More MYA plus One 7 Movies

More titles from MYA and new kid on the block One 7 Movies:

DVD Review: Lust

Lust (aka Torino centrale del vizio)

Italy 1979
Director: Bruno Vani, Renato Polselli (uncredited)
Writers: Alessandro Moretti, Renato Polselli, Bruno Vani
Starring: Rita Calderoni, Raúl Martínez, Tony Matera, Marina Daunia, Christina Hui, Emanuela Cannarsa, Albertina Capuani, Sergio Baldacchino, Mario Castagneri.

DVD Released: August 31st 2010
Cert: NR
Running Time: 78 minutes
Aspect Ratio: 1.66:1 Letterboxed Widescreen
Audio: Dolby Digital Mono Italian
Subtitles: English
Distributor: Mya Communication
Region: 0 NTSC

The Film:

So I usually end my reviews with some comments on the A/V presentation of the DVD I've watched but in this case the quality of the picture (and it's audio) affected my experience so much that I'm sticking it right up front; to say the transfer sucked donkey balls would be a massive understatement and, frankly, an insult to the burros bollocks which I can only imagine look better than this! It really does look like some bloke's discovered a mossy old European beta max tape in his waterlogged basement and then proceeded to transfer it to VHS and then to DVD, after letting his dog urinate on it first of course. It. Really. Is. That. Bad.

Phew, OK, now that's out of the way all that's left for me to do is tell you just how fucking awful the actual film itself is........

Helen (Rita Calderoni), a femme fatale with a nebulous mysterious past has fallen for a strapping young Italian bloke and wants to give up her former life to be with him. First however she wants to be honest with her fiance about just how much of a fucked up nutjob she really is; cue scenes of Helen with her lesbian tennis instructor, working as a drug mule and getting gang-banged by a bunch of bikers as her poor beau watches. But he's willing to accept her for what she is (you what!?) and Helen turns over a new leaf, only to suddenly vanish right after the wedding, d'oh! We follow said bloke as he tries to discover what happened to Helen; was she kidnapped by the shady organisation she used to work for? Did she just change her mind about the marriage? Or perhaps she forgot to try bestiality and has gone to satisfy her curiosity on that front as well..........

Actually writing that all out it makes it sound like an interestingly bonkers 70's spaghetti z-flick, believe me it isn't. A famous director once said about watching film 'I'd rather be confused for 20 minutes than bored for 5 minutes' well he should try and sit through the first 20 minutes of this one and he'd soon change his mind. I had no idea whatsoever what was happening - seemingly random images are played while Italian narration drones on in voice over about 'Helen, where is Helen, one moment here, the next she was gone, but I see her everywhere' wait, who, what? The basic plot of the film is painstakingly pieced together by the viewer after about 50 minutes of turgid indecipherable non-linear almost experimental onscreen pap and this isn't Memento folks, there isn't an intriguing twist or any hook at all to get the viewer interested or invested in the characters. The acting is uniformly awful, the sleaze factor is quite high with 70's style violence, rape, nudity, etc.

Aha apparently this is a "super-rare, almost lost film by Bruno Vani and co-directed by the late, great Renato Polselli. Mastered from impossible-to-find materials, this is a fair quality print." Fair quality, I had a chuckle over that one! So it's of some kind of significance to fans of Polselli presumably, good luck finding any of those!

The Disc: 

Dodgy letterboxed widescreen picture. VHS tape flaws all over the place, blown-out contrast, washed-out colours that make it seem like you're watching the image through a blizzard. Lots of print damage and debris. Mono Italian audio track is muffled, tinny, distorted and prone to drop-outs. Removable English subtitles are provided with hilarious translation errors throughout, so that's a bonus!

Review by Giuseppe Rijitano

DVD Review: Uppercut Man

Uppercut Man (aka The Opponent, aka Qualcuno pagherà)

Italy 1987
Director: Sergio Martino
Writers: Robert Brodie Booth, Maria Perrone Capano, Luciano Martino, Sergio Martino, Sauro Scavolini
Starring: Daniel Greene, Giuliano Gemma, Keely Shaye Smith, Ernest Borgnine, Mary Stavin, Bill Wohrman, James Warring, A.J. Duhe, Herb Goldstein, Ruben Rabasa.
DVD Released: August 31st 2010
Cert: NR
Running Time: 94 minutes
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1 Full Frame
Audio: Dolby Digital Stereo English, Dolby Digital Stereo Italian
Subtitles: N/A
Distributor: Mya Communication
Region: 0 NTSC

The Film:

