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Reviews
Ride a Wild Stud (1969)
Put this one out to pasture
Helmer of numerous B-westerns back in the '40s and '50s, director Oliver Drake hops into the saddle one last time for RIDE A WILD STUD, a rickety C-western that plays exactly like one of his oaters from the '40s, albeit with copious amounts of sex and nudity.
Script here, credited to Rachel and William Edwards, is inscrutable, something about a cowboy or the Feds rescuing one guy's kidnapped girlfriend from the "pleasure house" of Confederate bandit William Quantrill. In Old Hollywood fashion, the film even comes with a theme song explaining the story, though I still wasn't able to make out much more than A) Quantrill is bad, B) he will be defeated, and C) the song rhymes "dead" with "dead."
The problem is the script hasn't the faintest idea how to introduce anyone. It opens with eight minutes of cowboy action, looking like it was plucked straight out of a vintage poverty row Western, before flatlining into a long sequence of women being groped and molested at Quantrill's. Some lady is kidnapped at the end of the first scene and taken here, but we're given no idea who she is, and the other women (with the exception of the house's brassy grande dame) don't fare much better. It doesn't help that the film's two modes seem utterly at odds: either it's dishing up flatly-shot action and dialogue scenes in the manner of a Monogram picture, or it's indulging in random sequences of sex that seem like they're from another movie entirely. The film has no idea how to actually integrate sex into its plot, a la the dirty westerns of Dave Friedman - it just tosses in random porn breaks every now and then.
It also doesn't help that Quantrill is largely absent from his own story, with his pleasure house (we can't call it a brothel because the service is free) managed instead by one of his henchmen. This means the main villain essentially becomes a side-character in his movie, and while there are films that have used such absences to create an air of mystery, it will surely surprise no one that RIDE A WILD STUD is not among them. By the time the conclusion rolls around, with the heretofore-almost-unseen Quantrill battling a couple guys whose identity is largely unclear, the movie has collapsed into outright confusion. It really is little more than a recreation of '40s Western set-ups with some random nudity and rape tossed in.
As bad as this is, I probably should've hated it more, but there's also a certain charm to the sense it's been helmed by a group of old timers giving things one last go - while being utterly clueless how to update their schtick to the changing standards of the era. At least for Drake, this would be his last Western, if not quite his swan song. His few final credits saw further pivots into exploitation, with oddball titles like THE MUMMY & THE CURSE OF THE JACKALS and ANGELICA - THE YOUNG VIXEN providing a weird and pitiable capper to a career that largely seemed to long for the plains (or at least the studio backlot).
Love, Hollywood Style (1972)
What's LOVE go to do with it?
Less concerned with romance than the time-honored tradition of the casting couch, LOVE, HOLLYWOOD STYLE sees early porn stalwarts Rick Cassidy, Ric Lutze and Neil Pearlman donning the guise of producers to bed aspiring starlets for a nonexistent porn flick. The result is a by-the-numbers one-day wonder, enlivened only by the solid improv skills and bonhomie of its central trio.
Plot offers little beyond the set-up, opening on our group sitting around their Hollywood pad waiting for the calls to roll in after placing a casting ad in the paper. Somehow, they all agree Lutz will get first girl, followed by Cassidy and then scrawny Pearlman bringing up the rear (he apparently knows his place in the male pecking order!). First to show up is Becky Sharpe, playing an experienced actress who clocks the trio's game immediately. It takes little to get her in bed with Lutz, the lady clearly already aware of protocol for landing her role.
Next to show up is a curly-haired brunette who's more reticent. Cassidy inveigles her to strip before showing off her set of pipes (with a song, that is). Finally, they retreat to the bedroom, where Jim has them briefly roleplay Adam & Eve before getting down to business.
Final woman is a shy, bob-haired brunette who pairs up with Neil while making conversation about her job as a telephone operator. They have fairly desultory sex: the woman, whether going full method or actually just not feeling it, seems uninvested, while the usually dependable Pearlman is likewise off his game, delivering half-hearted oral and humping by numbers. Weirdly, while the Ric(k)s eventually switch partners, Neil stays in his nonstarter pair for the duration, until everyone returns to the living room for the mandatory closing orgy.
Structure-wise, there's little to distinguish LOVE, HOLLYWOOD STYLE from innumerable other lazy one-day wonders: a limited cast assembles in a single place (usually a house), pairs off and splits up to screw, then reunites in the final minutes for a group grope. If there's anything of note here, it's the number of key players present from the early hardcore scene - specifically Cassidy, Lutz, and Sharpe - along with someone like Pearlman, who's less well known but was a fairly common face in these early LA grinders. As a result, for those familiar with the era, the film has a charming hangout quality, particularly in the opening minutes, where it really seems like the guys have a mutual familiarity and are just goofing around together. The result thoroughly unambitious, but at least one of the more charming and professional variations on its extremely well-trod material. It may not be high art, but it's proficient porn, with a bit of historical interest as a kicker.
Mountain Lady (1978)
Camping LARP with nominal Christian overtones
If you've ever wondered what it's like to go camping in the Alaskan wilderness, MOUNTAIN LADY's got you covered. Produced and directed by Daniel L. Quick, who served in various production capacities on several other Christian features, it's narrated by one-time country-gospel impresario Stuart Hamblen, which is probably the only reason anyone might remember it.
With a cast as threadbare as its plot, MOUNTAIN LADY features a grand total of two (2) credited live performers, Tom D. Coreson as Grandpa and Heidi Machen as Heidi, who's dropped off by her dad to spend the summer camping (the identity of the guy playing Heidi's father, only briefly glimpsed during their car ride, unfortunately remains a mystery). Heading out into the Alaskan wilds with grandpa, Heidi is quickly introduced to the various necessities of survival, while the viewer is accosted by down-home aphorisms delivered via Hamblen's narration. Extolling the beauty of the land and calm of the untapped forests, Hamblen ultimately ties it all back to god, even gracing (?) us with one of his ballads ("The Workshop of the Lord"), which stops the film cold for a solid three minutes (as though it were going anywhere anyway). If the film has anything resembling a traditional plot, it's structured around a lost foal that runs off at the end of the first reel. But following a small amount of searching, gramps and Heidi quickly give up, so it's back to nature footage and weenie-roasting for the duration. (At least gramps does sauté up what looks like a mean batch of dandelion greens.)
Next to nothing of any dramatic incident happens in MOUNTAIN LADY, though at the same time it has such an earnest, soporific quality it becomes difficult to hate. There's something pleasantly quaint about the kind of God-and-apple pie picture it paints of Americana, and a calming aura to its endless litany of bucolic nature footage. It's like the good-hearted Christian answer to IN SEARCH OF BIGFOOT, another movie where a group of people head out into the Pacific Northwest and don't really do much of anything. When I say a movie's a sleeping pill, it's usually an insult, but here, through the sheer force of good intentions, MOUNTAIN LADY improbably manages to give sleeping pills a good name. If you ever felt like camping but couldn't be arsed to drag your butt off the couch, this is the film for you.
Burning Wild (1979)
Get out the vote
Unambitious in the extreme, this super-obscure quickie is a tossed-off effort that gives even storefront grinders a bad name. It's proficiently produced, but that's about all it's got going for it.
Topical for the time of my viewing, nominal theme here is politics, with various minor figures dropping by the stately manse of Joe Andrews, up for reelection and whose wife Lilian is more than happy to help back his cause. Along with unspecified housemate Ann (Tawny Pearl, the only person in the cast I recognized), she sets about schtupping all comers. A couple unclearly-defined local bigwigs start things off, followed by the female chief of police, and finally even hubby himself arrives to lend a hand with "voter outreach."
