Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on September 20th, 2007
If it’s 1977, this must be softcore, and so it is. Vanessa is a another lush sexual travelogue, dug up from the archives and given a rather spiffy release from Severin. Yet another product cast in the Emmanuelle mould, Vanessa has its titular heroine leave her convent home (gee, what sort of nonsense do you think we find out happened there?) after she comes into a large inheritance. Flying to Hong Kong, she finds out that this inheritance consists of a chain of high-end brothels. Cue the exotic locations and varied sexual encounters. There’s nothing hugely striking or original about any of this, but as an example its type, it’s quite handsomely mounted, makes some eyebrow-raising use of classical music, and has a couple of scenes that (almost) reach a (kind of) frenzy (all proportions maintained).
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on December 12th, 2006
Jewel Shepard is Christina Von Belle, "The Playgirl of the Western World," which means she takes her clothes off a lot and has plenty of sex. She jets around from one European location to another, engaging in the previously mentioned activities. Something of an adventure plot kicks in when she is kidnapped by guerilla lesbians, and is subjected to rather odd bondage games (what's with the toy cars and trucks being driven over her body?).The plot isn't enough to actually make the film interesting, though, and Shepard might be willing to take her clothes off, but isn't so willing to act. I've seen planks of wood deliver more passionate love scenes.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on December 12th, 2006
Nervy enough to claim to be an updating of the classic 1950 film La Ronde, this late-night-cable-fodder does borrow that film's structure as we move from one erotic anecdote to another, with a character from one story taking us into another, and so on, creating a chain of narratives involving rich people gettin' it on. I used the word "erotic" because everybody gets nekkid, but the charge the film carries is negligible. Thinks of it as a bad Robert Altman film with worse dubbing.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on November 2nd, 2006
Harry Alan Towers, that prolific producer of cheap but handsome exploitation (and the man behind many Jess Franco films back in the day) backed this 1983 effort which attracted some interest (from somewhere, apparently) for featuring French game show hostess Sophie Favier showing off her prizes, as it were. She isn't the lead, though. That happens to be one Jennifer Inch (?!), who plays a young woman dressing as a young boy. She is adopted by a nobleman, who wonders why he's so excited around his young charge.
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on November 1st, 2006
Well! The case informs us that "Former Miss Bahamas, Josephine Jacqueline Jones spraked an international firestorm with her debut starring role as Venus." I guess I must have slept through that firestorm. At any rate, this tale, "based on the scandalous story by Honor' de Balzac" (but then, Tower of the Screaming Virgins is "based on the novel by Alexandre Dumas"), is narrated in flashback by an elderly gentlemen who frequents a brothel, and sees the title character there. The film tells of her journeys through decadent 19th-Century society.