Lumbering meatbag Bobby Mulligan (Daniel Greene) is a wannabe pro-boxer waiting for his big shot. In the meantime he has a tendency to get himself into street fights with local bums at every turn, presumably his neanderthal features and general henchman type appearance tend to rub people the wrong way. Even Bobby's girlfriend's father Victor (the amiable Ernest Borgnine) can't stand him to the extent that the old guy slaps him silly when he sees Bobby hugging his daughter. Poor guy. Hang on though; he saves local mobster Duranti's trashy alcoholic moll Gilda from a back-alley gang-raping and suddenly he's in with a shot at his first ever professional fight; Duranti (Giuliano Gemma) being a fight promoter as well as a ruthless Bond-villain style baddie. All goes well for a while as Bobby wins fight after fight. Now he's in with a shot at the heavyweight championship but dumbass Bobby is seduced by aforementioned trashy slutbag Gilda and gets caught with his finger in the VD honey-jar by Duranti. As punishment the mobster orders Bobby to throw a fight, but of course at the last minute Hulk get mad and win fight. So begins a cycle of sadistic revenge between Duranti and Bobby that will escalate to murder and bitch-slapping's aplenty...........

A spaghetti-boxing flick? The Italians were a bit slow to catch on with the Rocky formula as by 1987 Stallone was already on Rocky IV but nevertheless here we are. Prolific spaghetti-meister Sergio Martino is on directorial duties here, happy working in whatever genre got him paid, Martino had been most successful with giallo murder mystery thrillers that usually starred popular genre actress Edwige Fenech (married to his brother Luciano back in the day) but you may also recognise him as director of Mountain of the Cannibal God and 2019: After the Fall of New York. The acting is terrible here with Daniel Greene awkwardly shuffling from one scene to the next without an ounce of charisma and sporting a forehead that surely must keep his shoes dry in the rain, there's also a career worst performance from Borgnine. The one exception is, astonishingly enough, the imported Italian salami that is genre stalwart Giuliano Gemma; his English is excellent and he actually plays a compelling villain that really makes the cro-magnon boxer he's up against seem all the more unlikely and unworthy of being his nemesis.

All the boxing genre cliches are ticked; old trainer that dies, fixed fights, professional rivalry, career threatening injury, star-crossed lovers and don't forget the training montage! What makes this one slightly more interesting is the addition of the organized crime element to the storyline and the almost sadistic instances of violence more European in tone than was popular in the USA at the time. The score is ridiculously bombastic and orchestral with a few pop/rock numbers accompanying the training montages in an attempt to (I can only assume) replicate the soundtrack success of the Rocky flicks but here simply make you pee yourself laughing at the unfortunate lyrics.

I'll be honest - I enjoyed this flick! It's cheesy, it's terrible, it's unintentionally hilarious but by god it's entertaining if you like this kind of 80's Z-movie guff!


The Disc:

Full frame transfer, looks like it may be sourced from a VHS due to some softening of the image here and there but it's a pretty good transfer overall. Colours look well saturated and the image is clean and well detailed. There are two audio options available; the Dolby Digital Stereo English track is clear and well balanced, the Dolby Digital Stereo Italian mix sounds a little tinny but then as no English subtitles are provided it's unlikely anyone outside Italy will be listening to it anyway!

Review by Giuseppe Rijitano

DVD Review: Naked Obsession

Naked Obsession (aka Spiando Marina, aka The Smile Of The Fox)

Italy 1992
Director: Sergio Martino
Writers: Sergio Martino, Piero Regnoli
Starring: Deborah Caprioglio, Steve Bond, Sharon Twomey, Leonardo Treviglio, Pedro Loeb, Raffaella Offidani, Raffaele Mottola, Martín Coria, Roberto Ricci.
DVD Released: August 31st 2010
Cert: NR
Running Time: 99 minutes
Aspect Ratio: 1.66:1 Anamorphic Widescreen
Audio: Dolby Digital Stereo English, Dolby Digital Stereo Italian
Subtitles: N/A
Distributor: Mya Communication
Region: 0 NTSC

The Film:

Mark Derrick (Steve Bond) is a US hitman that heads to Argentina on a contract, they need an out-of-towner and expert sniper for this hit. His employers also tell him that he's been hired because they know he will be well motivated given that his target is a member of the drug cartel that caused Derrick so much grief in his former life as a Miami NARC. Cue lots of sweaty sleepless nights as the hitman drinks himself into a stupor and relives the death of his wife and young son over and over. Luckily for him though his employers have set him up in a furnished flat that just happens to share a balcony with uber-slut Marina (Deborah Caprioglio) and it's not long before Derrick has fallen deeply in lust with his big-knockered neighbor to the extent that he starts to follow her all over town for a quick shag in random public places. True lust is never easy though and it soon becomes apparent that Marina is beholden to a dangerous drug lord but what are the chances it's gonna be the same bloke Derrick's been hired to snuff.....

