Vintage Pulp Jul 28 2020
Laura Gemser is a nun that likes to have fun.

Laura Gemser made more than fifty films, most of them of the erotic variety, which means we'll probably never run out of material on her to share. Above you see a Spanish poster for the her nunsploitation flick Sor Emanuelle, which was originally released in Italy as Suor Emaunelle. We already talked about the movie, but we wanted to share this unusual promo. We've never gotten the nun thing, we suppose because we aren't Catholic, or even religious for that matter, but for some reason these movies represent a full sub-genre of ’70s cinema. That being the case, it was only a matter of time before Gemser got into the habit.

She starred in this with Swiss actress Mónica Zanchi, who's billed as Mónika Zanchi. The two would pair up again a year later in Emanuelle e gli ultimi cannibali, aka Emanuelle and the Last Cannibals, another spectacularly bad sexploitation epic. In addition to the poster, we also—just because we can—wanted to share a couple of magazine images of Gemser and Zanchi, and those are just below. They're super naked. You've been warned. But these are beautiful shots. After its Italian opening in 1977 Sor Emanuelle premiered in Spain today in 1978. Check out our original write-up on the film here.


Vintage Pulp Jul 10 2020
The queen of sexual torture takes her talents to the Middle East.

Today is the day we finally complete the trifecta of Ilsa movies with Ilsa, Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks, for which you see two Japanese posters above. The movie premiered in the U.S. in March 1976, and opened in Japan today that same year. The Japanese titles of Western movies are sometimes like lists of ingredients. The translation of アラブ女地獄 悪魔のハーレム is “Arab hell devil harem.” Even with that clear warning, Japanese audiences—who aren't fazed by much—must have said, “These Yank filmmakers are fucking crazy.” Which is to say that the Ilsa trilogy is among the most irredeemable sexploitation cinema ever produced, the type of stuff that will never, ever be made again, at least not in the U.S., where every instance of cinematic nudity is a political event. Generally, we decry that, but only when it keeps realistic and healthy sexual interactions from being shown onscreen. Harem Keeper is not healthy. Not on any level.

But we digress. This was the second installment of the Ilsa trio, and all starred Dyanne Thorne. She reprises her role as the cruel dominatrix Ilsa, and this time she's in charge of a sheik's harem. She rules this desert roost with utter cruelty, indulging in random acts of corporal punishment, and assisting her boss as he derives both income and pleasure from auctioning kidnapped women to wealthy pervs. Ilsa and the sheik discover that their little set-up has been infiltrated when they catch a spy sent by the granite-jawed Max Thayer, who later himself arrives on the scene and is quickly a prized guest in Ilsa's bed. We could get into the major subplot involving war with a rival sheik, but suffice it to say that the entire plot is just an excuse to string together set pieces featuring vile faux-violence and silly faux-sex. How low does the movie sink? At one point Ilsa uses her incomparable creativity to implant a harem girl with an explosive diaphragm that will detonate during intercourse. It's no electrified dildo (see installment one), but it's close.

Yes, Ilsa is cruel as hell, but it's nothing excellent sex won't cure. That's right up Thayer the Layer's alley. He works his way to Ilsa's creamy center, at which point she decides to switch allegiances and betray her sheik. Will she get away with this outrage? Well, we've already mentioned there were three Ilsa movies and this was the second, so theoretically, she gets away with it. On the other hand, she died at the end of the first movie, so you never know. Regardless, without putting too fine a point on it, this is a terrible movie. But the participation of porn actress Colleen Brennan, nudie model Uschi Digard, and blaxploitation beauties Tanya Boyd and Marilyn Joi as Ilsa's usually-topless enforcers, make this worth a guilty watch. Just don't let anyone know you did it, or you might lose your job, your friends, your family, and even your cat—and cats generally don't give a fuck. But that's how bad this flick is. We have a ton of promo images below. Some came from an interesting French-Canadian website called Cinepix. You can check it out here.


