American Pie (1999)

A virginity losing romp in the grand tradition of Lemon Popsicle and Porkies. Unfortunately, the sequels dispense with the sweet innocence and focus on the smut.

"Say my name, bitch!"

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Best and Most Beautiful Things (2016)

A young, blind, aspie woman's search for her identity as an independent adult. Michelle sold the whole film and is open and extremely likeable.

A few things that stood out:

• After Michelle explains to a teacher why she felt patronised by her: "It's not you, it's your autism speaking". What a witch!
• The sensory-overload of the basketball game.
• The scene when Michelle tries to chat to another woman in a bar during a Pride fest, only for the woman to turn her back to her was heartbreaking!
• What a great mother and boyfriend!
• Cool socks!

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Viva (2007)

Belle de Jour crossed with Confessions of a Window Cleaner. Amazing set dressing and fake product placement.

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Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song (1971)

"We want an immediate end to POLICE BRUTALITY and MURDER of Black people." -- Black Panther manifesto (1967)

"Black Lives Matter affirms the lives of Black queer and trans folks, disabled folks, black-undocumented folks, folks with records, women and all Black lives along the gender spectrum. It centers those that have been marginalized within Black liberation movements. It is a tactic to (re)build the Black liberation movement." -- Black Lives Matter (2015)

Messy, egotistical, uncomfortable, meandering, funny, brave, chaotic, experimental, brutal, raw, guerilla, ground-breaking, important and with an Earth, Wind and Fire (written by Van Peebles himself) jazz-funk score that is fucking amazing!

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Prey (1978)

Totally worth it just for Sally Faulkner's portrayal of Jo the hysterically deranged, man-hating, vegetarian lesbian. Notable scenes? Where they dress the alien up in a women's dress and makeup and then play hide and seek. When Jo goes fucking batshit over some dead chickens. The very strange, slo-mo, fight in the muddy, swan pond. The final sex and death scene.

I liked this even more than Warren's later film, Inseminoid.

Letterboxd Review

Vampyros Lesbos (1971)

This review is for the Severin Blu-Ray (UK edition) with German soundtrack and English subtitles in the film's native ration of 1.66:1, which leaves narrow black bars at the sides of the picture.

Vampyros Lesbos starts with a sexy, trippy striptease with the beautiful Soledad Miranda (playing Countess Nadine Carody) writhing away to an organ (fnarr, fnarr), whilst Linda (Ewa Strömberg) and her boyfriend Omar (Andrés Monales complete with "Just for Men" styled hair) ogle from a table. With her hallucinatory dance act the Countess places Linda under a spell and, in the following days, haunts her dreams. Sexy, vampyric shenanigans ensue.

The bones of the Dracula story are tucked away under layers of sex and psychedelia. Linda meets with the Countess to discuss a property left to her in a will rather than the purchase of a house in the novel. She hires a boat to get to the Countess' island instead of a coach to the castle. Then we have the haunting of dreams, the locals warning Linda not to visit the island, a Renfield type character, Linda Westinghouse instead of Lucy Westenra and Doctor Seward (who is a bit of a dick). You get the idea. I think Franco must have been reading the, admittedly pretty dry, book and thought "hey, it's the 1970! Let's sex this up! Nicole, bring me my mescaline".

The relationship between Linda and the Countess is not based on any form of hypnosis but is the result of Linda's frustrated love-life and the Countess' need for more than just blind obedience. Watch the first bedroom encounter between the pair and note that Linda's expression is not of someone under control but that of someone who is nervous and excited. The scene is very similar to a famous scene in the uncut Hammer Dracula (1958). in fact the control in this film tends to come from the male characters, although there are the  Countess' previous victims to consider, who are reduced to dolls in the strip scenes. The Countess later admits her love for Linda when she says "But then I met Linda. Now I'm under her spell". If it wasn't for the gratuitous tits-and-ass I'd never call Vampyros Lesbos an exploitation film and most definitely not a horror film. This is as much a love story as Lady Chatterley's Lover!

The photography is beautiful with deep landscape shots cutting to macro shots of insects. Sure we get loads of zoom shots, but would it be a Jess Franco film without them? The colours are vivid; full of bright reds, deep blues and burnt oranges. They really give the film a Mediterranean feel. Where most vampire films use black as the predominate colour and red as a highlight, Franco reverses this and black is used sparingly, but when used it stands out wonderfully. There are a few shots that are really out of focus but these are few and far between and seem to be the fault of the focus-puller during Franco's frequent zooms.

The soundtrack? It's like distant conversations picked up by a ham radio enthusiast, looped, distorted and played back alongside some R&B/jazz Hammond organ and trippy sitar. Not just one of the classic exploitation soundtracks but one of the greatest film soundtracks of the 1970s.

The performances are, on the whole, excellent and above Franco usual standard. Miranda is great; at times fragile and then cold and aloof, whilst Carody (as Linda) is suitably naive and insecure at the start but slowly develops into a strong assertive woman. Michael Berling is excellent as the patriarchal and controlling Seward.

For gorehounds there is very little blood in Vampyros Lesbos and for those wanting tits-and-ass, there's frequent boobs and bush, one sub-softcore moment and a couple of very nice stripteases - the second being quite brilliant as the Countess slowly removes her clothes and dresses her living doll in them. Just don't watch the film expecting a Jess Franco sex frenzy.

The quality of the picture is very good with strong colours that pop off the screen without being over-saturated. The sound is clear and without noticeable hiss and the subtitles seem accurate.

A story of control versus love and sexual liberation. Seductive, sexy, beautiful and quite brilliant.

