Obscene Mirror (1973) [Italian Cut]

This offbeat 70's shocker by Franco, which became cult cult mainly cause it's hard to get hold of – at least in my opinion – also known as "The Other Side Of The Mirror", has been released in three cuts: Spanish, Italian and English with first one extremely rare. Although not as good as director's earlier works like "Venus In Furs" (1967) or "Justine" (1969), the film has got interesting script and pretty protagonist, who boldly takes the story ahead. Filmed somewhere on the coast Of Italy, it features very giallo story, somehow resembling Argento's "Four Flies on The Grey Velvet" (1971) and classic for erotic movies of the era, easy listening soundtrack. Italian cut titled "Lo Specchio del Piacere" contains all juicy sex bites, which serve as a sleazy eye-candy and fill the gaps of this titillating, paranormal exploit.

When Marie (Lina Romay) – one of two beautiful daughters of famous professor of archeology – commits suicide in despair trying to prevent her younger sister's marriage with Norwegian scholar, Annette (Emma Cohen) decides to leave an island of Madeira, where she's been living since she was born and finally get a job as a professional pianist. Although of very fragile character and striking beauty – working as a magic charm for the men – she carries inside a dark call from the the other world! Her older sister's ghost is haunting her and not letting Annette make a connection with any man. Although dark messages from the other world concern mainly incest, lesbian sex fantasies, they successfully take over girl's life and make her a puppet of dark forces. Eventually she becomes an assassin with personality crisis, slashing freshly met studs in a blackout until she meets her destiny.



Although plot is silly and Franco uses it mainly to show two girls licking their pussies with occasional dick swinging, the film ticks all the boxes as a genuine 70's euro sexploitation picture landing boldly in the land of softcore due to quantity of sex scenes and great close-ups (you won't see these angles in any modern adult movie). Although ghost and spiritual possession are part of the game here, it's not a horror by any means, so followers of this genre shoud stay away. However Franco's fans should be delighted with vintage jet-set enter the world of carnal pleasures aura, which has few good moments. Definitely not an obligatory viewing, but worthwhile, pleasurable experience, that brings its reward. Still, only for weird sexploitation connoisseurs and Lina Romay completists.

Ilsa: The Tigress Of Siberia (1977)

One of the last spinoffs in "Ilsa" series was produced in Canada and directed by Jean LaFleur. Although not as bright and bold as the original – "Ilsa: She-Wolf Of The SS" (1975), it definitely has a potential of delivering some cheap thrills to Dyanne Thorne's ardent fans. And we know for sure, they're out there, right? The movie breaks down in two acts – first one being set in Siberian gulag, in 1953 and second one in Montreal (Canada), in 1977. Ilsa is modelled again as a sadistic bitch, but this time she's a Russian officer having deep affinity for Stalin's and Beria's political line, including their glorious PR management. She has a lot of fun in the camp when tossing prisoners – who were out of line – to her dear tiger. Other kicks of Ilsa are pulling poor inmates under ice and private vodka drinking contests for her accomplices – two bravest chaps, who can drink shitloads and still stand on their feet, will nail her pussy together the same night in privacy of her bedroom.

Problems for Ilsa start when a stubborn prisoner – Yakurin, defies Stalin's and Beria's call to conform and shape up for the glory of the USSR. Virtually nothing can break this fucker and bring him to a flashpoint, neither cold showers nor electroshocks, not even hot body of Ilsa herself, who offers it in a desperate pass at him. But even these petty games soon fade away as Stalin kicks the bucket and his ideas for making everybody happy suddenly get revised pushing Ilsa and her torture loving helpers to burn the camp to the ground and flee to Canada in the saddle (probably through ice)... but Yakurin survives, first killing the bloodthirsty tiger with a shovel.