Vintage Pulp Jul 4 2020
A change has come and it won't be denied.

Is there anything more glorious than a low budget, Philippine made, revolution themed, female centered action movie? Not much. There were many of the type produced, thanks to the clever folks at American International Pictures. The poster above was made for the Italian run of the studio's 1974 epic Savage Sisters, with Cheri Chaffaro, Gloria Hendry, and Rosanna Ortiz. We talked about it and you can see the U.S. posters and read what we wrote here.


Vintage Pulp Jul 1 2020
Girls Come First but Lindberg came last.

Above you see a promo poster for the wacky British sex comedy Girls Come First, which premiered this month in 1975. The movie deals with a rich magazine owner named Hugh Jampton who hires a debt-wracked artist played by hunky ex-physique model John Hamill to paint nude portraits of the hostesses that work at the Swinger Club, which Jampton owns. This is a short film, only about forty-five minutes, so that's the entire plot, other than Hamill getting laid. Our main interest in this was determining whether Christina Lindberg is in it. She's not on any cast lists you find online, but she's right in the middle of the poster. Could she be in the film but be absent from cast lists? Absolutely. Thanks to the dreaded internet replication error, she's listed everywhere as appearing in 1974's Teenage Playmates, which she doesn't, so we wouldn't be surprised if she isn't credited for a movie she's actually in. So we took a detailed look and we can say without doubt that—like technical values, genuine laughs, acting ability, and a sense of shame—Lindberg is nowhere to be found here. The producers obviously figured she'd make a great addition to the poster and borrowed her for that purpose.

After getting over that disappointment, we noticed British-Chinese actor Burt Kwouk playing Jampton's chauffeur. His presence is worth mentioning because, in a way, he's a film icon, a sort of symbolic stand-in for stereotyped Asian characters in cinema. He played the bumbling Cato in four Pink Panther films, and here he plays a bumbler named—wait for it—Sashimi. Can you imagine? Kwouk personified the dilemma confronting all actors, but particularly actors of color, throughout film history. In the real world a paycheck is nothing to sneeze at, but the resulting work survives for future generations to ridicule and/or revile. Kwouk said in 1981 about the parts he played, “If I don’t do it, someone else will. So why don’t I go in, get some money, and try to elevate it a bit, if I can?” If Kwouk's work was the elevated version you'll break into a cold sweat imagining what his roles could have been like. In any case, we've solved the Lindberg mystery, and now we'll move on. Below are a couple of shots of Hamill and Longhurst for your pleasure.


Vintage Pulp Jun 21 2020
There's no kung fu like topless kung fu.

These Italian posters were made for the sexploitation/kung fu flick Schiave nell'isola del piacere, originally released in Hong Kong as Yang chi, and known in English as The Bod Squad, or alternatively, Virgins of the Seven Seas. This is a Shaw Brothers production, and when a company makes forty films a year not all of them will be scintillating. What you have here are five western women, all allegedly virgins, who get kidnapped by Chinese pirates. They're to be sold for big bucks to a brothel, but only after some training in delightful and arcane sexual arts. The plan to remake these inexperienced white girls into perfect carnal receptacles goes pear-shaped when an unexpected ally also trains the women in martial arts, and the five end up fighting alongside downtrodden locals to help take down an organized crime cartel.

Some of the things the squad learn—both sexually and for combat—are pretty funny. Like when they're taught to spit olive pits at lethal velocity. Or when they get a lesson in Chinese sex techniques—knowledge which is of course derived from a crinkly old parchment. There's also quite a bit of slapstick humor. The entire point of the movie, however, is to show five women going through various contortions in their undies, and on that score the movie is a slam dunk. The five squad members, Sonja Jeannine, Diane Drube, Gillian Bray, Tamara Elliot, and Deborah Ralls, give the physical acting their all, and in the end confirm that toplessness—like red sunsets, fine wine, and good music—makes everything better. After premiering in Hong Kong today in 1974, Yang chi reached Italy sometime in 1975.


