7.3 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
Before the advent of modern-day pornography, a vast and rapidly-paced world of smut peddling was the norm, complete with its own secret history. This documentary reveals the untold story of American cinema's gloriously sordid cinematic past.
Starring: David F. Friedman, Frank Henenlotter, Gal FridayErotic | 100% |
Documentary | 23% |
Comedy | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080i
Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
English: LPCM 2.0
None
50GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region A (B, C untested)
Movie | 3.5 | |
Video | 3.5 | |
Audio | 3.5 | |
Extras | 4.0 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
It’s not exactly a closely guarded secret that the internet is a virtual wonderland of pornography, and one of the kind of interesting tangential shifts in the entertainment landscape which the world wide web helped to usher in has been the compartmentalizing of pornography viewing into private, typically solitary, events. While there are still “peep show” palaces in most major cities (including my hometown of Portland, Oregon), the questionably “communal” aspect of going to an arcade or theater to watch porn is by and large a thing of the past. I’m old enough to remember the cheap, often disgustingly dirty, theaters where porn used to play, though I should hasten to add I only ever saw a porn film theatrically twice in my life, both times as a kind of joke. A bunch of buddies and I more or less snuck into a Salt Lake City porn palace back when we were teenagers (yes, that’s right, even a straight arrow locale like Utah’s biggest burg had porn, something that some current Utah lawmakers are evidently loathe to admit, as evidenced by some recent news reports I've seen concerning statements made about the "dangers" of porn and a perceived need to legislate against it). We saw some regrettable feature which revolved around stewardesses, if I recall correctly after so many years, and it may have actually "only" been a softcore offering. Later as a whimsical present for my 21st birthday, my girlfriend at the time took me to see Deep Throat, which had been ensconced for years in one of Portland’s most notorious porn theaters, The Aladdin. (The Aladdin later “cleaned up” and became a great performance venue for live music acts.) The thing about going to an actual theater to see porn was that there was a kind of built in “shame” involved, at least if you were a (relatively?) straight and narrow kid like I was. It was titillating, of course, and “fun” in an indecent way, but you couldn’t help but look around to see if there was anyone there you might not want to be seen by, as well as a nagging pang of conscience that you might be sullying some pristine topography in your soul. The “privatization” of porn courtesy of the internet age has largely erased that feeling of shame, at least in terms of what a porn viewer might be otherwise forced to confront out in the open (meaning the dark and disturbingly sticky confines of a porn theater).
That's Sexploitation! is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Severin Films with an AVC encoded 1080i transfer in a variety of aspect ratios
(due to the source archival elements), but "generally" in 1.78:1. As should be expected from a documentary cobbled together out of such a wide
variety of sources, That's Sexploitation! has a rather heterogeneous appearance. The contemporary interview and/or talking head
segments pop reasonably well, though kind of humorously the interlaced presentation leads to some combing artifacts when a pretty and scantily
clad woman twirls the tassles on her pasties. The archival source video is all over the map quality wise, with nothing ever totally escaping the
vagaries of time, wear and tear, but some clips (especially the more relatively recent ones) certainly looking at least somewhat more consistent
than others. Black and white clips have widely
variant contrast and black levels, and similarly the color clips have varying levels of palette accuracy and general densities. Grain structures
fluctuate as well, and damage ranges from minimal to pretty dramatic at times.
Note: We try to shy away from screenshots which feature outright nudity, which made providing screenshots for this release a bit of a
challenge. Suffice it to say there is no dearth of full frontal nudity in this documentary, both female and male.
That's Sexploitation!'s LPCM 2.0 track gets the job done, providing expected fidelity in the contemporary interview and talking head segments, but encountering some difficulties overcoming age related damage to some of the archival clips, which often are hobbled by hiss, pops, clicks, and minimal distortion. I kind of wished the documentary hadn't been so intent in slathering on music over great swaths of the enterprise, some of which leads to some (slight) prioritization issues during some of the contemporary talking head segments.
It might seem odd to call a documentary like That's Sexploitation! charming, but it frequently is, at least if you're not easily offended by the sight of naked females doing a variety of at times patently odd "maneuvers" (maybe that should be man-euvers). Anyone interested in the history of stag films or "nudies" should certainly find a wealth of great information here, and the glut of clips makes this a virtual encyclopedia of one of the more curious byways in the history of film. Technical merits are fine, given the wide range of archival material involved, and the supplemental package of sexploitation films is, well, mind boggling. Recommended.
2014
2012
1974
1983
1968
1970
1978
Limited Edition of 1500
1978
1972
30th Anniversary Edition
1978
1974
1987
1989
Peekarama
1985
Gosh
1974
Peekarama Collection
1981
Slipcover Edition | Limited to 2,000
1974
1977
1975
Lust at First Bite | Dracula's Bride | Slipcover Edition Limited to 4,000
1978