24 years went fast and it's 1977 now! Yakurin is a KGB agent, taking care of Russian sportsmen druring Olympic games in Montreal. They're just about to leave back home, but guys want to get laid first, so they head to the best brothel in town. The action promptly pumps up when this quiet hideout occurs to be under Ilsa's command – in the meantime she became the head of Russian mafia in Canada and handled ruthlessly all the foreign competition (we even get to see one of these poor Italian mafiosi quitting extortions to grow tomatoes on the farm). She orders to capture Yakurin, but when that's done, KGB operatives recognize old Siberian warden and Moscow orderes to solve the problem immediately. The brutes finally go belly up and you'll even see Ilsa crying like a baby!

Although there are many cracks in the screenplay, in the end you have to look at it as another silly sexploitation/prisonsploitation flick, which this time got enriched with international espionage & organized crime themes. It's not that bad if you focus on Dyanne Thorne's big booobs occasionally swinging out in threesome scenes – nice ones by the way. Even fighting and shooting sequences make sense from time to time and that includes featured usage of medieval weapons. Despite initial backdrop poverty – my thoughts were like: "This gulag looks so cheap, cause all the budget went into getting and feeding a tiger" – while the movie goes ahead, it's actually getting better and better. Whorehouse has a nice design and very 70's feel and Ils'a residence was well scouted. It's still level down comparing with the original mentioned above, but all fans of "Ilsa" series should enjoy it.



[The movie can be purchased from Cinema de Bizarre]

Angels' Wild Women (1972)

This sleazy 70's flick directed by exploitation legend, Al Adamson – who beforehand scored one of genre's favourites, "Satan's Sadists" (1969) – features Ross Hagen as Speed, a leader of rough biker pack, accompanied by couple of busty babes – real wolverines. They live to fuck and fight! They're gonna show you boobs, but you never touch these treasures without paying and it goes without saying that sometimes you need to sacrifice your dick to their kinky desires and keep your cool, while they're riding you on, otherwise you're in deep shit, pal... that's about female characters in "Angels' Wild Women" – pure exploitation of tits & ass passed as life of sex, drugs and violence, making a fundamental plot. It's basically, another "Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!" lame ripoff, but set in post Manson's Family America.

Intrigue is blunt, acting is a joke and backdrop serves an essence of rustic minimalism to put it diplomatically, but who cares? Our babes hang around having good time with rednecks while their boys plan a biker run with another ugly bunch. Eventually they hit the road and go on a heavy bendover during which they down shitloads of beer, smoke weed and ride sandy hills of California for fun, even exchanging half-witted ideas how to make some real cash. Yeah, baby! But their wild women are bored, so they plan to visit a hippie farm, ruled by Mansonesque type guru, who doesn't waste an opportunity to help one out with a golden shot of heroin – he actually lives off pushing H. This refreshing twist is directed in a very crude way as we might expect, but at least it makes you giggle.



Initially girls are kicking back on the farm and one almost falls in love, but soon they're in danger and it's too late to say bye! They're getting locked up by the cultists with their dying friend – they're gonna be all sacrificed in a bloody ritual. Al Adamson must've had very clear idea what was selling in American drive-ins at that time. I think it went like that... Hey guys, why don''t we mix these sexy biker chicks with Summer Of Love veterans, living in the mountains and pushing heroin for living? That's a hell of idea, man! Still, that shit must've been selling well back then, especially during Corman's women-in-prison offensive! Otherwise, they wouldn't give it a proper DVD release, which now is unfortunately out of print, so you need to keep looking if you wanna give it a hug.

In the end "Angels' Wild Women" could be classified as a poor imitation of "I Drink Your Blood" (1970), but more on the flashing tits side. That would be the only good reason to dig this flick as the breasts are big and natural! If you've seen the poster, you definitely get it – especially here lies the value of this inane flick. Fans of "Pigkeeper's Daughter" will appreciate it by default, while those ones who've seen other biker "gems" starring Ross Hagen like "The Hellcats" (1967) or "The Sidehackers" (1969) would probably wonder why he never pursued this hot rod musical line after acting against Elvis Presley in 1968. No idea, man! Any clues?

