I know it sounds like a documentary about 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, but in fact it is a Japanese samurai ghost story.

What, you've never seen one of those?

It begins with a scene set in 1840, near Kyoto. A bald-headed samurai warrior approaches a house. Well, I guess he's a warrior, because he has a very large sword tucked into that obi around his waist. You'd have to guess that he isn't a fisherman or a farmer, and he's probably not a chef because this was years before Benihana's. I ruled out "pirate." No parrot. He sees a beautiful woman in the entranceway. He enters. They engage in a courtship ritual, in which they sip some tea and exchange glances. They then get on to the actual courtin', in which they exchange more than glances and she sips her tea from the ol' samovar of love. Wink, wink, nudge, nudge.

Another warrior approaches the same house. This guy must be a higher-ranking bald-headed warrior, or at least a more prosperous one, because he has two swords tucked into his sash. He looks at the paper walls and sees the silhouette of the lovers embracing, and hoo-boy is he pissed off. We realize that it must be his house, and the woman must be his wife. We find out that he can use those Ginsu swords to slice and dice his way through walls, furniture ... even tin cans! Isn't it amazing? Eventually he uses the swords to chop off the other guy's right arm, and then his dick, and so forth, until the other guy looks like the Black Knight in that Monty Python movie. Mr. Two Swords then slices and dices his wife. For his grand finale, the disgraced warrior kneels down and commits hara-kiri.

Already we have learned two valuable lessons for our next assignment in Japan:

1. If you are a horny one-sword guy, do not choose the wife of a two-sword guy for your ceremonial lust ritual. You might choose the wife of a pillow manufacturer, or at most a Swiss Army Knife guy.

2. If you are going to have sex in a house with paper walls, and you just don't want to extinguish the lamps, be sure to place those lamps between you and the walls, or you will be entertaining the entire neighborhood with a xxx-rated shadow puppet show starring Admiral Winky-san.

The film then picks up the main story in 1982, when the ancient real estate agent for that house finally finds a tenant - the unsuspecting American family of a writer. "Wow, honey, what a deal. It's a twelve bedroom house on a hillside with an elaborate garden, and it's only three dollars a month. And everyone said Japan was so expensive." Of course, the Japanese are smart enough to avoid the 邪悪な家. The Japanese know that the sign means "evil house," but the Americans can't read Japanese, so the real estate guy translates it into English as "Future site of MacDonald's", and the Americans are none the wiser.

Of course, the house is now inhabited by the ghost of the three Japanese people who died there in 1840. Amazingly, they all get along just fine now in the afterlife, and really seem to enjoy their post-death entertainment, which consists of playing pranks on the new people who enter the house. Their powers basically consist of the ancient ceremonial "Froggy Gremlin" ritual, which is called in Japan "plucking the magic twanger." (Rough translation.) For you younger readers, Froggy was a little dickens from the Buster Brown kiddie show. He would always pop up in a puff of smoke, seemingly from nowhere, to plant words into a lecturer's head through subliminal suggestion, words which the lecturer would then repeat without thinking. When the kids would laugh at what he conceived to be a somber moment, it would suddenly dawn on him what he had just said.

Example:

Professor (seriously): "And little Dwight was a good boy who always listened to his parents, did his homework, and ate his spinach, and grew up to be ..."

Froggy: " ... a total jerk."

Professor:  " ... a total jerk. (Kids laughing.) No, no, wait ... why did I say that?"

Anyway, these three Japanese ghosts have the same subliminal suggestion power as Froggy. The director shows them superimposing themselves upon one of the living, at which point the ghost is exercising some mind control.

Example:

Wife (Unpossessed): "Honey, why didn't Alex ever get married?"

Husband: "He's picky. I guess he never found anyone who satisfied him."

Wife (Now possessed): "I'll bet I could satisfy him." (Now re-unpossessed): "Wait ... why did I say that?"

Well, you can guess that their marriage is going to get a little rocky after a few dozen exchanges like that. Of course, it will inevitably result in her sampling Alex's own bald-headed warrior. (Hey, how often do you get to see a 50ish Doug McClure naked?)  Eventually it will result in a closing sequence which is a re-creation of the opening sequence, except that the fight is between Edward Albert and Doug McClure, who are in turn being possessed by the two Japanese ghost-warriors.

This film has some very good moments, especially in the opening scene. It also has some beautiful photography. Unfortunately, it has two elements which kill it as a ghost story:

1. Unintentional laughs. Some elements of the ghosts' behavior provoke giggles rather than scares; Doug McClure looks downright silly in the scenes were he is possessed and has to do martial arts maneuvers; a scene with giant mumbling crabs is just ridiculous; in a family dinner scene a possessed Edward Albert makes his daughter drink soup with a ghost face in it - "C'mon, eat your soup for daddy."

2. Ultra-slow pacing.

Since the audience is forced to wait too long between the scares, and since half of the scares come out silly rather than frightening, the film just doesn't work. It's a ghost story that seems pretty good until the ghosts show up! On the other hand, my overall impression of the film is not what I expected from the cellar-dwelling 3.4 rating at IMDb. As I watched this, I didn't feel that I was watching a terrible, cheesy movie, but rather one that was a regrettable failure, because it could have been a very good genre flick with just a little more thought put into it.

NOTE: A typical MGM disc, this DVD has both a widescreen and a full screen transfer, and you need both to see all the nudity.

Susan George

Mako Hattori

While the film isn't that interesting, luckily for us it is Jasmin who is doing the cleaning. To be even more specific, she is cleaning herself in the owners' huge bath tub and she doesn't seem to mind very much when someone walks in on her.

I really should find myself a cleaning lady like this, does anyone know where?

• Jasmin Tabatabai (1, 2)

As promised, today we return to "The Teaser" (1973) and the good old days of Exploitation.

We kick it off with scenes of Rene Bond and Becky Sharpe spending some quality time together. We get full frontal views of both ladies.

Rene Bond and Becky Sharpe

Then, Becky bares her boobs while with a dude. Look closely for a little oral action in #3.

Becky Sharpe

We wrap it up with Rene and a good look at her boob job.

Rene Bond

As a bonus, here is one more assorted and fully frontal nude unknown.

Unknown

Christine Harnos

Straying just a tad away from the non-Skinemax theme today...next we have the semi-mainstream actress Gina-Raye Carter making an appearance on the late night cable series "Passion Cove".

Gina-Raye Carter

A little trivia for you...McCarthy not only stars in this flick, she also wrote it.

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