"The Queen of the Night will bear you up on her black wings"

Letterboxd Review

Sense8: Season 1 (2015)

Odd statistical anomaly:  Andy Wachowski, as well as sharing my name is exactly one day younger than me!

Sense8, a dodgy title that reminds me a little too much of the abundance of i's, e's, and x's in product names a few years back. I just don't like the substitution of numbers and letters for another letter; just call it Sensate. I suppose it could be worse, it could be "iSense8 eXtreme"!

So what's it about? A group of eight unconnected people become linked; sharing each other's thoughts, emotions and skills. Is this the next step in humankind's evolution and who is the shady organisation tracking them down? Sense8 was created, directed and written by the Wachowskis (The Matrix, Cloud Atlas) and J. Michael Straczynski (Babylon 5).

The first few episodes are quite bitty, which, I guess, can't be helped when introducing eight characters from eight different countries. That's fine though as all the background detail is intricate and you really start to become involved in their lives. You can tell it's all leading somewhere but you're not entirely sure where and knowing J. Michael Straczynski's penchant for huge sprawling story arcs you know it's going to be an interesting journey. The episodes are quite slowly paced with occasional action set-pieces to get your juices flowing. There is no rush, and that makes a real change these days when programmes seem to be continually scared of being cancelled and throw blood and John Woo style gun battles at you like there's no tomorrow. Don't get me wrong though, there are some stunning foreign location fight scenes, gun play and car chases in this otherwise character-lead sci-fi drama.

The main characters are well fleshed out and likeable. Some of them have obviously useful talents (shooting, unarmed combat, lock-picking, hacking), but others may not be quite as obvious. The "bleed-through" from one character's life to another's is really well handled and leads to some interesting crossovers. There is a considerable LGBT slant to some of the characters, in particular a transgender relationship allowing Lana Wachowski the means to address the media and public reaction to her transition. This is not at all preachy and intrusive, but welcome and very moving.

This brings me on to the, ahem, sexual content. Sense8 is highly sexual - there are dildos, masturbation, straight and gay sex. Also, because of the shared conciousness, it also brings up some interesting ideas about gender fluidity. Sense8 is admirable for the normalising of gay sex and intimacy.

Sense8 has themes of identity, empathy, gender, sexuality, trust, and personal and species evolution. there are touches of The Matrix; shared conciousness; dreams as reality; reality is an illusion; solipsism; simulation hypothesis, but if there is one overall theme it is that we are all flawed and it's our friends, our partners, our lovers that seal over the cracks and make us whole.

Some technicalities are glossed over, for example, how can a person who is two places at the same time, move in both places, which have different dimensions and layouts, without bumping into things. I guess this is what suspension of disbelief is for - just go with it and don't over-analyse the science; this is more about the "why" and not the "how".

The first season finishes with a terrific, action packed finale where every character has a part to play. The plot may have been a little obvious and contrived but I didn't give a shit. A fun end to a really interesting gender/identity drama. Good on ya Lana and I really hope Netflix picks this up for a second season.

Plus any programme that quotes Conan the Barbarian has got to be good!

"Conan! What is best in life?"
"Crush your enemies. See them driven before you. Hear the lamentations of their women."

Thriller: A Cruel Picture (1974)

Uncut, Synapse DVD

Young Frigga is molested as a young girl and rendered mute as a result. Later, as a teen, she is groomed, hooked on heroin, pimped and repeated raped and abused. She trains in marksmanship, unarmed combat and driving and then seeks revenge on her pimp and his clients.

Christina Lundberg as Frigga is just brilliant; just as cool as fuck. Starting as vulnerable and shy, then rebelling against her situation, then slowly becoming a puppet-like addict beaten into submission, then slowly bulding in confidence, until she become a killing machine intent on revenge and escape. You know those movies where you want to be the hero, well I wanted to be Lundberg's character. There is something mythic about Frigga, the black coat, the eye patch; a real angel of death. It can't be coincidence that her name is from the goddess Frigg, wife of Odin One-Eye.

Even though the sex scenes were added to appeal to the then new pornography trade in Scandinavia they are handled very well and you are distanced by the clinical way it is filmed. Instead of titillation you feel incredibly uncomfortable, and if you find that of these scenes turn you on, you're a very strange person indeed. Do they add anything? I think that they do, although they do make the film a little long.

The slo-mo kills were pretty good, although quite tame considering the extreme nature of the rest of the film. Still good though. The film contains a real a-z of British 70s cars: Capri, Granada and even a Escort Mk1 (my first car) Mexico. The soundtrack is great, full of phasing, oscillations, reverb and loops. There is, on occasion, some absolutely stunning camera-work.

The picture on this Synapse DVD was great. They kept a lot of the grain, dirt, scratches and burn marks whilst still making it watchable. The term "Grindhouse Classic" was invented for films like this.

Horrible, unflinching, nasty, cruel, depressing and brilliant.

Original letterboxd review

Nymphomaniac: Vol. I (2013)

Nymphomaniac: Volume One is a hard film to pin down. Superficially it's about a woman addicted to sex but delving beneath the surface opens a whole world of symbolism, metaphor and allusion. I don't think I can accurately review the film until I see Part Two, but here's a few of the ideas I pieced together from Part 1.

Loneliness:

• A Fibonacci number can only be created by the sum of the previous two numbers - it cannot exist on its own.
• Polyphonic music cannot be created by just one sound.

Control:

• She cannot control the world around her so she controls using her body and sex.
• By doing this she gradually loses the one thing she can control to addiction.

She is seeking completeness and this is embodied in the final act by three lovers, components or voices:

• Selflessness
• Submission
• Love

By the time she works out the formula she finds herself unfeeling and incapable of love.

Original letterboxd review