The runaway spaghetti freight train that is the career of Sergio Martino continued into the 90's with this low-rent erotic noir thriller. The story is actually somewhat compellingly told in that things aren't simply spelled out for the audience with certain elements revealed in excellent cheesy little flashbacks that seem to be from another film almost - one about a good cop gone bad and his attempts at redemption. As for the acting; in the 90's when you couldn't get any of the B-list actors you wanted for your thriller you hired Jack Scalia, when you couldn't get Scalia I'm assuming you phoned up Steve Bond. And here he is in all his poor-man's-Scalia, unshaven, alcoholic, buffed abs glory. To be fair he actually isn't all that bad as the horny hitman, he pulls it all off quite admirably given the lines he has to work with, not to mention the massive tits he has to fondle and the pouty faced cheeseball of an 'actress' attached to them. Deborah Caprioglio really only has two things going for her and one of them isn't her acting ability. She is however unintentionally hilarious as Derrick's all singing, all moaning, snake loving, easy laying neighbor; Debbie certainly ain't a shy girl!

It's essentially a two person movie as well, with Bond and Caprioglio pretty much the only substantial characters in the film and Bond spends most of the flick wasted on J&B and staring at the walls of his apartment, there's very little action considering this was set-up as a hitman story. Oh and the bloody awful soundtrack sounds like a bunch of random gameshow themes have been merged together into one unholy symphony of 90's pop pain. My enthusiasm for this one started to wane at around the one hour mark when it became apparent that this hitman just wasn't going to actually 'hit' anyone anytime soon. That said it is a fun little Z-movie thriller if a tad overlong in my admittedly jaded opinion.

The Disc:

Very nice anamorphic transfer, colours look well saturated and the image is crisp, clean and well detailed overall with accurate flesh tones and solid blacks. There are some very minor instances of debris and print damage. The stereo English track is clean and clear with only a couple of noticeable instances of background noise/distortion. The Italian stereo track sounds a little muffled/tinny but then as seems to be the norm for Mya there aren't any English subs included, so it's not like anyone is gonna listen to it!

Review by Giuseppe Rijitano

DVD Review: Sandok

Sandok (AKA La Montagna di Luce)
























Italy 1965
Director: Umberto Lenzi
Writer: Fulvio Gicca Palli
Starring: Richard Harrison, Luciana Gilli, Wilbert Bradley, Daniele Vargas, Andrea Scotti, Nerio Bernardi, Nazzareno Zamperla, Giovanni Cianfriglia, Dakar.
DVD Released: June 29th 2010
Cert: NR
Running Time: 87 minutes
Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1 Anamorphic Widescreen
Audio: Dolby Digital Mono Italian
Subtitles: English
Distributor: Mya Communication
Region: 0 NTSC

The Film:

Alan Foster (Richard Harrison) is a suave British thief hiding out in India. While staying with the Maharaja he gets shitfaced and loses a million rupee in a game of cards. The rajah wants his cash or Alan gets a bullet in the face so the thief has no choice but to try and steal the biggest diamond in India; "The Mountain Of Light" which sits on the forehead of a massive statue worshipped by hundreds and guarded by an army. Oh and surrounded by a moat containing a crocodile, naturally.

Given the only other Umberto Lenzi films I've seen involve people getting their genitals cut off and eaten by cannibalistic natives I was surprised to find myself watching a family friendly adventure flick here. Well, as long as your family speaks Italian and doesn't mind the racism inherent in a film that must have used up Europe's entire supply of boot polish to make it's Caucasian cast look slightly ethnic. Apparently this is Lenzi's 3rd Sandok film in three years, the previous two featuring Steve Reeves in the main role. It's a kind of Sinbad/Tarzan knock-off with sequences that could have inspired Indiana Jones; Alan Foster has a habit of just shooting the natives coming at him with swords. The film moves along at a nice pace, never boring, a couple of nice twists keep things interesting as does the relatively nicely shot location footage. Richard Harrison is entertaining enough as the musclebound protagonist - veteran of over 100 films in the spaghetti industry he was an American that couldn't get a starring role in Hollywood so jumped at the chance to work in Europe and never looked back. Famously it was Harrison that suggested Clint Eastwood to Sergio Leone when he was looking for a 'Man With No Name'. Eagle eyed genre fans will also spot Dakar from Zombi 2 and Dr. Butcher M.D. in a small role as a heavy and Italian sexpot Luciana Gilli as a blacked up Indian belly dancer that Foster inexplicably falls madly in love with near the end of the film.

Mildly entertaining is the best I can say about it - still it's a bit of an odd movie to be released on the Mya label, are they doing PG-rated spaghetti adventures now then? Oh and another drinking game presents itself; down a shot every time someone says 'Mountain Of Light' and try not to spill your drink every time Foster proclaims 'you dirty fakir'!