Vixen! (1968)

Can sexploitation get political? It definitely can if we put Russ Meyer's crazy mind to it. After all, he proved it beyond doubt by making one of his most controversial movies – "Vixen!", starring gorgeous Erica Gavin. Produced on a shoestring budget of $76.000, it grossed more than $6 mln in couple of months, establishing Meyer as one of the most important personalities of American independent cinema. "Vixen!" was for many reasons a real turning point for US film industry, but first of all it was a first motion picture ever to be rated X – only 18+ people were able to enter the cinema in order to check it out... and the theaters, which showed it were virtually scarce.

Second of all, screening of the movie has been put on hold or picketed with a rumble by local conservative & christian organizations all around USA. They were terrified with a picture, that actually showed real sex – although this tension went down significantly over next 40 years, it didn't really change much as pornography in theses circles is still considered devil's tool to corrupt minds. Although from today's perspective "Vixen!" is just an awesome B-cinema classic, it's cheap thrills retain raving 60's vibe due to Meyer's unequivocal sense of style. Still, this shit never really made a buzz comparable to worldwide famous „Deep Throat”, premiered two years later. However, the latter one paradoxically cashed in less in short period, which shows that keeping low profile sometimes can make you a real favour.

Despite hitting soft spot of the bigots, Meyer was right on time with „Vixen!” as high 60's were exploding in a fire of the cultural revolution and everywhere you looked personal was becoming political (as countercultural slogan has put it). Let's not forget that divorce, abortion and anal sex were illegal back then almost everywhere around the world – 70's were to change it due to fierce fight of freedom organizations, which pulled off a big social offensive and finally reformed outdated laws. However, in 1968 „Vixen!” was still fighting a front of it's own by pushing the borders of what could have been shown on the screen and eventually it won by putting a first softcore movie on the map. This was a glorious moment, which actually paved the way for 70's erotic film industry and made sleazy sexploitation subgenres like women-in-prison a key asset for all independent production studios in America, Europe and Japan.



"Vixen!" is one of the coolest Meyer's flicks – an overspill of beauty, hot sex and political satire. Bizarre by any standards, the movie features a rustic, Canadian scene... as we are led to believe with propaganda style voice-over and leafy backdrop. Deep down in the forrest lives a young married couple and two bikers hang around (how would ever 60's exploitation movie pull it through without the bikers?) Vixen is pictured as an oversexed, always horny, female creature, who lives to make sweet love... apparently to everybody she can. She fucks Canadian ranger, when her husband-pilot is away, but when he comes back one day with a married friend and his wife, Vixen will fuck this fresh and handsome male body as well... she is after all on a mission to make everybody happy and that's basically main plot (who needs more anyway?)

However, there's more than that as this classy sexploitation flick expands genre's possibilities in a fascinating way. After Vixen is done with her husband's friend, she goes after his wife – a pretty and busty blonde, who is so desperate to have sex, that she'll try it with woman for the first time (fantastic lesbian sex scene). Then Vixen fucks her own brother (one of the bikers) and almost gets raped by his black buddy – an American biker , who's always on the edge, constantly teased and mocked by Vixen's racist comments. When this is finished, we expect that she'll have a nice time with a Canadian bear, but there's nothing like it as Meyer corners us instead with an off-beat political twist! A figure of professor O'Bannion appears on the scene. He reveals his communist sympathies to the black guy, who beforehand jumped the US draft and fleed to Canada. Then he tells him about Cuba: "(...) where people of all colours are equal and where revolution is still in the air (...)". Finally, they terrorize the pilot and force him to go all the way to Cuba, while we get to hear most hilarious politically soaked lines ever featured in exploitation movie (even better than satirical dialogues in "Big Bird Cage"). Personally, I fuckin' loved it!