Even by vintage porn standards, f*cking your way to victory one person at a time is a pretty weak set-up. Little matter, since the film's nominal gestures toward any form of political or social commentary are so lazy as to constitute self-parody. BURNING is little more than people having sex in a house, for around an hour, which is presumably all that 95% of the audience was asking for anyway. Performers run the gamut from unappealing to attractive (distaff cast fairs better, with Pearl in particular bringing her trademark SoCal charm), and that's really the only metric this can be judged by since the film as a whole is so thoroughly uninterested in striving for anything bigger. Final shot - arrived at before anyone in the closing orgy has achieved climax - is one of the actresses flashing a peace sign at the camera and smiling, "Politicians - they f*** you one way or another." Same goes for low-rent pornographers.
The Peeping Detective (1971)
Private eyes are watching you!
Thoroughly and almost affably unambitious, THE PEEPING DETECTIVE (I have it under decent authority the film may have been called "Snatch Shot" originally, but still have not confirmed 100%) is a low-stakes but proficiently executed storefront grinder. It'll hardly set the world on fire, but you could do a lot worse.
Adam Ward stars (if one can "star" in these things) as a down-on-his-luck private dick on the cusp of losing his business and office. Attempting to calm his nerves via a morning quickie with secretary Sandy Carey, he's interrupted by the arrival of first one and then another customer in rapid succession. Both want Ward to gather evidence their spouse is cheating, and, atypical for the genre, Ward immediately guesses the twist: the two are married and each angling to gain advantage in their divorce proceedings.
Knowing a good thing when he sees it, Ward takes both their cases and, after finally getting The Carey Treatment, sets out of photograph both partners in flagrante with his infrared camera. This leads to some extended couplings featuring the husband, who is indeed sleeping with another lady, and his wife, who's shacking up with her attorney (Ric Lutze)! Ward gets the necessary pics and returns to the office, but what happens when all parties converge by accident the following day?
This is hardly great shakes, but the film is at least competently constructed and takes some care with its story even while being clearly dashed off in a single day. Shockingly, it takes almost 15 minutes for the movie to get to its first sex scene, teasing the audience with flashes of Carey undressing but taking a surprising amount of time to get to business. Porno patrons must have wanted to riot! Following this extended set-up, the film smartly opts not to bite off more than it can chew, cleanly sticking to its simple and well-delimited premise. The result is paint-by-numbers porn that admittedly bogs down during its sex scenes, but at least stays on target and gets over the finish line smoothly, even leaving room for a few flourishes like pratfalls from Ward during his spy missions and high-key drawing room farce as Ward and Carey attempt to hide (or hide others) in the office darkroom.
Perhaps all this is damning with faint praise, as the film's little to write home about, but it has just enough competence that it emerges as diverting while still providing "program picture" porn. One other point of (minor) interest: in contrast to a lot of cheap early XXX, this was clearly shot on a soundstage with a professional jib, which allows for some unusually active camerawork and, in particular, myriad distinctive moments of the camera smoothly raising and lowering during the action. Other films I've seen with this visual tic, such as SEX SPA (aka "How to Lose Weight"), all seem to be credited to James R. Haskin, so it's quite possible he's the mad auteur behind this as well. If so, congrats are due for establishing an efficient and effective assembly-line model, perfect for cranking out quickies like this that hardly break new ground, but are nevertheless laudable for their efficient consistency.
The Mind Blowers (1969)
AC/DC obscurity BLOWs a promising set-up
Lost in the depths of the Something Weird back catalog, THE MIND BLOWERS is an interesting artifact - hardly a gem, but with enough peculiarities sprinkled through to make it worth a look. Hailing from '69, it marks the last year of the B&W NY sleazies, right before hardcore came on the scene and turned the entire industry on its head.
Opening with great shots of 42nd Street in its prime (replete with marquees advertising now-obscurities like THE PINK PUSSY: WHERE SIN LIVES), we're introduced to a number of the Deuce's denizens, including a couple sailors on shore leave, a hip young couple with a frigid distaff half (interestingly, her partner is Warhol superstar Eric Emerson, slumming it here), a nelly-ish gay dude, and a sexually-liberated chick. They're all about to become THE MIND BLOWERS, when each ends up invited by a friend or acquaintance to the lab of Prof. Wolfgang Gotterdam, who, along with his idiot assistant Dumbkopf, is conducting unorthodox experiments in sexual impulse transmission. Instructing each volunteer to focus on the most erotic fantasy they can imagine (during which the Professor even sees fit to grope the hippie girl!), Gotterdam records their brainwaves and later plays them back for different participants, leading the swishy gay dude to take a walk on the straight-and-narrow, the liberated girl to turn into a Bible thumper, the macho sailor to indulge in some male-male lovin' with his buddy, etc.
While hardly reinventing the wheel in terms of sexploitation, THE MIND BLOWERS starts off with a solid premise. It admittedly spins its wheels a while getting to the lab (Emerson and his girlfriend stop to take in an "art film," which allows for a gratuitous interlude of lesbian canoodling), but after that things become fun - if erratic - once the cast gets there. The guy playing Gotterdam hams it up appropriately, and the personality-swapping scenario is solid, allowing the different characters to step out of their shells. The problem is that the film doesn't quite know how to dramatically maximize this - the characters swap inclinations but never learn anything in the process. The film seems to be setting up a major narrative thread of the lonely gay guy longing for his dream hunk, but it never hooks them up - any character development is dropped the second everyone has had their sex scene.
Having seem this years ago, the film always stuck in my mind for this surprising male-male content - a rarity even in this era, when sexploitation was still figuring out exactly what audiences did and didn't want. The movie's refreshingly progressive in this regard, which makes it frustrating things just bottom out into a standard orgy at the end. Add on to that that the film seems almost actively disinterested in presenting appealing sex - all the scenes are shot from a minimum of angles, each unflattering, and usually just show a couple embracing with little clear view of anyone's body - and you have a frustrating result, replete with many of the quirky touches that make better sexploitation films work, but undone by a total disinterest in telling a coherent narrative. Not exactly a MIND BLOWER itself, there's still enough in this film to make it worth a watch - at least for Warhol acolytes and fans of closet-case sexploitation - but temper your expectations.
My Master's Table (1972)
MASTER class in arty S&M
Not leaving all that much for a reviewer to say, MY MASTER'S TABLE is short and to-the-point - nothing more than a single S&M session between four guys on a modest soundstage, it nevertheless stands out due to solid craftsmanship.
Literally just two men being stripped, strapped down and tormented by another two, TABLE nevertheless distinguishes itself from pretenders (plenty of '70s sex films enjoyed throwing in a pro forma whipping scene) via a focus that remains centered on bondage over sex: guys are tied up and disciplined with a variety of gadgets, and one scene features one of them being anally probed by all manner of strange devices including a dildo strapped to a power drill and even a fluorescent light. Youch!
Sexual duties are more limited than standard XXX fare, but still include the requisite fellatio and some proper anal (i.e. With a human penis). One guy even ends up straddled by another and forced to perform some prolonged salad-tossing - as though he would have minded! Where the film most distinguishes itself, however, is in its surprisingly evocative use of color. This is unfortunately obliterated in pretty much all current versions, which come from the same dupey B&W source, but the original has been revived in a few gallery-type environments and will hopefully be made available to broader audiences eventually. The set-up may be simple, but the devil's in the details - this one's a winner.