The Disc:

2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer looks quite good overall: strong vivid colours, some softening of the picture in the darker scenes. Audio is a mono mix in Italian; clean and clear, the English subs are free of errors.


Review by Giuseppe Rijitano

DVD Review: Love Games

Love Games (AKA Sette ragazze di classe)

Spain/Italy 1979
Director: Paul Lezy (Pedro Lazaga)
Writer: Tulio Demicheli
Starring: Janet Agren, Nadiuska, Alberto de Mendoza, Paolo Giusti, Giacomo Rossi-Stuart, Adriana Russo, Beatrice Giorgi, Bentley Bosco, Patrizia Basso.
DVD Released: June 29th 2010
Cert: NR
Running Time: 87 minutes
Aspect Ratio: 1.77:1 Anamorphic Widescreen
Audio: Dolby Digital Mono Italian
Subtitles: English
Distributor: Mya Communication
Region: 0 NTSC

The Film:

Following the adventures of a group of seven criminal masterminds/high class hookers as they blaze a trail of grand larceny across Europe from Spain to Italy's Amalfi coast. Along the way they'll impersonate the police, army officers, famous models, British royalty, porn stars and even an alien from the planet Eros - all in the pursuit of making a shitload of cash.

Ever wondered what a cross between Ocean's 11 and Sex And The City might look like? Nope neither have I, but the 1970's Italian sex comedy film industry provides, whether you like it or not! A hopelessly silly tale of beautiful women conning aging rich businessmen out of their ill-gotten gains. Unfortunately the director/writers forgot to bring the funny amidst all the slap sticky over plotted scams and shenanigans. Low on sleaze as well as laughs there's really little to recommend in this picture other than a morbid fascination with what an Italian version of UK TV's Hustle might have looked like in the late 70's. There are a few familiar genre faces in the cast including Eaten Alive's Janet Agren but for the most part it is populated by unknowns and deservedly so.

Director Pedro Lazaga was a ridiculously prolific filmmaker and made a record number of turkeys over his 4 decades or so in the business but this was his very last due to his shuffling off this mortal coil at the age of 61 the same year it was released. The score is actually the best thing about the film; composed by Fabio Frizzi, most fondly remembered perhaps for his collaborations with Fulci on The Beyond, Zombi 2, City of the Living Dead, etc.

The Disc:

1.77:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer is bloody atrocious! It's a VHS source with muted colours and a terrible fuzzy picture. Very disappointing. Audio is a mono mix in Italian, no complaints on this score it's clean and clear, the English subs are good overall with only the odd grammatical inconsistency here and there.


Review by Giuseppe Rijitano

DVD Review: Submission of a Woman

Submission of a Woman (AKA Al calar della sera)

Italy 1992
Director: Alessandro Lucidi
Writer: Alessandro Lucidi
Starring: Daniela Poggi, Gianluca Favilla, Paolo Lorimer, Cecilia Luci, Anna Orso, Andrea Ward.
DVD Released: June 29th 2010
Cert: NR
Running Time: 87 minutes
Aspect Ratio: 1.66:1 Anamorphic Widescreen
Audio: Dolby Digital Stereo Italian
Subtitles: English
Distributor: Mya Communication
Region: 0 NTSC

The Film:

Luisa (Daniela Poggi) is an Italian model and actress. Somewhat disillusioned with her work she yearns for roles that demand more of her than the ability to look hot in lingerie. Especially as she now has a husband and a baby at home to look after. Unfortunately Luisa has caught the attention of a dangerous stalker that has already brutally killed at least one victim. This psychopath (Paolo Lorimer) follows Luisa and watches her from a distance but when she heads home to her remote farm in the country he sees his opportunity to strike and a romantic weekend getaway becomes a terrifying ordeal of terror and survival.........

At least that's the kind of hyperbole I'd write on the back of the DVD box to get some poor sucker to rent it! In reality this is a competent Italian TV movie thriller that is let down primarily by it's deathly dull first half. For about the first 45 minutes we simply watch Poggi as she goes about her day, from a trip to the supermarket to getting her car serviced to meeting her agent - it just goes on, and on, and on. Now she may be a fine looking woman but this isn't Haneke or the Dardennes directing here, there truly is nothing drawing the viewer into the story through these scenes. The conceit being I suppose that we are supposed to be wary of all the men she bumps into during the course of her travels in that one of them might be the stalker we briefly saw kill a woman in the film's opening moments, but really it's just tedious beyond belief.

