Updates

• Charlie's French Cinema Nudity Site is updated
• The Tuna Report for the month of January shows 99,169 as of Jan 31, with 1,318 added for the month. It looks like he'll hit six figures somewhere around the 20th.

 

Looker

Here are the video clips. (The caps and comments are in yesterday's edition.)

• Terri Welles
• Susan Dey

 

Private Collections

Private Collections (1979) is a trilogy of unrelated short erotic tales from three directors: Just Jaecklin, Walerian Borowczyk and Shuji Terayama. It was co-produced by Japan's Toei, and the French company Films du Jeudi (Thursday Films). The DVD includes an interview in English with Just Jaecklin, who gives a real insight into this project. Producer Pierre Braunberger hounded Jaecklin to participate in this experiment. Jaecklin didn't feel the trilogy format with three different directors could result in a watchable film, but Braunberger wore him down and he agreed. He believes he was right, and the trilogy is not a good film. When it came to casting, he was curious about Laura Gemser, who had springboarded her career from the Emmanuelle series. There was some bitterness in his voice when he mentioned that he only made the first of the Emmanuelle films. The moment he met her, however, he knew she was the right choice for his script. His is the first tale on the collection, and tells the story of the sirens in a new way.

Isle of Sirens	A sailor trips and falls off of his yacht, which sails away without him. He washes up on the shore of a tropical Island. He is obsessed with being rescued until he discovers Laura Gemser and her three female friends, who seem only interested in running around topless, and serving him in any way possible. All four women show breasts and buns.
The Grass Labyrinth	This is the Japanese segment, and tells of a young man in search of the words to an ancient nursery rhyme. We learn that he was heavily influenced in his youth by an insane woman who kept seducing him. This installment is full of amazing imagery, but I am afraid most of the symbolism is lost on Western audiences. Still, it contains the best sex scenes of the three, and amazing visual style. Several women show breasts and buns, and there is even a full frontal, which clearly not shot for Japanese audiences, since pubic hair could not be shown in Japanese films in 1979.
L'Armoire	The final segment stars Marie-Catherine Conti as an exotic dancer and hooker who brings home a rich customer for the night. Based on a Guy de Maupassant story, it supposedly is a mystery, where the couple keep hearing noises. The punch line is the reveal of the source of the noise. Unfortunately, Borowczyk is clumsy in his storytelling here, and builds up no suspense. Marie-Catherine Conti shows breasts and partial buns. Two unknown lesbians at the strip club do full frontal.

Severin did another good job remastering and releasing a lost classic of early Eurotica. Unfortunately, that doesn't change the fact that, as Jaecklin said, it is not a very good film. Where it shines is as eye candy, and the Severin transfer is very well done. Several frames of the Japanese segment deserve to be framed as stills. This is a C, as Eurotica.

IMDb readers say 5.1 based on nearly no votes.

 

Laura Gemser

Group (Gemser segment)

Marie-Catherine Conti

unknowns

Borowczyk segment Japanese segment

Ten 'til Noon

The action of "Ten 'til Noon" occupies 10 minutes -- no more, no less, and that's what we see. Then we see a replay of those 10 minutes, and the actions of people associated with the first scene, from their point of view.

The movie opens with Larry, a wealthy computer nerd, waking up in his bed one fine morning at ten 'til noon. Well, it would be fine if a well-dressed man and his sexy female assistant weren't sitting across the room pointing a gun at him. In this room it's all riddles and pleas for mercy. We're not really sure why these people have been sent to kill Larry, we just know that they're supposed to do it right at 12 noon. When the clock strikes 12, we're taken to another location and back ten minutes. We are once again at ten 'til noon. With this new setting and new pair of characters, Larry's dilemma unfolds furthermore and we start to understand why someone wants him dead. This format continues until we've met a whole slate of crazy characters involved in this plot for nerd murder: mob bosses, cheating significant others and perverts.

 

Jennifer Hill

Rayne Guest