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Wednesday 24 March 2010

SEX FREEDOM IN GERMANY




Title: Sex Freedom in Germany
Genre: Documentary, colour
Language: German & English (dubbed)
Country of Origin: Germany
Format: NTSC
Cast: Sabine Clemens, Jürgen Drews, Otto Mühl, Apocalypse
Narrator: Yes, unidentified male
Camera: Hubs Hagen
Music: Apocalypse
Research Team: Peter Hajek & Joe Hembus
Film Editor: Jutta Brandstaedter

Film Director & Producer: Dieter Geissler (b. 1939- )
Region: 1

No. of Discs: 1
Classification: X rating (MPAA)
Film Year: 1969
DVD Year: 2004
Running Time: 1:19:00
Product Code: 3575
Entry No.: 2009008
Entry Date: 6th July 2009

FILM DESCRIPTION
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This German documentary was shot in 1970 but didn't see the light of U.S. projectors until three years later. Fitting, then, it would get released by a company called Sunset International; by 1973, the sun had clearly set on this type of exploitation movie. It didn't matter that the MPAA (¹) slapped it with an X rating (²); the phenomenal success of Deep Throat one year earlier spelled the end for this particular variety of soft sexploitation. It's a shame, because if the very funny and entertaining Sex Freedom in Germany is any indication, the flame under this subgenre was turned off just as things were really beginning to cook.


“What happened to the good old-fashioned German morals?” a narrator asks during the opening credits to the (ear) strains of good old-fashioned krautrock. “No other country in the world goes about their enlightenment on sex so religiously, and dogmatically, amd thoroughly as the Germans!” the narrator boasts, as we slide into a quick look at the career of porn filmmaker OSWALT KOLLE (³), maker of such enlightening films such as Sexual Partnership and Your Husband, The Unknown Creature. Following this is a segment on Beate Uhse, a popular chain store in Germany which appears to be a combination Barnes & Noble and 42nd-Street-style porno palace.


A trip to the prophylactic factory yields big laughs as poorly-dubbed people in white lab coats talk about the new “Anti-Baby Condom,” while a technician inflates a sample until it's practically the size of the Underdog float in the Macy's Thanksgiving parade. We then travel to a small village in the Bavarian Alps where a hornely married couple perform naked “free jazz” every night in a local pub –with the wife sometimes covered head to toe in black paint! – for the understandably confused locals. Moving on, there's an amusing Christmas Eve visit to a sex commune where, we're told, filming was allowed only after members were provided with “150 liters of liquid green gelatin for their carnal bath.” Naturally, an orgy and impromptu bongo party ensues.


Other highlights include Swedish psychologists DR. EBERHARD and DR. PHYLLIS KRONHAUSEN () who discuss their erotic art exhibition; an interview with a representative of the German Sex Democrats (“We want to bring the entire foreign policy under the auspices and the influence of sex!”); a defrocked priest with homosexual and pedophilic tendencies who counsels young male hustlers; a lesbian couple (“Men are not revolting to me, as long as they leave me alone!”); a whip cracking stripper named Gerta; a transexual barmaid; a performance by the rock band APOCALYPSE; and a loquacious British gigolo who caters to rich, neglected German wives (and apparently saw Alfie too many times for his own good).


And just in case you need to clear a room in a hurry, there's an outrageous piece of performance art by painter OTTO MÜHL () that must be seen to be (dis)believed. (Oh, how I wish I could've been in the MPAA screening room when that scene was shown!)
Chris Poggiali



NOTES
(¹) Motion Picture Association of America
(²) X rating = no one under 17 admitted

(³) Dr. Eberhard Kronhausen (1915- ), Swedish-American psychologist and writer, and Dr. Phyllis Kronhausen (1929- ), Swedish-American psychologist and writer; both exponents of the Sexual Revolution in the 1960s
() Oswalt Kolle (1928- ), German sex educator and producer of films in the 1960s. His explicit films belonged to “white-coaters” genre.
() Otto Mühl (1925- ), Austrian controversial artist



CASHBACK



Title: Cashback
Genre: Comedy, colour, anamorphic widescreen 2.35:1
Language: English
Country of Origin: United Kingdom
Location: Pinewood Studios & Sainsbury's Whitchapel, London
Format: DVD, PAL
Cast: Sean Biggerstaff, Emilia Fox, Shaun Evans, Michelle Ryan, Stuart Goodwin, Michael Dixon, Michael Lamboune, Marc Pickering, and 49 other actors
Story: Sean Ellis
Art Director: Emma Jones
Director of Photography: Angus Hudson
Music: Guy Farley
Production Designer: Morgan Kennedy
Editors: Scott Thomas & Carlos Domeque
Line Producer: Marshall Leviten
Associate Producer: Winnie Li
Executive Producers: Daphne Guinness, Vijay Thakur, Peter Hampden & Norman Merry
Director: Sean Ellis
Producer: Lene Bausager
Company: Left Turn Films
Region: 2
No. of Discs: 1
Classification: 18 (contains strong nudity and language), IRL 15+
Film Release Date: 2006 (UK 2/15/2007 at the Glasgow Film Festival), (Greece: 5/31/2007)
DVD Release Year: 2008 The Works UK Distribution Ltd
Running Time: 1:38:48 plus 27mins DVD extras

Product Code: 5050582568325
Entry No.: 2009004
Entry Date: 25th May 2009

FILM DESCRIPTION

After being dumped by his girlfriend (Michelle Ryan), art student Ben Willis (Sean Biggerstaff) develops chronic insomnia. Finding himself with too much time on his hands, Ben begins working the night shift at the local supermarket. There Ben begins to imagine he can freeze time and uses his "ability" to undress and sketch the female customers in the nude.