The film's second half however switches gears with a full on home invasion, a couple of murders and a violent rape thrown in for good measure. The film from this point on is actually very well put together and tensely acted. Poggi and Lorimer are very good in their respective roles with a psychological as well as physical game of cat and mouse developing between the two. It's a pity we have to wade through the turgid swamp that is the first half of the movie really because the second half barrels along at a good pace and even throws in a couple of unexpected and rather entertaining twists.

Written and directed by Alessandro Lucidi who was (and still is at the age of 60+) mainly an editor (notables include The Designated Victim, Terror Express, etc) this was his 3rd and final attempt at directing and that pretty much says it all really.

A strangely bloodless and very average 90's Italian TV thriller then, go forth and rent...or not.


The Disc:

1.66:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer looks very good indeed; strong colours, healthy flesh tones, excellent contrast and a crisp picture. Audio is a stereo mix in Italian; clean and clear, the English subs are free of errors.


Review by Giuseppe Rijitano

DVD Review: Without Trace

Without Trace (aka ...A Tutte Le Auto Della Polizia)

Italy 1975
Director: Mario Caiano
Writers: Fabio Pittorru & Massimo Felisatti
Starring: Antonio Sabato, Luciana Paluzzi, Enrico Maria Salerno, Gabriele Ferzetti, Elio Zamuto.
DVD Released: April 27th 2010
Cert: NR
Running Time: 99 minutes
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1 Anamorphic Widescreen
Audio: Dolby Digital Mono Italian
Subtitles: English
Distributor: Mya Communication
Region: 0 NTSC

The Film:

A bunch of filthy rich snobs relax around the massive swimming pool at the palatial estate of Professore Andrea Icardi as his precocious teenage daughter Carla strips down to her undies and takes a dip, to the delight of quite a few of the male onlookers. Yup she's a bit of a Lolita this one, no sooner has she finished teasing her father's friends than she's sneaking off after school for an illicit hook up with...well who knows? Coming home late Professore Icardi finds that his daughter still hasn't returned home and after checking around it's soon apparent she's missing 'Without Trace'. Better call in the local coppers then, led by 70's Italian Burt-Reynolds-a-like Antonio Sabato as Commissario Fernando Solmi; a loose cannon cop who lives on the edge and doesn't play by the rules. As you'd imagine Solmi isn't particularly fond of the upper class and especially doesn't like the inequality shown by the massive police mobilisation to find the (probably just runaway) daughter of a rich bloke. However when Carla's body is discovered in a lake, weighted down with her Vespa (nice!) it's not long before Solmi's getting too close to the case (probably because of his wife's unexplained briefly mentioned death) and verbally showering his contempt for perverts and hustlers at anyone within earshot. Especially that bloke running the skeezy bordello full of underage girls where Carla's schoolfriends all seem to work! With the evidence building via tyre tracks, bullet casings, a suspicious packet of Benson & Hedges and the testimony of a sweaty peeping tom that witnessed Carla's final moments the cops get ever closer to nailing their target which leads the diabolical villain to start killing all those that know anything about him in a desperate and bloody attempt to evade capture.

For it's first hour or so this is a steadily entertaining Italian police procedural flick (or poliziotteschi as this particular sub-genre might be classified). Despite it's 70's trappings and obligatory occasional flashes of full frontal female nudity it's held up well over the years. It even features an eerily familiar forensics lab scene; funky music plays as various white-coated geeks look through microscopes and process evidence - CSI Lazio anyone? Seemingly unable to hold this dramatic tension any longer however the film reverts to Giallo-tinged black gloved throat slitting's and garroting in it's final act which pretty much spurts arterial blood all over it's carefully built up storyline and rushes things to an action packed car chase of a conclusion that leaves you feeling somewhat let-down. The reveal of the killer is well handled however and surprisingly (for this genre) he turns out not to be a complete nut job but an almost sympathetic character. Another in the line of "schoolgirl gialli" then that were so popular round about this time (thanks to Massimo Dallamano and the likes of What Have You Done To Solange and What Have They Done to Your Daughters?, etc) - films that usually managed to be hypocritically moralistic as well as sexually exploitative. To be fair though this one is far less sleazy than it could be and all the better for it. The film also benefits greatly from an excellent turn by Sabato as the hard-nosed cop and the criminally underused ex-Bond girl Gabriele Ferzetti as his partner! Oh and the film's original Italian title A Tutte Le Auto Della Polizi (Calling All Police Cars) is a far more fitting one than Without Trace really given the nature of the plot.

The Disc:

Very nice anamorphic transfer, colours look well saturated and the image is clean and well detailed overall. Audio is the original Italian mono with optional English subtitles, it's a clean and clear track. More like this please Mya!

An odd but entertaining combination of Italian 70's hard-boiled cop flick and serial killer slasher movie!