Carnal Games (1978)
Just ignore the ending
Surprisingly obscure, CARNAL GAMES features an impressive number of vintage XXX heavy-hitters and decent production values. That coupled with a solid script and impressive technical execution leads to a pleasant rediscovery - not quite a lost masterpiece, but at least a cubic zirconia in the rough.
The film first impressed me with its unusually long dramatic setup: fleeing the casting couch of sleazy talent agent R. Bolla (shockingly in a non-sex role, at least in my copy), Christina (C. J. Laing) heads to a nearby restaurant, unaware a mysterious valet (Gilbert Palmitier) is watching her. He reports her location to his employer, George (Jake Teague), who gets himself seated across from her. Though Christina is initially suspicious of his advances, George wears her down and brings her back to his mansion.
Ten minutes in and still without anyone getting naked, a hitherto-unheard narrator informs us George and Christina were married a couple weeks later. It's almost 15 minutes in before our first sex scene, surprisingly not between Christina and George, but with the couple spying on the valet in a three-way with a gardener (Dave Ruby) and another woman. This serves as Christina's introduction to George's brand of CARNAL GAMES...
In another marathon exposition dump, George tells Christina of his dead wife Madeline, whom he used to enjoy sharing these kinds of voyeuristic escapades with and who also, as it turns out, was his sister! Christina's perfect resemblance to Madeline is what attracted George to her, and he's been following her ever since. Weirdly, the revelation her husband was sleeping with his sister and stalking her because of her resemblance to a dead woman barely phases Christina, and she goes up to bed and masturbates.
From there, George pushes Christina into doing more and more of the kinds of things he used to do with Madeline - which mainly just seems to be sleeping with a lot of people. Unfortunately, trouble comes in the form of George's handsome employee (a very young John Leslie), whom Christina starts feeling genuine affection for. Will she be able to extricate the young man and herself from her husband's grip - and, more importantly, can George ever learn to live without Madeline?
**SPOILERS**
Obviously, the answer is no, but the ending of this film is a howler. After carefully laying out its plot for three reels, it face-plants in the fourth, seeming like whoever made it ran out of time, money, or both. Trouble begins literally at the reel change, with a tone-deaf scene of Laing telling Teague she's fallen out of love with him. While the rest of the (often lengthy) dialogues so far have been carefully scripted, this endless, circular exchange feels totally improvised, with Laing repeating the same points endlessly and stumbling over her words. Things don't get better from there, with Teague persuading Laing to partake in one last "game" before calling it quits. No surprise to anyone even remotely versed in vintage porn that it's nothing but an orgy with everyone who came before - the main shock is that a film previously so inventive allows itself to devolve into such a prosaic denouement. Really running out the clock now, the film cuts to stock footage of a car chase, with the narrator intoning that Teague was unable to let go of Madeline and ended up following her to his doom. The car that's supposed to be Teague's swerves, careens off a cliff and bursts into flames. The End.
As storytelling shortcuts go, this isn't quite as bad as compensating for an absent Bela Lugosi with an offscreen car crash in PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE, but it's not far off. What's depressing is that these abysmal last 15 minutes follow on the heels of an opening hour with so much promise. Laing and Teague are both great in their roles, each giving some of the best work I've seen out of them, and in general the writing and production values of CARNAL GAMES are a cut above. It's clear someone put an unusual amount of care into this, and while the dashed-off conclusion doesn't completely ruin things, it's a stunning fall from grace.
Ivone, a Rainha do Pecado (1984)
Is it melodrama or sleaze?
Francisco Cavalcanti delivered something close to a trash film knock-out with 1983's RAPISTS OF VIRGIN GIRLS, but this follow-up, one of at least four (!) movies he directed in 1984, left me pretty cold. In Cavalcanti's defense, he's trying something more ambitious here: a period piece that charts a conflict through the decades. Unfortunately, he doesn't quite have the chops to pull it off.
Things start in 1939 - the only clear date marker given by the film - where prostitute Ivone is one of the key earners in sleazy pimp Zelao's stable. When the police raid his brothel one evening, they find Ivone's seven-year-old son in the room and promptly cart him off to an orphanage, deeming her an unfit mother. This set-up is actually very good, presenting a compelling scenario it's easy to get invested in: as poor Nelsinho, Ivone's son, gets forced by the cops to strip and bathe as he stands there crying for his mom, it's clear where the film's sympathies lie. Things don't get better from there, as the orphanage where Nelsinho is dumped serves him gruel full of cockroaches! He ends up banding together with a couple other boys to escape.
Ivone finally convinces the police to give her her son back if she will give up prostitution. She first asks Zelao to marry and make an honest woman of her, but he laughs it off, so Ivone quits the business anyway and sets out solo. But by then it's too late: Nelsinho is already fighting for survival on the streets. He and his friends start out robbing people, and after several years, we next meet Nelsinho breaking up an attempted rape as the other guys begin assaulting their latest mugging victim. In the meantime, a distraught Ivone, betrayed by Zelao and given no help from the police, vows to take her job back on her own terms and use the funds from an independent whorehouse to find her missing child. However, Zelao has no intention of allowing his former chief earner to usurp his business so easily.
Whereas VIRGIN GIRLS, the only other Cavalcanti film I've seen, keeps the plot minimal in order to pile on the sleaze, I was surprised to find IVONE far more ambitious - it's basically trying to be a real movie with some sex scenes added. The problem is, beyond its compelling first act, it doesn't really know what to do with the pieces it has on the table. Ivone largely seems to forget about finding her son, getting distracted by her prostitution business - how else to explain how full decades go by without her ever so much as looking for him? - while poor Nelsinho gets thrown in jail for the crime his compatriots committed and left to rot for the movie's second half. Of course, the crux of the film's conflict is supposed to be between Ivone and Zelao, and the two gradually get older over the runtime, donning progressively more ridiculous makeup that makes them look like they got sprayed with increasingly liberal amounts of that fake snow for Christmas trees. There are eventually a couple murders, but mostly Ivone and Zelao just meet up to scowl at each other. It's hardly a compelling conflict, and the film finds next to nothing to do with it. After 90 minutes had passed, aside from in the opening, I wondered how the film had spent all that time.
The end result isn't calamitous, it's just like a really low-tier attempt at an epic crime drama bereft of direction and with numerous softcore sex scenes added. This conflict between the dual nature of the film's tones - is it a serious melodrama or a sleazy softcore film? - is its biggest misstep. In contrast to RAPISTS, which knew exactly what it was and made zero apologies, the result here is muddled, and highlights how trying to walk a line can simply lead to a muddled and ineffective result.
Sesso in confessionale (1974)
Opinions are like...
Dumped onto DVD with little fanfare under the generic title SEX ADVICE, SESSO IN CONFESSIONALE (or "Sex in the Confessional" in more accurate English) is, rather than the mondo-style doc promised by its advertising, more a scabrous and very period-appropriate critique of the Catholic church's attitudes on sex. If anything, the structure of the film more resembles one of the German REPORT films, centered on short, supposedly true vignettes.
Structure is fairly loose, and mostly built around people seen confessing or seeking guidance in a Catholic church. In addition to providing absolution, the priests serve as confidantes and psychiatrists, too. Of course, there's the expected litany of schoolgirl-style "I was heavy petting, father - is it a sin?" questions, but several of the parishioners also seek guidance on whether they can use birth control or family planning. As expected, the priests' responses - now decades out-of-date - are uniformly cringe-inducing: it's maddening to watch one guy tell a parishioner who's having great, fulfilling sex with his wife that he needs to stop if he's unwilling to have more children. Generally, most of the supplicants seem like sane, well-meaning individuals who only have their lives complicated by a bunch of uptight moralists introducing pointless rules and inventing problems.
