The Beautiful, the Bloody, and the Bare / Behind Locked Doors

Unnerved after a trip to Northern Italy, Pete Abbott wallows in The Beautiful, The Bloody, and the Bare when he becomes a New York nudie photographer. Trouble is, the color red sometimes so upsets him that he starts killing his models! From the director of Teenage Gang Debs, here's one of the earliest films to mix nudity with then excessive bloodshed to create what would be best called a gory-nudie-cutie. Plus: When their car is deliberately drained of gas, sexy Ann Henderson and semi-lesbian friend Terry Wilson seek help at the house of creepy ex-mortician Dr. Bradley (a dead ringer for Henry Kissinger). But once Behind Locked Doors, the girls instead become the unwilling victims of Bradley's psychotic sex research: "I am looking for the perfect love mate!" Worse, if Ann and Terry don't cooperate, they'll join the women embalmed and on display in Bradley's "memorial exhibition room!" With sordid shocks and skin, here are two psychotic sickies direct from the demented vaults of Drive-In King Harry Novak (Axe)!

Behind locked dooooooors...(creepy voice)

I got this DVD for Behind locked doors because the trailer for it made it look so cool! Creepy haunted house like movie with some hot girls and some promising lesbian action!!! I was let down however, and the movie just couldn't live up to my expectations. It is still a great grindhouse movie, but I was hoping for more. The first ten minutes is like some pot dance party. It just drags on and on. There is no lesbian action, one of the girls is a lesbian but the other isn't and that's about as far as it goes. The other sexual themes just weren't sexy for me. As a matter of fact they were just creepy. Anyway, what did I expect for a grindhouse movie!!? The trailer really made it look like it had a plot! The other feature on this movie just isn't worth mentioning, I just didn't care for it at all. If you like it that's fine with me, just not my cup of tea. If you're into this kind of movie, check out Behind locked doors, just don't have high hopes, you may end up loving it. I wish I did, instead it's about 3 stars in my book. July 30, 2007

You want naked women, this DVD has naked women

In case the titles did not make it clear, this Something Weird DVD offers up another pair of exploitation films from the 1960s, in which we combine nude women with homicidal maniacs. "The Beautiful, the Bloody, and the Bare" (1964) is the first film written and directed by Sande N. Johnsen. Leo runs an art studio where nude models pose for his students, and he takes great pains in the monotonous voiceovers to explain what makes a good model (the key is how smoothly they change positions). Then his friend Peter (Jack Jowe) shows up, fresh from bumming around Europe, and Leo helps out by letting Peter take photographs of models at the studio. But then one model paints her nails red and Peter is on his way to jumping off the deep end.

When television first started and everybody was thrilled by watching a visual medium in the comfort of their own home, one of the earliest shows was "Photographic Horizons," which showed models posing so that viewers at home could take photographs of them right off the screen. This movie reminded me of that, because for most of it there are shots of nude women posing. Then the movie remembers that there is this horror element to it and Peter ends up doing more to his models than taking their pictures. To be fair, Peter is as freaked out by the color red when it is his own blood as when it belongs to anybody else, but you have to think that it is hard to walk through New York City without seeing a lot of red, you know? The credits for this film promise some of New York's top models and you have to agree that the women you see are quite good at their craft.

"Behind Locked Doors" is a 1968 film from producer Harry H. Novak that teaches the rather strange lesson that there things that can happen to a young woman that make almost being raped in a barn seem like a good thing (I am NOT making this up: that is the morale of the story as indicated by the last scene in the film). Ann (Eve Reeves) and Terry (Joyce Danner) are at a barn somewhere in the country where young people are dancing. Ann ends up in the hayloft with this guy who tries to assault her. But then Dr. Bradley (Daniel Garth), a local "bird watcher" who has been ogling the action, intervenes with a pitchfork. When the girls head back to the city their car runs out of gas and they find themselves on Dr. Bradley's doorstep. However, it turns out that he used to be a mortician, but now he is a sex freak who is looking for the perfect playmate. You would not think he would have high standards, but all of his experiments so far have ended up posed nude for eternity in the basement. And Ann thought he was such a nice "older" man.

Obviously, if you are looking for something weird you have come to the right place with these two movies and you can decide for yourself which one fills the bill better. There are plenty of strange things to go around in both films, but "Behind Locked Doors" comes out ahead for me. After all, you have these guys pawing these gals in the hayloft, focusing entirely on getting the women topless, and then totally ignoring their breasts. Then you have Terry, who is locked into a bedroom in a house with a crazy girl who offers his visitors a choice between sex and death, and her reaction is to try and seduce Ann. Of course, the common denominator here is that what is important is what the camera gets to see and not any extraneous notions like plot or characterization. But what else is new in the wonderful world of sexploitation?

As always with Something Weird, they are lots of extras that help to make up for the shortcomings of the main features. The quartet of shorts, labeled as "Lurid stories of Lust," includes: (1) "Part Time Pin-Up," a Barry Mahon short, in which a young woman explains her part time job as a nude model, a "legitimate" job for which she makes $50 for less than two hours of work; (2) "Playgirl Models," a Manuel S. Condo short that really gets into the details of lighting models (really); (3) "Sex Workshop" is a a Nudie Cutie Short that smacks of the worst of vaudeville; and (4) "Sexercises" involves two women in a physical fitness short (not really). The Twisted Trailers include both of the feature films and another seven films including "Tender Flesh," which was originally called "Welcome to Arrow Beach" and starred Laurence Harvey in his last film and a young Meg Foster with the light blue eyes, and Mickey Rooney in "B.J. Lang." Also included are the trailers for "Color Me Blood Red," "Blood Bath," "Pets," "The Sinful Dwarf," and "The Captive Female." Finally, we have a Gallery of Harry Novak Exploitation Art with Soundtrack Greatest Hits and a Gallery of Harry Novak Exploitation Photography. August 6, 2005

Mixed Bag

It's hard to go wrong with the Something Weird line of DVDs. They cram so much material onto one DVD that it's a bargain by any standards. This one is a decided mixed bag. I bought it primarily for the "Behind Locked Doors" feature. I discovered this movie accidently in 1989 when a video store owner I knew was selling the videotape off at a discount price. I had never heard of the movie before, but I loved it. Completely zany, illogical, and bizarre. The acting is abysmal, the plot absurd...and yet, despite such deficiencies, it still manages to exert a quirky, even hypnotic spell all its own. Apparently filmed somewhere in upstate NY during the mid or late 1960's, I find myself wondering as I watch it compulsively yet again- is that house still standing? Are these actors still alive and, if so, what are they doing now? Do they ever acknowledge that they appeared in this? Is that field still in existence or is it a housing development by now? As for the 1st movie...the less said, the better. But, in spite of my own better judgement, here goes...It also suffers from horrible, wooden acting, writing, directing, etc., but its most egregious failing, its most unpardonable sin, is that it's BORING! It doesn't have the wacky, redemptive qualities of an Ed Wood script or the cartoonish violence of a Hershell Gordon Lewis to stave off total numbness or actors so flagrantly awful that they're fascinating to watch in spite of themselves. Even the plentiful nudity doesn't work. Indeed, I think it might prove soporific even to a 14-year old boy entering the heat of adoloscence. In fact, outside of a few scenes filmed on NY streets circa 1964, there's absolutely nothing to recommend about this film. So, buy the DVD for "Behind Locked Doors" and the added features. Like I said, you really can't go wrong with the Something Weird line. If one thing doesn't grab you, something else will. September 20, 2004

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