Review by Giuseppe Rijitano

DVD Review: Crime of Passion

Crime of Passion (aka Delitto Passionale)

Italy 1994
Director: Flavio Mogherini
Writers: Flavio Mogherini & Daniele Stroppa
Starring: Serena Grandi, Florinda Bolkan, Fabio Testi, Paul Martignetti, Vesela Dimitrova.
DVD Released: April 27th 2010
Cert: NR
Running Time: 103 minutes
Aspect Ratio: 4:3 Full Frame NTSC
Audio: Dolby Digital Stereo Italian, Dolby Digital Stereo English
Subtitles: N/A
Distributor: Mya Communication
Region: 0 NTSC

The Film:

Peter Doncev (the fabulous Fabio Testi) has a slag for a wife. She may be a famous writer and a bit posh but she has a tendency to sneak out for a spot of after hours extra-marital rumpy pumpy with the English Ambassador whenever she gets the chance and not even her wheelchair bound daughter Anna can guilt mommy into staying at home when she's got the horn. On her latest carnal excursion however she is brutally (luckily post-coitally) murdered in her cheap hotel room. Enter young rookie detective Ivan Zanova (Paul Martignetti) and his crinkly beret wearing Wilford-Brimley-moustached partner/mentor to investigate. There are plenty of suspects to go around, including Peter's randy sister-in-law Tania (Serena 'bad boob job' Grandi), his secretary Milena (Anna Maria Petrova), his wife's professional rival alcoholic aging bint Giulia (Florinda Balkan), the list goes on and on. The aforementioned cops spend most of the film chatting leisurely to these people, in no great hurry to find the killer. Hell Inspector Ivan even finds time to take crippled Anna out on the town, well to a local gypsy encampment anyway, for an impromptu jam session (he plays saxophone) with the creepy gypos. While his partner Brimley-tache spends most of the film hairy stark bollock naked in a bath house/spa where Ivan also has to shed his clothes and grab his limp member to report in on a regular basis. Eventually the killer strikes again and is almost immediately caught...THE END!

It's a 90's giallo apparently, not the genre's best decade it seems. Featuring quite a few familiar genre faces but none of the charm, mystery or style of it's predecessors. Why the director/writer's thought it would be a good idea to have this Italian production set in Russia (presumably) is something of a mystery in itself - I kept having Nam-style flashbacks to Police Academy 7: Mission To Moscow, spookily also filmed in 1994, and wishing occasionally that I was watching that movie instead. Martignetti is the films protagonist, the main copper, the performance that really does make or break a film like this and he is a truly irritating screen presence unfortunately; the weediest, wettest, woefully inept screen detective ever. Even the lure of Serena Grandi's criminally underutilized dirty pillows couldn't save this film.

The Disc:

1.33:1 Full frame transfer looks a bit soft but is generally OK for a VHS transfer. Audio options include; a dubbed English stereo track that sounds fine (the accents are all over the place though from Russian to English to American) and an original Italian stereo track with no optional English subtitles, that's right NO ENGLISH SUBTITLES, what's the point in that? Another disappointing Mya presentation.

Ultimately this plays like a low budget Italian TV thriller.

DVD News: Mya Titles for Febuary

Anna: The Pleasure, The Torment (aka Secrets of a Call Girl - Quel Particolare Piacere, 1973)

Satan's Wife (aka Ring of Darkness - Un Ombra nell'Ombra, 1979)

Desirable Teacher (aka Pierino Contro Tutti, 1981)

Blade of the Ripper (aka The Strange Vice of Mrs Wardh, 1971)

Sex Advice (aka Sesso in Confessionale, 1974)

DVD Review: The Hunchback of the Morgue

Review is once again over at Cinema Nocturna!

DVD News: Mya Non-Stop

More MYA Dvd goodness on the way on the 12th January with the following titles being slated for release:











However, as usual with MYA, street dates are not always firm, and if you click the covers, all the above titles are available to order right now via Amazon.com.

DVD Review: Craving Desire

CRAVING DESIRE

Italy 1993
Dir: Sergio Martino
Screenplay: Sergio Martino, Maurizio Rasio, Umberto Lenzi
Starring: Vittoria Belvedere, Ron Nummi, Simona Borioni, Andrea Roncato, Serena Grandi, Hal Yamanouchi

Cert: NR
Running Time: 101 minutes
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1 Full Frame
Audio: Dolby Digital Mono Italian, Dolby Digital Mono English
Subtitles: N/A
Released: Mya Communications
Region: 0 NTSC

The Film

Skeletons like their closets. For when exhumed they are liable to collapse, shattering the surrounding silence with their spare secrets. Craving Desire opens with the disinterment of a wealthy family’s grand matriarch, as she is moved from tomb to grave. A pair of undertakers tie the yellowed shoulder blades to the ribcage, the long-buried framework now held together by thin strips of ribbon. Once they unravel there will be hell to pay; expect a few broken bones and splintered sockets.