Not that the film would articulate its thesis quite like that, but it does ultimately seem to be what it boils down to. While the movie uses these confessions as bridges to quick, semi-salacious scenes of the subjects people are talking about, the heart of its argument is found in equally brief interviews with feminists, sociologists, sex researchers, and various men and women on the street. Almost uniformly, they rebuke the clergy's advice, insisting that in a modern society things like premarital sex and birth control are necessary for people to form healthy relationships and lead fulfilling lives. As such, the film provides an interesting snapshot of Italy during a time of great transition, as things like the pill and legalized erotica were ushering in an era of greater sexual permissiveness. Despite being marketed as an exploitation film, SESSO instead has a lot more in common with other social issue movies of the time than an Ernst Hoffbauer jiggle opus. It still feints in that direction, but clearly is thinking deeper, and a more somber tone to match.
Unfortunately, the film - at least in available versions - never fully achieves its ambitions. It's erratic in the extreme, hopping from confession to confession and enactment to enactment with little structure or rhythm, and interspersing its interviews rather arbitrarily. Perhaps there's a more integral Italian edit that makes better sense, or maybe it's just an artifact of the '70s and You Just Had to Be There, but the result is muddled and confusing, an interesting attempt at something different (and more substantial) that nevertheless fails to make a compelling or cohesive argument.
Seifuku no furyo (1994)
Needs pruning
Directed by "death photographer" Tsurisaki Kiyotaka, PARANOID GARDEN, a WWII-themed AV (adult video), represents the beginning of his career, before he discovered his specialty. It's decently directed, but I don't think all that different from a lot of AV.
Less a story than a set-up, the film is about a family in the waning days of WWII mourning the death of their son in combat in increasingly bizarre ways. There's sadomasochism and incest, and when the authorities learn the younger daughter is hiding a deserter, they resort to all manner of nefarious methods to get her to reveal his whereabouts.
An interesting quality of Japanese AV - or at least this one - is that it seems less sex-focused than its American counterparts. That makes sense, as when you have to blur out everyone's genitals the depiction of simple sex becomes (even more) visually boring. However, it also leads to a lot of very weird sublimations, like toe-sucking, (fake) coprophilia, and a "nose speculum" scene that seems like a pretty obvious visual metaphor for something... (Even weirder, this isn't the first time I've seen such a thing, though given the other, another AV called LOVER M, was also produced by Cinemagic, maybe someone there just has a particularly weird fetish...)
All this is fine, but eventually grows wearisome even at just an hour. Given the war content, I'm sure someone could construct an elaborate intellectual defense for the project, but you'd also have to ignore the fact that such themes and imagery crop up in lots of Japanese erotica throughout the decades. Ultimately, a better inquiry into the subject would be sociological rather than based on this film, and a better dive into the director's filmography would probably start elsewhere.
Marriage Dropouts (1969)
Drop in on the DROPOUTS!
Generally slagged on as one of the lowest common denominators in the world of soft- and hardcore sexploitation, Leonard Kirtman gets a bad rap, but every dog has its day. Before he dove into the genre himself in the early '70s, Kirtman produced a vast number of (frequently pun-based) erotic titles for Distribpix. THE MARRIAGE DROPOUTS, by Tommy Goetz, is one such example, and while it's not anything revelatory, it's a solid enough low-energy grinder. Maybe Lenny should've stuck to producing.
Exceedingly basic premise, like a lot of these Distribpix softies, finds four guys headed to the marriage office to get their unions annulled. Each has a tale of woe surrounding the collapse of his marriage, and they all get a chance to meditate on them when their elevator breaks down:
First guy seems to be living the perfect life, happy with a wife and kid, until his son stumbles in on his mother and a female friend making love. Aside from the kid part, I feel like most guys would welcome this development, but it was the '60s, so maybe some were a bit more uptight. The second has a ridiculous problem, which is that his wife can never get enough and is running him ragged. The third guy calls his wife a pig because she likes to sit around eating crackers in bed and pleasuring herself with a vibrator. He eventually catches her stepping out on him. The final segment is the most interesting, with a young man coming home to his beautiful bride but failing to perform - he can't stop thinking about the hustler he made eyes with on the street. After cycling through all these couples twice for some reason (first for the setup and then revisiting for the "stinger," where everything falls apart), the film closes with this poor handsome closet case leaving his wife to go explore his gay desires, the film failing to even close out the elevator scenario that serves as a wraparound.
Lazy in the extreme, this is another softcore nudie that's basically just 60 minutes of people rolling around in bed, papered over with ridiculous narration - no sync sound in sight. At least in this case, however, the film features multiple narrators, and boy do they have a bevy of ridiculous problems! Toss in the fact this is coming on the cusp of the hardcore revolution and features a fair amount of welcome (and equal-opportunity) frontal nudity, and you have a softcore flick that's unambitious but agreeable, a weird kind of cinematic comfort food for a certain kind of filmgoer (me!), who, for some reason, just cleaves to it. The bizarre gay plotline is the icing on the cake, a fascinating left-field inclusion for a straight film and an interesting time capsule of just how far attitudes have progressed since the '60s. While certainly not that much to write home about, I nevertheless found THE MARRIAGE DROPOUTS surprisingly diverting - it may not be high art, but it works well within the confines of its limitations.
Man and Wife (1923)
Country vs. city - silent style
As the nascent film industry was still shaking itself out, the early 1920s saw plenty of opportunity for smaller players like New Jersey-based Effanem Productions to float lower-budget product onto the market. Fairly modest in both scope and ambition, MAN & WIFE reaps appropriate dividends - it's diverting but little more, while also being just a tad ridiculous.
Another tale of country vs. City life, MAN & WIFE finds farmgirl sisters Dolly and Dora longing for something bigger than their pa's attempts at marrying them off to the local farmhand. Running off to the city, Dora disappears, while Dolly, staying on the farm, eventually meets and falls in love with a visiting doctor. Moving out themselves to establish a sanitarium, the two are shocked to learn - quite by accident - that the doctor's prior wife, presumed dead in a fire, is actually alive and hopelessly insane. Only the doctor himself can perform the brain surgery necessary to restore her health - but what will the woman's regained sanity reveal about her prior identity? (If I have to tell you, you may need the operation yourself!)
Predictable in the extreme, MAN & WIFE is basically a one-hour, self-contained soap opera, mainly interesting for how bonkers the plot is willing to get. Its primary draw now will be for fans of Norma Shearer, quite winsome as the city-loving Dora. She clearly reveals the charming star quality that would soon get her shipped out to LA, making much bigger films under the auspices of Irving Thalberg and Louis B. Mayer. As for the rest of the cast, they're proficient but nowhere near as memorable, with Robert Elliot as the doctor making for a particularly dull leading man. Production values are modest and locations limited, though at just 54 minutes, the picture is mercifully brief - not doing anything terribly novel, it at least knows when to exit the stage.
Shûnen no dokuja (1932)
Just crawls along...
Apparently the first (surviving?) movie made on Okinawa, THE VINDICTIVE SNAKE has some interesting, lived-in cross-cultural elements going for it, but little else.
