that the contract was signed in the middle of the night in a drunken state. However, according to the judge, it was "incomprehensible why Houellebecq participated in the shooting if he really found the agreement problematic." Moreover, the judge said, there had been "sufficient time between the conclusion of the agreement and the start of filming to review the content of the agreement and, if this had not led to a solution, to decide to refuse his collaboration."

In the Netherlands, Houellebecq published novels including Subject and Elementary Particles.