Luigi (Nummi) would appear to be a robust example of youthful bourgeoisie with an executive job, rich fiancée (Cinzia, played with gusto by Borioni), and privileged family spurring him forward. So far, so slick, until his cousin Sonia (Belvedere) shows up at his apartment and begins to insinuate herself into his life, first casually flashing her endowments at him during breakfast, before interrupting our hapless yuppie mid-flow with his bride-to-be. Sonia’s soft, attentive charms prove to be far more appealing than Cinzia’s nitrous nagging and hedge-trimmed hair, and it is not long before Luigi is fully greased in her oily charms and ready to produce genetically-deficient offspring. He promptly dumps Cinzia and publicly declares new love, much to the disgust of his stern parents. To celebrate, our kissin’ cousins go to a nightclub and bring back a reveller, Francesca, to join them in a kinky threesome. Luigi’s once staunch foundation is disintegrating. The twine is beginning to fall apart.

As is Sonia, her motives gradually unfurling as Luigi sinks further into her seductive thrall. Once Francesca discovers a book of witchcraft belonging to her lusty hostess, the film veers from erotic soft-core thriller to something altogether more demented and unpredictable. Ricocheting between sweet sexiness and bitter, destructive desire, Vittoria Belvedere plays Sonia as a Michelin-starred bunny-boiler. A lot of the fun to be had in this pulpy slice of fiction is in seeing to what extremes she will go to in degrading her cousin’s ivory-white reputation; shoplifting, robbery, and even a spot of swinging with a woman who sports a hairstyle like the pop singer Yazz once had. The only way is no longer up for Luigi- brittle and spiritually jaundiced; he is close to breaking point.

Director Martino underlines the empty sterility of Luigi’s well-heeled lifestyle, allowing his camera to prowl through the dry, neutral tones of the character’s penthouse apartment with its décor at once nondescript and vulgar, a brashly turquoise floor exposed by the grey illumination from an ostentatious skylight. Any other colour that is present threatens the bland comfort of his existence: the ruby lips and flame hair of his boss’s wife, a temptation that would spell career suicide; the bright, flattering costumes worn by Sonia, a candy-coated cyanide pill to be greedily gulped down. Despite the character’s presentation as a spoilt rich kid, Nummi manages to imbue Luigi with enough childish naïveté to make us see him as a victim. Towards the end of the film, Sonia splays Luigi against the domed skylight, which bristles under his weight; it is as if he is being crucified on his own bourgeois livelihood, so transparent and fragile. A bubble of lofty affectation ready to be burst, Sonia strikes at its tainted root.

If her appearance rekindles a repressed attraction between the two cousins from their youth, there are other hidden fractures to be unearthed from this family vault. Craving Desire’s denouement is gloriously over-the-top, dripping with violence and macabre revelation. Sonia, clad in black PVC and high heels as a deathly dominatrix, brutally tortures Luigi and delivers a lengthy piece of exposition divulging grim childhood trauma. The skeletal spectre now hauled out of the cupboard, it can only be dashed against the ground.
A taut, twisted psycho-thriller, Craving Desire hits its mark with a bone-crunching thud.

The Disc

Presented in the original full-frame 1.33:1 aspect ratio, the transfer is, for the most part, immaculate. Neutral tones are rendered with clarity, whilst the explosions of colour are richly saturated (check out Luigi’s glowing green telephone for truly alarming kitsch value). Two audio mixes in English and Italian; both presented in Dolby Digital mono, which does not quite do justice to Natale Massare’s electro-flecked score, although the dialogue is free from surface noise. And for those purists who prefer subtitles to dubbing, there is no need to fear as the English dub is of top quality and unobtrusive, with dialogue delivered sincerely. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the disc is a little, ahem, bare-boned in terms of extras: a small documentary on Belvedere might have been nice. But maybe that’s just my own desirous craving…

Reviewed by James Kloda

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DVD Review: Italian Sex (Sesso in Testa, 1974)

ITALIAN SEX (SESSO IN TESTA)

Italy 1974
Dir: Sergio Ammirata
Screenplay: Sergio Ammirata, Marino Onorati
Starring: Pilar Velázquez, Didi Perego, Mario Carotenuto, Toni Ucci, Lino Banfi, Sergio Ammirata

Cert: NR
Running Time: 90 minutes
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1 Letterboxed Widescreen
Audio: Dolby Digital Mono Italian
Subtitles: English
Released: Mya Communications
Region: 0 NTSC