Following much travelogue footage of the island of Oahu (one wonders if, like a lot of Asian silents, the film was constructed this way to give traditional live narrators time to make introductions), we meet our protagonists, a couple who just moved to the island to start a plantation. All seems to be going well for the two, until the wife is stricken with leprosy. Sneaking away under the pretense of finding a doctor in Japan, the husband simply absconds, abandoning his wife for the next several years. When she's finally given money by a pair of kindly neighbors to make the voyage, she ends up on the streets, begging for money while her husband romances a dance hall girl and takes her as his new bride. When hubby finally bumps into his old wife on the street, he begs her forgiveness, though that's just a ruse so he can take her somewhere and push her off a cliff. Thinking himself rid of her, a surprise awaits that night, as the husband and his new mistress are visited by a pair of very angry serpents.
Very little about this movie hangs together, and it moves at a glacial pace. It's really about 15 minutes of legend dragged out to a patience-testing 70, and everything takes ten times longer than it should. An opening scene by a lake, where the couple discusses their good fortune and then takes turns finding excuses to worry about it (followed by admonishing their partner not to do so) threatens to cross over into self-parody it becomes so cyclical. And just when you think it's done, it adds a coda with the husband noticing his wife's fever - the first symptom of her impending diagnosis.
Much of the film is like this, needlessly languid and pointlessly drawn out - the dance hall scene where the husband meets his new wife seems like something out of an exploitation film, padding the runtime with endless musical numbers. It's quite clear where the film is going with every beat, but in each instance it takes much way longer than necessary getting there - why couldn't the wife just die on Oahu, for instance, rather than having to come all the way to Okinawa just to get killed? But if the narrative had been streamlined, we'd have a one-reeler rather than a feature, and that probably wasn't the filmmakers' intention.
Unfortunately, writer/star Seizen Toguchi, while handsome, generally brings thespian skills to match his scriptwriting. While he's fine enough in regular scenes, the second things get dramatic, he begins pulling silly faces. Even for a silent film dilletante like me, it underscored the elegance of good silent acting, because that's not what's on display here. The climax is decent, if arbitrary, with some snakes and the wife's ghost appearing to terrorize the couple in their bedroom, but it's 5 minutes of horror after an agonizing 65-minute slog. Maybe viewers in 1914 were willing to put up with that, but it's a tall ask of anyone today.
The Awakening (1971)
Another evocative gay porn film from Jai
The mysterious Jai (here credited was "J. A. I.") strikes again with another flick that seems more art than porn. Across a small but potent body of work, he's managed to leave a strong impression on me, and I hope others seek out his stuff too.
Like other known Jai efforts UP & COMING and THE LAST THRILL, THE AWAKENING feels more like a sketch than a finished project, but it's effectively handled and full of promise, unified by many of the same obsessions that inflect the director's other films: art, melancholy, and loss. Simple but effective set-up finds a car running off the road before an excellent opening credits sequence, which makes effective use of Cat Stevens' "Sad Lisa" over images of a pretty blonde intercut with countdown leader - an effective meta touch that works well despite feeling charmingly "film school."
We meet our protagonist (Jason de Witt) driving down LA's Pacific Coast Highway, where he's retreating to his lonely beach house one year after the death of his wife. Along the way he picks up handsome hitchhiker David Michaels, who, with his long flowing locks and beard, has a Barry Gibb / James Brolin vibe that's quite sexy. Letting the stranger crash at his, our hero is surprised when the guy crawls into his bed that night after a long cry on the couch, trying to assuage whatever pain he's feeling through a passionate bout of fellatio.
It takes the film an incredible 16 minutes (out of 56) to get here, and the sequence itself, while generally too shadowy to be good porn, is nevertheless great as a piece of mood building, bathed in cool blue light as the ocean waves crash mournfully in the distance. The next morning, the narrator admits he's never been with a man but hopes this won't be the last time. Dressing his new paramour in a Christlike tunic from one of his photography shoots, he allows him to wander the beach and make up his mind whether he wants to stay.
Up to this point (around halfway through), the film has been superb, effectively building an incredible sense of slow-burn mood. Unfortunately, around here it becomes clear the movie doesn't have much of an idea where to go: the guys wander the house some more and have various brief sex scenes, but any sense of narrative progression dissipates. Eventually, the Christ guy turns up with another, twinkish dude from the beach (the oddly-spelled Sabastian McKenzie), and the trio make love - unfortunately bereft of any catharsis because it's unclear, emotionally, what anyone is going through. After that, they all go their separate ways.
Despite petering out, THE AWAKENING still leaves a positive impression. Even more so than Jai's other films, it's evocative and mournful, making great use of its location and a few well-chosen musical tracks. The cinematography is professional, and if anything suffers as a result of the surfeit of style it's the sex, which is given short-shrift. In a sea of so much interchangeable porn, however, I'll gladly take an intellectual turn-on over a physical one. Unfortunately, Jai never quite seemed to nail it with any of his productions, always feeling like he was starting with a great idea but didn't quite know how to develop it. Nevertheless, something as evocative as THE AWAKENING still deserves praise - it's another breath of fresh air from one of early gay porn's most interesting unsung auteurs.
La surexcitation finale (The Last Thrill) (1971)
You got your art in my porn film!
Feeling like an unusually successful collision between an adult movie and a micro-budget arthouse flick, THE LAST THRILL is too limited in scope to qualify as more than a modest success, but it's interesting and contains the blueprint for something better.
More of a sketch than a full feature, the 50-minute film opens with some oblique footage captured driving through a cemetery, before switching to an anonymous high-rise office building, where a man narrates into a tape recorder his gradual introduction to homosexuality. Beginning with imagining what it must be like giving head while his girlfriend is blowing him (not shown), the guy is driven by these thoughts to a porn theater, where a tall stranger drops to his knees and grants the him his first male-male encounter. Still curious what it's like to be the one sucking, the protagonist fulfills his fantasy after-hours at an art gallery, where the guy whose paintings are showing also - rather improbably - owns the place and can shut it down for some privacy. An encounter with a pair of dudes follows, after which comes a bizarre interlude where a naked black man dances to Elton John's "The King Must Die" for several minutes (his moves suggest he's professionally trained). Things run off the rails into full-on existentialism afterward, with the protagonist ushered into a secret room where, having been unable to climax for the last few months, he's joined by all his former lovers to give him the titular LAST THRILL.
Shot almost entirely in a single white room, THE LAST THRILL seems to actively turn poverty into an asset. Usually, it's pathetic when you can recognize the same set re-dressed multiple times in a single film, but here the environs are so sparse that the nakedness seems to become the point: the "gallery" toward the beginning is merely a couch with a single painting hanging on the wall, while the three-way takes place in the same room with zero context as to what environment it's supposed to represent. The climax occurs here as well (the room is consistently recognizable by its badly-painted corner), with the cadre of former lovers worshipping the protagonist on a strange white altar. About the only scenes that don't take place in this room appear to be the narration interludes (which still well could - it's shadowy) and the theater scene, which is nevertheless just six folding chairs set up in front of a cheap window. Most early sex films are threadbare, but LAST THRILL turns it into an aesthetic, using the spartan nature of its near-single location as part of its attempt to play with memory.