Vintage Pulp Jun 21 2020
If you're going to have a fantasy make it a doozy.

We have two exceptionally beautiful Japanese posters today. These were made for Hakujitsumu, known in English as Daydream. That's an unusually concise Japanese title, but this won't be a concise post. The movie is loosely based on a 1926 novel by Junichir Tanizaki, and was one of the first films classified as pinku eiga, as well as one of the first erotic productions to have a big budget and a run in mainstream cinemas. It also played outside Japan, with a screening at the 1964 Venice Festival and a release in Stateside cinemas. And because of its success, director Tetsuji Takechi remade the film in hardcore style, not once, but twice, in 1981 and 1987, both times starring Kyōko Aizome, who we've talked about before.

The premise of this is fascinating. Akira Ishihama meets Kanako Michi in their dentist's waiting room. Later, as both of them are receiving anesthesia, Ishihama looks over and sees—because apparently Japanese dentistry meant placing two patients into the same room—the dentist and a nurse strip Michi, then seemingly suck her blood like vampires. Was it an anesthetic dream, or a real occurrence? Ishihama needs to uncover the truth. He goes to a nightclub where Michi sings, sees the dentist approach her and demand that she leave with him. Ishihama follows—or actually sort of teleports after them—and later sees Michi submit to various forms of kinky bondage. But is any of what he's seeing real? The title of the film gives that away, doesn't it?

We wonder if Hakujitsumu used the plot device of fantasy because it softened the idea of the bondage and weirdness Michi goes through. Well, all that would soon become routine in Japanese cinema. In addition this was the first Japanese film to show an actress fully naked—which happens for extended periods. Most write-ups say there's even pubic hair shown, but we'll admit we blinked and missed it if that was the case. What we didn't miss was what a clear precursor to the pinku genre of roman porno Hakujitsumu is. Here those elements seem novel; by the 1970s, they wouldn't be, and as a result filmmakers were by then pushing the envelope with violence, water sports, and enemas. That envelope could have stayed flat, as far as we're concerned. Hakujitsumu premiered in Japan today in 1964.


Modern Pulp May 29 2020
Once is bad luck. Twice is a trend. Six times looks more like a career choice.

Yes, Junko's back. Counting this movie—Dan Oniroku onna hisho nawa chyokyo, also known as Secretary Rope Discipline—we've now watched six of Miss Mabuki's roman porno outings, and what can we say? They're all crazy. In fact, sources say she retired because her body couldn't stand up to all the kinbaku in these flicks. This time around she's a worker at a fashion house, mostly filing and typing her days away. But she's also stealing trade secrets. When she's caught, she refuses to reveal who put her up to it, and to make her talk, the company's chairman... well, you can figure out what happens next. It involves ropes, whips, and enemas.

There's a subplot. Does anyone care? Okay, her boyfriend is a cheating dawg. He even does it right in front her because he's a terrible guy. It gets worse and worse for Junko. Later the chairman's son takes a liking to her and assumes the duties of disciplining her, which leads to her being forcibly tattooed—a standard and terribly disturbing motif in these films. The two plot streams intertwine, so to speak, in a final manic orgy. We knew fashion was a tough industry, but we had no idea it was anything like this. Next time you buy a new outfit, try to remember the pain and suffering that went into it. Dan Oniroku onna hisho nawa chyokyo premiered today in 1981.

Vintage Pulp May 11 2020
Once upon a time in the Reich there was a sadist named Ilsa.

Ilsa la belva delle SS, as it was called in Italy, is better known as Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS, and it's not hyperbole to describe this naziploitation effort as one of the most widely reviled movies ever released. And for good reason. It's significant as an example of just how out there and taboo shattering the sexploitation genre got during the 1970s. The poster was painted by Luciano Crovato, who produced a number of iconic movie promos, including the second and third pieces in this post. We'll get back to him. If you want to know more about Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS look here. If you dare.