Ben is occasionally distracted from his fantasy by his unconventional yet hilarious co-workers, who introduce him to their inventive antics of losing time to survive the boredom of the graveyard shift, but it is quiet check-out girl Sharon (Emilia Fox) who catches his attention and she soon becomes the object of his fantasies.

Written and directed by Sean Ellis, Cashback unveils a world where reality and fantasy blur and love and beauty are realised in the most unusual places.

THE NAKED: A PSYCHOLOGICAL FILM



Polish Title: Golasy: Film Psychologiczny
English title: The Naked: A Psychological Film
Genre: Comedy & Drama
Language: Polish
Country of Origin: Poland
Special Features: English Subtitles, On/Off Biographies, Out Takes, Stills Gallery and Chapter Points (The Dog, The Bank, The Twins, The Doctor, The Kan Kan and The Knife
Format: DVD, PAL, Full-Screen 4:3
Cast (in credits order):
Anna Pudłowska, Barbara Gąsior, Agnieszka Paśko, Irena Kołodziej, Waldemar Płotek, Danuta Sokalska, Milosz Turowski, Maks Turowski, Beata Bodniak, and Tomasz Koloddziejczyk
Rest of cast (in alphabetical order):
Jerzy Grobel, Małgorzata Kąca, Jerzy Kapeluszny, Karol Lamka,
Marek Laski, Renata Michalska, and Ryszard Strzalkowski
Production Design: Justyna Wójcicka
Sound Department: Henryk Szurkowski
Sound Editor: Mariusz Szulc
Film Editor: Robert Piechnik
Executive Producers: Beata Świętnicka & Monica Dobra-Każimierczuk
Camera and Electrical Department: Wojciech Rawecki
Screenplay: Krzysztop Jaworski & Witold Świętnicki
Director: Witold Świętnicki
Producer: Fajgel Grupę ATM
Production Company: Wytwórnia Filmów Amerykańskich
Region: 2
No. of Discs: 1
Classification: 15
Film Release Date: 25th October 2002
DVD Release Date: 6th October 2008 by Oracle Home Entertainment Ltd
Running Time: 1:12:34
Product Code: 5 060000 401844
Entry No.: 2008015
Entry Date: 9th December 2008
Awards: Viewers Award Warsaw International Film Festival 2001

FILM DESCRIPTION

The Naked takes place in an office.

The main characters in the film are some clerks. All play naked, but they don’t f*** because this is a psychological film.


A clerk’s life is full of many things – gossip, tea, coffee, the radio or even TV!


But, as we all know, a clerk’s life can also be full of danger – dog bites, tinned knuckle in the staff canteen, electric shocks, ransom demands… or even an exploding office.


The Naked gives you all this… and more, providing a challenging insight into life in an office where nobody wears any clothes.

CONFETTI


Title: Confetti
Genre: Comedy, colour
Language: English
Country: United Kingdom
Location: London and Spielplatz Sun Club of St. Albans
Special Features: 3 new endings, "Confetti keeps falling" - More tears and tantrums featurettes; 4 weeks to go, 2 weeks to go, 1 week to go; English for the hearing impaired

Format: DVD, PAL, 1.85:1, Dolby

Actors: Martin Freeman, Jessica Stevenson, Stephen Mangan, Meredith MacNeill, Robert Webb, Olivia Colman, Vincent Franklin, Jason Watkins, Felicity Montagu, Jimmy Carr, Alison Steadman and 104 more
Music: Paul Englishby
Editor: Nicky Ager
Production Designer: Chris Roope
Director of Photography: Dewald Aukema
Executive Producers: David M. Thompson, Lee Thomas, Andrew Taylor, Oliver Edwards, Joe Oppenheimer

Producers: Ian Flooks & Ian Benson
Director: Debbie Isitt

Distributor: Twentieth Century Fox
Region: 2
Language: English
No. of Discs: 1
Classification: 15
Film Release Date: 5th May 2006
DVD Year: 2006 by Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment LLC
Running Time: 1:35:45

Product Code: 5 039036 027502
Entry No.: 2008016
Entry Date: 9th December 2008

FILM DESCRIPTION

When Confetti magazine decide to hold a competition for the "Most Original
Wedding of the Year", three couples with quirky themes and ideas for their special day embark on a hilarious journey toward wedded bliss. Aided by some eccentric wedding planners, relatives and friends, the couples endure nerves, knocks and nose jobs in their efforts to win the top prize.

This delightful, brilliantly funny film will have you rolling in the aisle but not marching up to it. Confetti is a fresh and feel-good Brit-comedy that is not to be missed...