The Movie

“The vernacchio is produced by the vibration of the tongue on the lips,” demonstrates the sweaty teacher to his (scantily-clad) student with gusto. If you thought the above referred to a lewd deed, you are symptomatic of the condition affecting most of Italian society according to this 1974 film- a dirty mind, or ‘Sex In The Head’ as the title literally translates. For the gentleman is referring to the creation of a certain type of fart noise, acceptable to be used in the presence of ladies and archbishops. The innuendo is apt: not only does it court a sex-addled imagination but the lip-smacking trumpeting could be seen as an auto-erotic substitute for an oral act of coitus. (If you think I’m delving too deep into the film’s unconscious, feel free to practice your own vernacchio now.) Italian Sex is thus a surreal exposé of the prurient psyche of modern life, the feisty fantasies and pulsing perversity that seep beneath a routine bit of how’s-yer-father. Homoeroticism, sex with nuns, incest, necrophilia; it’s all here in a film that would make Alfred Kinsey blush.

Similar to that prominent sexologist, sociology student Diana Tornetti (Velázquez) has decided to research the wanton desires of Italian men for her PhD dissertation. Her methodology is one of strenuous fieldwork, going undercover as a prostitute for three eventful months. Before she can be awarded her doctorate, she must relate her exploits to an academic board, comprised of a flustered vicar, a monocled aristocrat and one prudish woman who chokes violently at the mere mention of the word “enticement”, presided over by the great Italian smut star Lino Banfi. Consequently, her encounters are presented as episodic vignettes as if they were chapters from her thesis. Brimming with colourful characters and bawdy burlesque, Sergio Ammirata’s only film as director (with veteran Fernando Vacanze Per Un Massacro Di Leo providing uncredited ‘academic’ supervision) plays like an Italian version of a British sex romp; heck, it could be called Confessions Of A Post-Grad. Or Carry On Swotting.

Inevitably, the content of her thesis is hit and miss. Some sequences are very funny, if based around a single punch-line: a camp hotel waiter (played by Ammirata himself) only poses as a homosexual so that women will crave sex with him in order to cure him of his ‘deviance’; an impotent Mafioso, Frank, has to slap his women around to protect his macho image; and a decidedly ugly man, who looks like a cross between Frank Zappa and Bruce Forsyth, reveals only after he has had sex with our heroine that the money he proffered was a gift from her mother.

The film is at its best with scenes that rock with a dark undertow below the comic bounce of the carnal capers: a recent widower attempts to seduce Diana while his wife lies embalmed in a coffin next door- when she scarpers he looks at his ex and proclaims, “You’re ruining me even in death, huh? Go to hell twice.” This evidence leads our student to surmise that men take pleasure “to profane every sacred thing”. In another episode, what appears to be a traffic jam turns out to be a queue of men waiting to drill a nun; as she lifts her habit, Ammarita shoots through her legs capturing the look of nervous excitement on the punter’s face. Not only does this link voyeurism with forbidden privilege, but the camera position also reflects Diana’s desire to examine the world from a different angle, one that sprouts from the loins.

The licentious fantasy and libidinous technique on display is crystallised in the performance of Velázquez. Donning multi-coloured wigs and negligees like a hyperactive cabaret star, her energy and humour toward her predicaments is what gives Italian Sex its distinctive honours. As the horrified splutters of the judging panel transform into approving coos, the film itself further loosens up and plunges into manic surrealism: one of the clients is a deranged man in a Mickey Mouse jumper who, it is claimed, has wandered in from another film; Ms. Torrentini acts as a stage manager to a bizarre piece of physical theatre with thriving naked lesbians accompanied by wild animal noises, all watched by a horde of ageing critics, scrutinising the participants through opera glasses and taking detailed notes. Sex is a theatre of the absurd, full of exaggerated role-play, styled (and stylised) perversity, and performed with a cheeky self-awareness.

After Frank has executed his wife-beating charade, he looks into a mirror and blows a raspberry at his own spurious image. Likewise, Italian Sex irreverently trumps a cloud of spittle on the cultural portrait of a wholesome, chaste society. We all secretly enjoy a healthy vibration of the tongue on the lips.

The Disc

Presented in 1.85:1 letterboxed widescreen, the transfer is decent with colours bright and suggestive. Only minor pops and scratches evident from the source material. Contrast is good, with the stylish black and white décor of Diana’s apartment room looking particularly ravishing; however, some of the detail in the darker scenes is fuzzy. Audio-wise, the Dolby Digital mono mix is in Italian with removable subtitles in English. Some of these are riddled with grammatical errors, which add to the sense of chaos: “He took me in a desert place” (she’s not referring to bedding Bedouins). No extras, perhaps unsurprisingly for a release of a fairly niche title.

Reviewed by James Kloda

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