The Touchables (1968)

Another obscure artifact from the swingin’ Britain era carries a bizarre title "The Touchables", which is probably one of the reasons it survived in bootleg circuit till that day – it definitely stimulates your neurons. The picture was pushed on American market with "Love in the fifth dimension" slogan, but never made a blast and has been omitted by all potential "reanimators" ever since. Amazingly it flew back to the surface with a wave of reborn psychedelia to amaze the next generation with it’s pseudo erotic flare and cheesy touch. Directed by Robert Freeman – an original photographer of The Beatles, who took a picture used as a cover of "Rubber Soul" (1965) – it brings to the screen four lovely 60’s models from Vogue Magazine (Judy Huxtable, Esther Anderson, Marilyn Rickard and Kathy Simmonds) starring as a mod/feminist posse and David Anthony as Christian, a rising pop star.

However, it dries up your wet dreams having very little to do with genuine sexploitation as nudity is practically absent. Some mild erotic, fetish games are a nice spark, but there’s too little to talk about something explicit anyway. What it sticks to instead are music, clothes and interior design, all neatly framed into a showcase of swingin’ 60’s scene… after all it’s a very minor cult exploitation movie. On one side we have stunning, but bored ladies nicking wax figures to keep themselves on the beat and on the other one some cartoonish gang capo, who extorts hard cash from the celebrity world and wants money from Christian’s manager very badly! These both threads intertwine and eventually create a very dull plot. Christian gets kidnapped by the gals during a charity wrestling match and taken away to a mysterious, Buckminster Fuller inspired, ball-of-inflated-rubber-hideout at the brink of a lake. There he’s tortured by getting teased, kinked, made out, laid and by other terrifying weapons of ars amandi… but we will never see the details, cause director probably didn’t want to get an X rating and dropped the sex bits.



As the story moves ahead, Christian tries to escape in order to talk to his people, but he gets shot by one of the hosts and is forced to bed them all over again. Finally, the gangsters track him down through one of the girls visting her flat and invade this private paradise bringing chaos and destruction. However, one woman manages to break free and brings professional wrestlers to help out! The story ends happily and we can watch another movie. A real downslope of this soapy flick is the story, but its’ so flat that at least everybody can take it… but there’s "All Of Us", a stunning psychedelic ballad by Nirvana featured during the opening credits, somewhere in the middle and in the end. These guys were found by Robert Freeman through Island Records having their first album released at that time. They scored the song for "The Touchables" and afterwards cut their second album, named "All Of Us" (1968) – one of the most amazing UK psych-pop albums of the late 60’s. Another part of the soundtrack was provided by Traffic – a short instrumental piece used in a boat speeding scene.

If not for the music, the movie might be suggested to fashion or interior designers looking for the feelings and styles marking the epoch. When these do not matter, I’d watch it for the chicks, who make some connection with British celebrity world of that time. Kathy Simmonds was George Harrison’s girlfriend and broke many hearts while the other ones are just very pretty and in the end make this movie a pleasant experience on the visual side. I won’t say we won’t find any good frames in "The Touchables". In fact you can see clearly a photographer’s hand in most of the scenes, it’s just they alienate the viewer from the experience making it extremely distant. Lacking nudity, drugs or any kind of psychedelic freak-out, which mark shitloads of American exploitation flicks of that time, the movie fails to deliver it’s psychedelic-erotic message remaining one of these 60’s oddities enjoyed only by journalists, musicians or book writers.



[The movie can be purchased from Cinema de Bizarre]

Zombie Strippers (2008)

If you’ve gone through shitloads of classic genre movies, you definitely noticed that Lucio Fulci is the man, who made a first crossover between zombie genre and sexploitation in his cult classic "Zombie" (1979), pitched with a real market wit as a sequel to George A. Romero’s "Dawn Of The Dead" (1978). Honestly, I do not enjoy zombie movies a lot… still good ones come as a surprise. After all, it’s better to be nicely surprised than to be left truly disappointed. Saying this I have to admit I’ve had a lot of fun with trashy "Zombie Strippers", which delivers exactly what is spelled out in the title – topless & undead chicks stripping… and as they’re fuckin’ hot it makes your worthwhile. Is this movie funny? Definitely, even if jokes from time to time get flat-lame, cause what saves the day here is the unprentencious humour-nudity-gore formula. Who would actually believe, that so worn-out genre might still kick around and provide you such a giggle? Well, it does and at least it worked for me.