Speaking of which, the film's overall project, even if under-sketched, is still laudably ambitious. While it's never quite clear where the movie ends up, its outline nevertheless functions as a forebear to a surprising number of hardcore hits, anticipating both Gerard Damiano's DEVIL IN MISS JONES with its NO EXIT-style existential angst as well as Anthony Spinelli's SEX WORLD in its (in this case very threadbare) depiction of a FANTASY ISLAND-style environment where one's desires (or perhaps needs) are fulfilled via a sexual scenario organized by a group of mysterious overseers. The existential dread of the graveyard footage even recalls the haunting ending to Jason Sato/Norman Yonemoto's BROTHERS which would follow a few years hence. Unfortunately, the mononymic Jai's work here isn't quite up to that film's standard, both throwing in goofy art school touches like needless French dialogue as well as failing its premise by inadequately fleshing it out (the film trails off into a vague non-ending rather than feeling like it's really concluded). Nevertheless, it's still a solid effort for the fledgling hardcore genre, which was still finding its legs ca. 1971. Jai's other known XXX outing, UP 'N' COMING, deploys a lighter of a touch in its depiction of an art world love triangle, but evinces a similar skill at delivering an entertaining and unusually fleet sex opus. My hope is this mysterious auteur moved on to bigger and better things under his real name, as based on the evidence here, he was certainly not without talent.
Eager Beaver (1977)
Meager BEAVER
Hiding behind a myriad of pseudonyms, the Cooper Brothers cranked out a seeming infinity of interchangeable porn flicks, highlighted only by crude-but-effective exercises in poor taste like GOLDEN BOYS OF THE SS and the infamous WET WILDERNESS. Emblematic of their devil-may-care attitude, credits are listed in the same font and interchangeably swapped between films - pseudonyms ultimately representing no one. For the desultory EAGER BEAVER, "Ted Most" gets the directing credit (having also "acted" in BUCK'S BIRTHDAY and "written/directed" Y'ALL COME), while Alec Reon, supposed auteur behind MORTGAGE OF SIN and SEX MUSEUM, is here listed as writer (a credit "he" shares only with the aforementioned GOLDEN BOYS).
What all this jabbering is to say is that these films, like their credits, are largely interchangeable, and it's clear - as though the movies themselves didn't make it so - that the creators cared little for most of them on any individual basis. Still, even by that low standard, EAGER BEAVER is more half-hearted than the majority: it has effectively no plot and even fails the ultimate porn test of being erotic. What passes for story follows Mary (Christine De Shaffer), whose husband John has developed a bad habit of privileging his office job over his marital duties. Left home alone after John goes to work, Mary hooks up with neighbor Sue and heads to the beach, where she frolics in the surf as Sue gets it on with handsome lifeguard Jim and his less appealing friend Steve. When John calls Mary to tell her he'll once again be working late (he's busy getting a hum job from his secretary), she and Sue decide to invite the lifeguards over. No prizes for guessing who decides to stop by on his way to a date at the movies...
Less a story than a succession of random incidents, BEAVER has nothing to offer from a narrative or character standpoint - it's strictly sex, half-heartedly performed. The problem is the Coopers are so lazy they can't even manage to get a sex scene right: their privileged angle is bed-level, like Ozu on his tatami mat, locking the camera down like Warhol and limiting themselves to zooms into portions of the action which are then intercut with returns to the wide shot. For some reason, they also seem to love positioning guys so they are leaning back with the woman mounting them, resulting in an angle limited to buttocks-and-penetration alone. A legitimate enough vantage point for inserts, this becomes maddening as the backbone of a sex scene, where it reduces to action to a pair of disembodied genitals. The result is not just useless as entertainment (natch), but even for the specific purpose for which it was designed - forget good art, this isn't even good porn! That's too bad, because some members of the cast are attractive, and one wonders what could have been made of them by a director with even the most marginal investment in the material.
Januarius (1971)
Both sides now...
Opening with a silly preface about the Roman god Janus - master of gates and doorways who was able to see simultaneously in two directions - and one of his female subjects, the mawkish but loveable JANUARIUS posits its story as what might happen if the legend were updated to modern times (ca. 1970). The result is underwhelming when judged by that metric, but impressive when taken on its own - for an early hardcore film, this is unusually ambitious and heartfelt.
JANUARIUS centers around pretty housewife Janice (see what they did there?), who's having marital problems with her handsome blond husband Bob. Not so keen to do much in the sack lately, Jan soon realizes why: she can't stop thinking about being with another woman! After a pretty young neighbor stops by looking for her dog, Jan masturbates about her, fantasizing they're first making love in the woods and then that the neighbor is whipping her, in a bizarre and impressive scene that finds an entire bed dragged outside for the couple to use under the leaves.
Meanwhile, both Jan and Bob have caught the eye of swinging neighbors Frank and Patti. Frank tries to get Bob to bring Jan over, but Bob rightly intuits she's not yet open to a swapping. Patti plays it cooler, discussing Jan's marital issues with her before recommending her psychiatrist to help Jan deal with her problem. Played by early hardcore vet William Howard (credited as George Peters), the doc and his nurse Miss Hargrove take a hands-on approach after Jan confesses she thinks she's a lesbian: Howard has her first try making it with his nurse, then with him! Meanwhile, back at the ranch, the swinger's orgy has begun: Bob kicks things off with his visiting cousin(!) Melinda, while everyone else lounges around naked. What will Jan think when she gets home? Will she join the orgy? (Few points for guessing correctly...)
Starting from the plot of a typical one-day wonder, JANUARIUS distinguishes itself with its delicacy of touch: while it will certainly come off as naïve to modern audiences, there's nevertheless a purity to its project that's charming. This is a bona fide artifact of the sexual revolution, and the film leans hard into the belief that love and self-understanding can cure almost any personal ill. The sex scenes demonstrate an impressive (if occasionally inept) experimentalism, overdosing on dissolves, cross-fades, superimpositions and the like. Likewise, the film goes the extra mile aesthetically, leaning heavily into sparkling filters as well as touches like the forest-bed fantasy above - flourishes that give the film a respectable touch of class and make it play more like a bawdy student project rather than a seedy storefront grinder.
In contrast to the type of often-tawdry sex flicks that proliferated in the early days of hardcore, JANUARIUS is graceful and restrained, featuring a surprising lack of ejaculations and a young, attractive cast that truly seems to be enjoying itself. Even if they're not the best thespians, they nevertheless seem wholly committed to the film's project, and their charm and exuberance is contagious. JANUARIUS may not reinvent the wheel, but it's a perfect example of an early sex film done right, the product of people who truly believed in the potential of a newly liberated American cinema. In that regard, it's a small but notable treasure, and well worth discovering for enthusiasts of vintage erotica.
Beneath a Dead Moon (2014)
Overlong collection of bad horror shorts
A haphazard collection of (mostly) Joe Sherlock shorts centering around supernatural entities, the main problem with BENEATH A DEAD MOON is that most of its films fizzle out narratively. Way overlong at two hours, you get seven (count 'em!) go-nowhere shorts:
TAINTED BLOOD - Following an elaborate preface about a worldwide war between humans and vampires, imagine my surprise when we end up with a two-hander. Discovering an old acquaintance about to throw himself off a bridge, a woman brings him home, and, after a ton of jabber-jawing, they make love. He asks her to turn him into a vampire, but there's a surprise in store - you can guess from the title.
SUPERSTAR - A lady (who starts things out with a gratuitous shower scene you probably won't be that thrilled for) gets a tattoo on credit, but never seems to get around to paying for it. Eventually, the tattooist comes back to exact his pound of flesh.
DARK BITE - A nerdy office worker is despised by his boss and coworkers, so a woman appears out of his dreams and gives him a book of spells that turns him into a werewolf. For some reason, he kills the local convenience store clerk rather than taking revenge on any of his enemies.