Vintage Pulp May 2 2020
Katayama finds herself with too much skin in the game.

Above you see two posters for the Japanese movie Tokugawa irezumi-shi: Seme jigoku, which is known in English as Inferno of Torture, and, occasionally, Hell's Tattooers. We aren't going to get too deeply into the film. It's where Japanese cinema delves into bondage and tattoo fetish layered with gore, and deals with two Edo-era master tattooists who play out a bitter rivalry on the skin of Yumiko Katayama, as well as other unfortunates. If you can tolerate the frontloaded blood and torture, the latter two thirds of the movie may be worth watching for the tattoos, which verge on magical rather than merely ornate. The set design and Teruo Ishii's direction are good too. The tateken sized promo at top is rare, if not even nonexistent online until this very moment, so we thought we'd share it. Tokugawa irezumi-shi: Seme jigoku premiered in Japan today in 1969. Below you see Katayama in a nice pose, untattooed.


Vintage Pulp Apr 28 2020
Bad guys turn island of delights into gangster's paradise.

L'ultima isola del piacere is the Italian title of a West German flick originally made as Die Insel der tausend Freuden, and known in English as Island of 1000 Delights and Triangle of Venus. Filmed in Mauritius, this is a disjointed sexploitation thriller about a tennis pro who squanders his fortune due to bad gambling habits, which culminates in him losing his wife in a poker game against an evil casino owner who is also a—wait for it—white slaver. You may ask yourself why the wife agreed to be wagered. The answer is she sort of hates her husband. Hubby has a mistress, so he isn't too broken up about the outcome of the bet either. Unfortunately, his sidepiece is a greedy sort who convinces him that murdering his own aunt for her fortune might be a good idea. Meanwhile Olivia Pascal plays a private investigator working for the aunt and charged with investigating the casino owner's trafficking ring. The two plot threads weave together shabbily at best, with the murder plot taking an unexpected turn.

We watched this flick solely for the beautiful Pascal, but we have good news for our female readers: although these ’70s sexploitation movies usually have male stars of dubious physical grooming and charms, this time the male lead is Philippe Garnier, and we're pretty sure you'll like him. Unfortunately, he plays a total asshole, plus in order to see him—or Pascal for that matter—you'll have to wade through bad editing, terrible acting, a mean-spirited script, several scenes of torture, and, worst of all, an almost continuous Euro disco soundtrack. We certainly can't recommend this one, but we do like the poster. The production photos, few of which hint at the ugly subtext of the film, are interesting too. Maybe just look at those and call it a day. Die Insel der tausend Freuden premiered in West Germany today in 1978, and reached Italy at an indeterminate date sometime thereafter.


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History Rewind
The headlines that mattered yesteryear.
April 10
1919—Zapata Is Killed
In Mexico, revolutionary leader Emiliano Zapata is shot dead by government forces in the state of Morelos, after a carefully planned ambush. Following the killing, Zapata's revolutionary movement and his Liberation Army of the South slowly fall apart, but his political influence lasts in Mexico to the present day.
1925—Great Gatsby Is Published
F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel The Great Gatsby is published in New York City by Charles Scribner's Sons. Though Gatsby is Fitzgerald's best known book today, it was not a success upon publication, and at the time of his death in 1940, Fitzgerald was mostly forgotten as a writer and considered himself to be a failure.
April 09
1968—Martin Luther King Buried
American clergyman and civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., is buried five days after being shot dead on a Memphis, Tennessee motel balcony. April 7th had been declared a national day of mourning by President Lyndon B. Johnson, and King's funeral on the 9th is attended by thousands of supporters, and Vice President Hubert Humphrey.
April 08
1953—Jomo Kenyatta Convicted
1974—Hank Aaron Becomes Home Run King
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