In the spirit of classic gore & nudity Fulci, director Jay Lee spins his flick around zombies, naked broads and machine gun overkill. It’s the nearest future and George W. Bush just banned public nudity making all strip clubs illegal (ho, ho, ho!)… while somewhere in Nebraska a top secret, governmental laboratory is researching a deadly chemo virus, that turns people into zombies. Soon situation sneaks out of control and elite, military Z-Squad is called in to solve the problem. Unfortunately, one of the Rambos gets bitten by an undead, making his way out ASAP in fear of being eliminated by his – till this point – combat companions. Before poor lad turns into zombie though, he gets to sneak into the underground strip club, ruled by metrosexual Ian (Robert Englund) and his Russian supervisor bitch, where rest of the action will take place.



Suddenly we’re in the middle of the action and we get to to see some sweet piece of ass as the gals come on stage and strip away their bikinis. The cast is pleasant with Jenna Jameson leading this gig, but all other actresses, either stuffed with silicone or not, are nicely kickin’ softcore eye-candy. When hard work turns into a nightmare and first stripper gets turned into a zombie, we’re jumping on a roller-coaster of better-or-worse ideas, how this will affect the business. As it occurs, nothing makes a better treat than spinning a tragedy into a buck-rolling machine, so when the owner takes the risk of keeping green coming with the brand new bloody zombie strippers show, that leaves the public ravishing – they want the undead chicks BADLY! This however effectively takes the wind off other strippers’ sails, who must jump on the bandwagon in order to keep the job. They work the floor as well, so when one is caught with a customer biting his dick off turning him and next the others into zombies, problems start to pile up. Initially, newly found undead customers are locked in the basement, but soon an orgy of terror will follow bringing justice to greedy fuckwads managing the club and all slut strippers themselves… hell yeah!

"Zombie Strippers" not only provides an overfill of zombies and nudes, but spoofs on all classic genre themes. We even find a homage to gangsploitation classic, "The Warriors" (1979), when one of the undead gals is rattling two bottles singing: "Warriors, come out to playyy-ayy!" So nice and kind of neat indeed. Although this is not the best exploitation revival flick, released recently, it definitely has a classic exploitation call and a lot of minor genre musings with twisted humour glazing on the top. As we might expect, it looks cheap, but not too cheap – something between "Blood Feast II" and "Planet Terror". The movie leaps from gore exploitation to comedy, but overlaps both with a healthy layer of nudity, which keeps it rolling when dialogue lines are getting sloppy (you don’t like nudity, don’t watch it just to complain afterwards). Some intellectual rocks like a scene with a stripper reading Nietzsche might seem blundering, but they don’t really spoil anything mostly drowning in the background in a moment they’re gone. Do you have to watch it? No, you’re not gonna lose anything, but if in the hood why not give it a sneak peek.

Motorpsycho! (1965)

Now, that’s what I call a proper savage movie! "Motorpsycho!" takes you for a ride with three biker brutes and great looking girls, which show off their big boobs and long legs. This amazing black and white picture has been shot in 1965, but lost nothing due to it’s age and today presents itself as fresh as it’s been back then. Amazing photography, original screenplay and vigorous acting are gonna work, if you’re a fan of Meyer’s talent for picturing eroticism and violence. Otherwise, watch it for pure curiosity!

You have to notice this was a first 60’s biker movie, before even Fonda and Corman got together to make "The Wild Angels" – it didn’t make such a financial blast, but made some money anyway and above all it was a much better movie – so keep your cool up and discover. In the realm of pure exploitation form, this is a real sweet pie, against which not many flicks might stand up. This is mainly due to a great cinematic talent of Russ Meyer, who did a brilliant job here taking each shot by himself, working with a camera in a way, which sets us right there in the middle of the action. Hallelujah!