BEETLEMANIAC - A guy shows up to a woman's place for a blind date, and after way too much prelude of her goofing around getting ready, he grosses her out by telling her about his work with insects at the zoo. Then he turns into a bug monster and eats her. No, it doesn't make any more sense if you watch it.
NOWHERE TO HYDE - Dr. Jekyll's grandson continues his grandfather's experiments using potions he buys off eBay(!). The serum works, and quickly attracts the attention of his still-living grandfather, who wants to use it to reverse the permanent transformation he's caused in himself. The conclusion to this is baffling, with the serum actually serving as a portal to another dimension and dark-universe characters swapping out to replace their counterparts.
SCENT OF THE SASQUATCH - A couple girls and one of their ranger boyfriends go into the woods and one of them gets killed by a sasquatch. There's really no plot to this one at all.
As though that weren't enough (we're already at the 100-minute mark!), the film ends with several minutes of bloopers, followed by a "Bonus Short":
THE EYEBALL OF FEAR - This is a takeoff on Eurotrash slashers, with a bunch of unattractive campers going into the woods and running afoul of the reanimated corpse of a maniac (brought back to life by his mad scientist father), whose head has been replaced with a giant eyeball. This kind of had potential, but there's no effort made to characterize anyone, and no creativity to the killings - the guy just runs around with a pitchfork and stabs people off-camera. More boring and annoying than clever or parodic.
Overall, the quality of the shorts is what you'd expect for later-day (digital?) SOV: cheap, but not the cheapest you've seen. A couple of the featurettes have been repurposed from an earlier omnibus called WEREWOLF TALES that doesn't appear on the IMDB - I have no idea about the rest. In general, it's all quite arbitrary, with decent set-ups but no idea how to follow through. The most baffling outing is BEETLEMANIAC, which features totally confusing non sequiturs like the "script girl" wandering into the middle of a shower scene to make out with the lead as the production crew looks on. I expected this to be a twist, with the film suddenly turning into a meta-movie about making horror films, but nope, it returns to its go-nowhere plot and stays there. I've seen worse SOV garbage, but I wouldn't even recommend you stoop this low; there are better ways to waste your time.
Raw! Uncut! Video! (2021)
Unexpected profile of gay fetish outfit Palm Drive Video
Decent documentary about Palm Drive Video, which made a name for itself producing fetish content as a self-sex alternative to traditional porn during the AIDS epidemic. The film does a very thorough job of illustrating the various - erm - unique facets of the company's oeuvre, with plenty of clips that may shock even seasoned viewers. It also manages to make a fairly convincing case about the value and importance of pornography as a means for the gay community to speak about and to itself, and the importance of preserving this history.
I wish the film had done a better job actually portraying the two gentlemen behind the company, however - we just get a tiny bit of background about both of them, and, despite being the co-protagonists, neither emerges as a terribly well-developed character. I guess the star of the film is ultimately the videos, but, even at just 79 minutes, things start to drag toward the end, feeling like the film's treading the same territory. Result is a fairly satisfying portrait of an obscure part of smut film history, but would have better staying power if it had taken a bit more time with the surrounding details.
Lost Man (2001)
Pointlessly provocative festival fodder
An almost perfect example of the kind of self-indulgent short that proliferated at film festivals in the early '00s, LOST MAN would be totally forgettable if not for a couple crudely inserted shock scenes, clearly designed to get people talking. But if the main thing they're saying is "That's the poo movie, right?", unless you're John Waters, it's probably time to head back to the drawing board.
It's impossible to convey the plot of LOST MAN, as I couldn't really follow it. It's essentially a "couples squabbling" short story yanked straight out of the pages of The New Yorker. John is a city dweller adrift in his 20s, struggling to figure out where his relationship with girlfriend Courtney stands while French acquaintance Pascal comes to visit. What all this means is presumably apparent to the director, who would no doubt love to walk you through it at length if you were obliging enough to watch his movie with him.
Where the film stands out - clearly by design - is in a couple shock moments that come out of nowhere. The second, which features Pascal dropping his pants and graphically masturbating while ogling the protagonist's old Polaroids, is surprising but also de rigeur for the period, the turn-of-the-millennium heyday of "art-core." More shocking is a scene beforehand, which finds John's girlfriend unleashing her pent-up frustration by dropping *her* drawers and graphically urinating and defecating on his pillow. The irregular rhythms at which these excreta are produced give the uncomfortable impression it's all too real, and, if so, it's possible to commend the thespian for her commitment while still questioning the moment's necessity. It basically stops the film cold, an example for all the wrong reasons of Tom Gunning's Cinema of Attractions. Unlike a typical moment of attraction, however, one has to wonder who on Earth was asking for this.
Whatever the case, these two odd moments mark the film's claim to fame, and serve as a handy summation of its key qualities: masturbatory and ultimately kind of crappy.
Malibu Days Big Bear Nights (1982)
Too much of a good thing
William Higgins' porn generally isn't known for its elaborate plotting, but even he pushes the limit in MALIBU DAYS, BIG BEAR NIGHTS, a film with a great title but not that much backing it up.
Bare bones set-up finds a quartet of college guys (Adam Stewart, Alan Howell, Kurt Franklin and Joel Allen - cuties all) heading up to a cabin at California's Big Bear Lake for a bit of R&R. Settling in, one of the guys finds an unmarked video in the closet and pops it in for the crowd, hoping it's a porno. That's what they get, but as one piquedly huffs, "It's all guys!" Nevertheless, they make the most of it and settle in for five scenes, growing progressively more aroused. You can imagine how things end!
The title sets up a great contrast, pitting California's sunny beaches against its snowy mountains, but the film barely takes advantage of it. Apparently "Malibu Days" are broad enough to encompass action pretty much anywhere (a number of interior scenes in no way have to be in Malibu, nor do they involve beaches or surfers), and the Big Bear stuff only accounts for the intro and last scene. The result is exactly the kind of pseudo-loop-carrier the set-up promises: a bunch of discordant - and discordantly erotic - scenes strung together with little rhyme or reason.
Film's biggest honors go to Mark Scott Solo (aka Scott Nichols), a bleach-blond cutie with a shoulder tattoo who's the epitome of a SoCal heartbreaker. He gets the two sequences up front, first tag-teaming J. W. King with Brad Scott in lieu of doing $25 in chores, then coming back from a surfing trip and stripping out of his wetsuit with Jamie Wingo, before the two join friends Davin McNeil and Peter Geary for a four-way living room orgy. Solo is hot in both scenes, even while stuck with guys who are only his match about half the time, but the film is hampered by some shoddy lighting during the indoor parts - you can see a spotlight moving around desperately trying to illuminate things. Subsequent pairings are hit or miss, with a tearaway jeans number featuring Nick Rodgers and Giorgio Canali that did little for me (neither is really in the twinky Higgins mold), though a follow-up with Shawn Michaels and Davin McNeil brings the heat. A closing sequence in a hot tub with Mickey O'Toole and Kevin Carey should be hot (both guys are sexy), but feels dashed-off, rushed through like an afterthought as the film is already past the 90-minute mark.
This highlights the primary problem with MALIBU, which is that it just keeps going and going. The film takes north of 15 minutes to get to its first sex scene, with endless footage of the surfers and college guys wandering around eating up time. When the action starts, in the Higgins style, it's all a bit overlong, until the film suddenly starts rushing toward the end. By the time it gets to its climactic showdown, it's exhausted the viewer's patience with one too many video segments, and despite the pace picking up considerably during the cabin orgy and all the boys bringing a marked level of enthusiasm, the film's overall length prevents its climax from being the firecracker of a closer the movie needed. Knowing a good thing when he sees one, Higgins still throws in a weird coda after "The End," a quick three-minute scene with Solo showing off how he may well have earned his name.
