Eastern Promises

More than just a crime thriller, 2007's Eastern Promises examines the presence of Russian crime families in London, and also looks at the common practice of slavery, as Russian girls are imported to work as prostitutes, but with no choice in the matter, literally slaves to the Russian crime masters, and kept in line with daily injections of heroin.

A pregnant and addicted 14-year-old girl shows up at a London hospital in the midst of a miscarriage. The baby is saved, but the mother dies, and a midwife, Anna (Naomi Watts), is deeply affected by the plight of mother and daughter. When she finds the girl's diary, she sets out to have it translated to find out what happened.

Anna's inquiries lead her to the kindly owner of a Russian club, but what she doesn't know is that he is also head of the Russian crime family that "owned" the girl, and he wants to be sure that the diary stays out of police hands.

Enlisted to help is Nikolai (Viggo Mortensen), a driver for the old man's son, heir-apparent to the family. Without wanting to, on orders from his two bosses, Nikloai becomes involved in Anna's search.

I found this to be a well-done thriller that also explores many issues of Russian mob life including the effects of the mob on London, and the underground slave trade that exists there.

Tereza Srbova

Love Camp

 (1977)

Part Two

Jess Franco directed 187 movies, if his profile on IMDb is to taken as gospel. In the 70's and 80's alone he put out 139 films under his own name and those of various aliases (IMDb credits him with more than 20 alternative names). Quite a few of his movies have been reviewed in the pages of the Funhouse and from them one can discern a theme: get of a lot of attractive women, get em nekkid, keep em nekkid (no matter how incongruous is the nekkidness) and have all sorts of bad people do bad things to them while they are nekkid. You could argue that Franco was one sick twist, except that the violence was usually bloodless and seldom gut-wrenching. My take on his style was he set out to give the public what it wanted, which to his mind was good looking women, unclothed and in peril. Not 'xactly my own cup o' tea but in this matter I seem to be in the minority.

Anywho, Frauen in Liebeslager, aka Love Camp (1977) is the distilled essence of Jess Franco's style of filmmaking. Story goes that a bunch of revolutionaries in some jungle-filled third world country abduct a bunch of women to serve as sex slaves for the fighting men on their side. They hit a brothel (good thinking there) and pick up a pair of working gals played by Monika Kaelin and Brigitte Meyer (not to be confused with the Euro-pornstar, Bridget Maier). But then, as if at random, they grab a waifish virgin played by Esther Studer and a mid-thirties bride, played by Ada Tauler. And they just have to grab the town lesbian, played by Monica Swinn. Off into the jungle they go, to a camp run by a sadistic blue-eyed blonde (Nanda Van Bergen) in the services of the revolutionary commander, who is also blonde and blue-eyed. So I am figuring these are the unexplored jungles of East Fresia. The camp commandant and the commander of the whole shebang both have eyes for Ada Tauler, so you have the girl-boy-girl triangle thing. And the lesbian gal wants to make it with the virgin. The latter resists until she is employed in the services of fat, hairy commandoes, at which point she begins to bat from the other side of the plate. Three gals escape but are caught. Two are dragged back to camp but Ada's character returns willingly because she and the commando commander have this thang goin', ya' know.

All that stuff is the maguffin for shower scenes (two of them), girl-girl scenes, girl-boy scenes, topless conversations, a catfight, a whipping scene, a topless firing squad scene (in which both the condemned and the members of the firing squad are topless) and a whole lotta running through the jungle with the hooties a-bouncin' every which way. Seventy-nine minutes of running time and I am guessing seventy of them have at least one topless or fully nekkid woman in it. This one more than sorta delivers on the promise offered by Jess Franco's name on the cover.

A few words about the actresses in this boob-fest.

• Monika Kaelin would go on to be Penthouse Pet of the month for May 1980. In the three years between her appearance in Love Camp and in the pages of Penthouse, she would slim down and take on a much more feminine appearance.

• In Love Camp, Esther Studer approached the end of a film career in which she played the fragile waif who got both nekkid and abused on a regular basis.

• Then there is Ada Tauler. IMDb has her starring in a 1959 film directed by Jess Franco that translates as We are Eighteen Years Old. Since Ada looks like a remarkably in-shape mid-thirties gal in Love Camp, logic suggests she was one of the 18-year-olds back in the '59 flick. I guess that means she might have had a serious career for a while, during which she was known as Adela Tauler. Her last three or four films, however, are pure Jess Franco exploitation movies. Love Camp would the penultimate, with only Voodoo Passion to cap her career as an actress. There is not an inch of her that escapes the light of day in this movie. She is topless or completely naked in each of her 21 scenes in Love Camp. Almost half the 79-minute running time of this movie has Ada revealing some goodies. You want topless? Check. You want full-frontal standing up?  Check. You want full-frontal lying down? Double Check. You want her sport-humpin'a guy? Yep. And a gal? Oh yes. The last of her girl-girl scenes has her rolling around, on top of Nanda, who obliges by tugging on Ada's tuche to give us a nice view of her holiest of holies. Thing goes for more than a minute and Ada's rumpus is something to behold despite her mid-thirties age. Damn, I love that scene. (Sunday's Fun House)

This is the second batch of caps and clips. Many more to follow.

Today's group just features Esther Studer

(Film Clips)

 

 

"The Hunger"

Season 2

Episode: Triangle in Steel

A young man joins a team constructing a new bridge but when he becomes obsessed with the wife of the team's leader, everyone tells him to forget her, that there are enough fish in the sea to get into trouble just for this one. She is especially dangerous since since she and her husband are Indians who have mystical powers. He is too horny to listen to anyone and does the boss's wife.

Unfortunately, he works at great heights and there is an eagle hungry for revenge.

Oopsy-daisy!

Victoria Sanchez