Intrigue is quite simple, but the action is significant here, fueled by great instrumental garage soundtrack (one of the first cases when this gritty 60’s style was used in a movie), which will make crate diggers scream. Somewhere around the desert in Southern California three biker thugs are going on a rampage of sex and violence, raping all the big-breasted women they meet and they get to pick on some really cool kittens (well, Meyer had a talent for casting great-looking actresses). There’s a marksman, an Italian rocker and a nutjob listening all the time to his little radio and sometimes calling his mom.

Soon their sheer lust for pleasure is getting out of control and they switch from rape and mutilation to killing their prey! When they rape a pretty girlfriend of a local vet (obviously pissing him off), he goes after them immediately! But savage instincts are on the loose now and only due to helping one of the fresh victims – awesome busty chick – our hero is able to put an end to this bloodshed. She’ll save him from everything even offering her own body to the brutes, when it gets down to it! Great scene of sucking the blood from a snake bite is priceless. This is a hell of an exploitation picture and definitely one of the best biker movies made in the 60’s, so all you grindhouse and drive-in freaks will have their fun guaranteed!

Zeta One (1969)

It’s hard to drop even a line about any classic exploitation movie without a certain distance. I suppose it’s kind of a necessary presumption to take that before you start watching this particular (as it ought to be), newly bought, obscure gem, it’s plot will be bland, acting not very refined, photography ridiculous and special effects as cheap as it takes. Well, welcome to B-movie world, which you visit only if you’re stoned or determined enough, because only then you can pull it together. This applies to "Zeta One" as well, so sit back and chill out first, please.

60’s were definitely faddish times! Artistic and financial creativity in the field of filmmaking gave birth to a lot of odd artifacts, which dumped by distributors after couple of screenings were shelved or stored by directors themselves, but with time a whole culture arose around it. Call it "cult movie culture", "digging in obscurities" or "rarity seeking", but some people just find a pure pleasure in discovering something, that not many have seen, even if it’s as bad as "Astro Zombies" (1968) or "The Hellcats" (1967). Fortunately, "Zeta One" is an excellent movie in it’s class. A bizarre mix of spy and sexsploitation loosely whooping up pop sci-fi themes with not the worst acting you’ll ever see and definitely hot chicks. This strictly British nugget was shot mostly in Camden Studios, in London while the capital wast still swingin’.



We embrace the plot in a form of retrospection. Our dear storyteller is a secret agent James Word, who just accomplished the most amazing assignment you will ever hear about. By the will of Her Majesty The Queen he’s been ordered to figure out what a notorious villain – Major Bourdon had been up to making his moves around the town, dropping a puzzle word Zeta and finally meeting North London stripteaser. As the action picks up we find out that he’s been looking for mysterious Zeta One – another dimension space station, inhabited only by women, who were beforehand kidnapped in different countries and brainwashed to serve their beautiful blonde queen, Zeta. As a matter of fact, Major Bourdon has a serious beef with her trying by all means to end this oasis of feminine power, hence we are thrilled to watch their all out war.

As I noticed at first, there’s no really need to care about a screenplay here as this film has little to none artistic quality (excuse me, did I really say it?). Director kept a strong sense of aesthetics instead, editing his work into colourful bricolage of topless chicks, mod clothing, absurd action scenes and occasional psychedelic effects like feminine, naked body floating on a dynamically splashing background (certainly, not without a motive). We even get James Word playing strip poker and parading in wellies, a whole basket of goodies indeed. In fact, why not indulge and sip a bit of this space-sex-spy cocktail, which by the way has a great fusion soundtrack? And finally there’s an important note for you – vintage nudes’ hunters, that waving tits are more often on than off here and some are delicious ones. After all this is one of the most eccentric 60’s exploitation pictures and a very funny one, so don’t hesitate too much if you like that kind of immagination.