In contrast to a film like CALIFORNIA SUMMER, all of whose scenes are also long but compensate via impressive sexual heat that usually involves multiple climaxes, MALIBU consistently feels like it's struggling to find its footing, as though it threw a gauntlet for itself ("This film should be two hours!") with no idea why. The result is frustrating and arousing in equal measure, full of many good points that would nevertheless shine all the more brightly with a bit of pruning.
The Great Rip Off (1977)
Paying the rent
Sharing several cast members and a central location with Roger Marks' far superior THE CROOKED ARRANGEMENT, THE GREAT RIP OFF comes off as a pale companion, a rote and near-plotless bump-and-grind done doubly wrong by poor photography. Fitting for a film about paying the bills, it seems like everyone here is just cashing a paycheck.
The plot, which doesn't even reveal itself until two-thirds through the film, concerns a residence that rents rooms to wayward young men. Given most are unable to meet their financial obligations, the landlords allow them to take it out in trade. In the final minutes, one of the guys overhears the two discussing their scheme, and comes up with a lousy plot for him and his fellow tenants to get revenge.
Even the synopsis above gives the film too much credit, as it seems like more of an experimental exercise in narrative delay than a proper movie. The film begins with one of the landlords (a curly-haired guy with a mustache) making it with a tenant (a cute young twink in a gaudy '70s floral-pattern shirt) before cutting to another couple, a ridiculously fit bodybuilder and a willowy blond, and their dilettantish explorations of (very) light S&M. It takes a whopping 40 minutes for these two set-ups to conclude, at which point the central conceit of the rental scam (how is it a scam, exactly, since both parties get something of value?) is finally revealed and then immediately resolved. It isn't even made clear that the two couples are in the same house until the start of the (largely theoretical) third act!
As usual in porn, when the story fails, what's left is sex, and RIP OFF unfortunately proves insufficient in this regard too. The first pairing was the less appealing to me, with the one guy's curly hair and mustache a turn-off and reminding me of THE JOY OF PAINTING's Bob Ross. While the twinky partner is cute enough for two (at least theoretically), he's unfortunately undermined by terrible photography, which favors disorienting macroscopic zooms into his shaggy raven locks over clear views of the action.
More interesting is the second couple, which features two hot guys and the promise (though failed delivery) of S&M thrills. Unfortunately, most of what the implied discipline amounts to is just weird positioning, with the muscular top at times hefting his partner onto his thighs (while remaining standing) or bending him over horsey-style for rear entry. Still, despite the scene itself failing to achieve take-off, the uber-toned dom is captivating, and, using his tattoos, I was able to match him (and his submissive partner) to a longer, far better scene in CROOKED ARRANGEMENT. That sequence, where the two engage in a marathon - and very hot - sex session in an upstairs bed, is even sampled here when the final tenant peeks through a door and briefly spies on the couple, inadvertently offering a free glimpse of a far better film. I'd advise you to stick with that production and skip RIP OFF, whose only real merit is truth in advertising.
Anne's Ordeal (1972)
Early storefront roughie, available 2 ways
Available in two versions, ANNE'S ORDEAL (or MAN AT THE DOOR, as is titled what seems to be the original cut) is a fairly desultory early storefront roughie no matter how you slice it. I'll begin by describing the MAN version...
Minimalist set-up finds Anne (Sandy Carey) getting a call from her roommate Jill (Sunny Boyd / Eve Orlon) saying she's staying late at the office (you can guess doing what!). Left alone in the house, Anne is surprised by Howard Alexander knocking at the door. After first claiming he has a date with Jill, Howard takes Anne hostage and ties her to a chair. Certainly the film's most interesting / fetishistic scene, this plays out like something between an Athena (Terry Sullivan's SF fetish company) and Avon production, as Howard threatens Anne at knifepoint, then makes her pee all over the chair after she asks to use the restroom. Finally untying her, he forces her to masturbate on the couch after she reveals she's a virgin, then drags her into the bedroom to render that moot.
Noise at the door announces third roommate Leslie (Becky Sharpe). Barely a minute into her conversation with Howard, Leslie proclaims she's harbored feelings for Anne and would love to have her way with her too - some pal! Things proceed apace, with the three getting into various configurations, before Jill comes home to join the party. Can Anne manage to grab her attacker's weapon and find her way to freedom? (Well, this has to end somehow...)
Aside from the roughie segment, there's little to write home about in this cut, with prosaic, early one-day-wonder cinematography, stiff improvised dialogue, and a total lack of narrative momentum. ANNE'S ORDEAL, which I originally assumed to be a projectionist's personal hack job on a single print but actually appears to be a professional (the term being relative) alternate edit, grafts on a slightly more complicated story by turning the bulk of the narrative into a flashback. Carey has been brought back and is now dating well below her station in the form of portly Kris Flanagan. After the two experience the usual porn problem of frigidity issues (after Flanagan finds a knife under the bend and pulls it on poor Sandy!), Flanagan brings Carey to a quack psychiatrist who hypnotizes her, cueing an abridged flashback version of MAN. Why someone felt the need to rebuild this from the ground up (maybe it was to include a greater variety of sex scenes?) is a mystery, but all of the good stuff (i.e. The chair scene) seems to still be there, with more of the lollygagging shorn away (albeit replaced by similarly turgid filler). Either way, you're not signing up for much. For now the film's main point of interest remains the story behind its two radically different iterations.
California Summer (1984)
It's a scorcher
Short on plot but long on eroticism, William Higgins delivers a surprise knockout with CALIFORNIA SUMMER. I usually fault his films for lacking narrative, but who cares when the men are this sexy?
In the film's defense (or maybe not), it seems like there's some attempt at a barebones plot, but it's so sketchily elaborated that, if it exists, it's impossible to follow. Opening finds three guys - Mark Scott Solo, Brett Woods and Chris Thompson - skateboarding and then going their separate ways. Woods is a surfer going to a contest in Hawaii, and Thompson is a pilot and offers him and his buddy a free ride. Back at Chris' place, the two get down to it before Chris has to leave. Next scene finds Solo hanging out with three friends and unable to get their girlfriends to come over - what's left to do but play grab-ass in the pool and have an orgy? One of the orgy participants, Tim Richards, leaves his brother Larry at home the next day, and Larry promptly seduces the pool boy. Back at Thompson's house, Chris makes it with Joe Reeve, the other surfer, before discovering Wood is bowing out of the trip. Set to housesit for Chris, Tim convinces Joe to go solo so he can still have the run of the place. With the house to himself, Tim invites three more friends over for another orgy (he's just that insatiable, I guess!).
During the early '80s, there was a vogue in straight porn for LA RONDE-style narratives, where the action passes from character to character. CALIFORNIA SUMMER can't even manage that, instead just accumulating random incident as it hops from one guy to the next with the barest of set-ups. This seems to presage the type of scene-based content Internet porn would eventually devolve back into, and it would generally earn my contempt, but for the fact all the guys are so darn hot. Obviously, the Higgins brand is famous for young, athletic, all-American men, and Will doesn't disappoint here, delivering a cast of stunners who all have great chemistry, rut enthusiastically and in many cases deliver multiple pop shots in a scene. It's not exactly high art (though it does feature a nice original score by Costello Presley), but sometimes, you just have to let porn be porn, and here Higgins delivers.