Spanish director Jess Franco and regular leading man Antonio Mayans must have been really good friends. Not more than a few minutes into this, and Franco's partner Lina Romay (playing prostitute Suzy) and Mayans are getting very intimate, as they would continue to do at regular intervals throughout the ensuing 100 minutes.
Mayans here plays Private Eye Al Crosby (but he may as well be Al Pereira, a similar role he would play more than once later on in his career). His current situation involves him in various sexual dalliances and dangerous liaisons involving Susy, Bijou (Doris Regina) and Harry and Carla, two gangster-types who are in the process of splitting up. He's also beaten and drugged in a series of events interspersed with plenty of muggy sex.
So what is this? A sex-thriller. A sleazy spy romp. Pornography with a vague storyline winding through it. As with most of Uncle Jess's projects, it falls between several definitions without claiming to be wholly one or another. And that is why his work is fascinating to many - certainly for me, even a grainy 'skin flick' like this is engaging in an, er, impenetrable way. The dialogue (dubbed, of course) is coarse and unnatural, and the editing is somewhat choppy and inevitably this is a very low budget production. And yet the acting is convincing throughout, more so than is usual with this kind of film, with curly-wigged Lina Romay, constantly under-dressed and proving extremely watchable as always.
100 minutes is a very long time for this kind of film, and just when you question what exactly it is you are watching, the twist/revelation in the plot hits you with a sharp incredulity. "I hate looking like an ***hole," complains Crosby at one stage. If only he knew what his mission truly entailed!
An Enjoyably mystifying, sleazy flesh show.
Mayans here plays Private Eye Al Crosby (but he may as well be Al Pereira, a similar role he would play more than once later on in his career). His current situation involves him in various sexual dalliances and dangerous liaisons involving Susy, Bijou (Doris Regina) and Harry and Carla, two gangster-types who are in the process of splitting up. He's also beaten and drugged in a series of events interspersed with plenty of muggy sex.
So what is this? A sex-thriller. A sleazy spy romp. Pornography with a vague storyline winding through it. As with most of Uncle Jess's projects, it falls between several definitions without claiming to be wholly one or another. And that is why his work is fascinating to many - certainly for me, even a grainy 'skin flick' like this is engaging in an, er, impenetrable way. The dialogue (dubbed, of course) is coarse and unnatural, and the editing is somewhat choppy and inevitably this is a very low budget production. And yet the acting is convincing throughout, more so than is usual with this kind of film, with curly-wigged Lina Romay, constantly under-dressed and proving extremely watchable as always.
100 minutes is a very long time for this kind of film, and just when you question what exactly it is you are watching, the twist/revelation in the plot hits you with a sharp incredulity. "I hate looking like an ***hole," complains Crosby at one stage. If only he knew what his mission truly entailed!
An Enjoyably mystifying, sleazy flesh show.