We just finished watching L’ultimo giorno di lavoro di una prositituta, and it’s pretty much exactly what the title says—the last day in the job of a prostitute. Lovely Dagmar, played by Diana Kjær, is a hooker in Copenhagen and has decided to quit the rackets and escape to Stockholm. We follow her during her last day as she sees various clients, co-workers, friends and relatives, and also gets slapped around by her pimp. This movie is really bad—it’s poorly acted, poorly produced, and poorly written. In parts, it’s unintentionally funny, but the deliberate attempts at comedy fall flat. Stereotypes abound: you get a couple of Japanese guys with bowl cuts who say “Ah so,” and know karate, a Russian diplomat who’s always drunk on vodka, a mustachioed Italian guy who air-conducts classical music, and a hippie who’s trying to be a rock star and needs money to get his girlfriend an abortion. While we didn’t enjoy the movie, it’s worth noting that the radiant Anne Grete Nissen appears in a minor role, and we absolutely love the rare Italian poster you see above. L’ultimo giorno di lavoro di una prositituta, aka Dagmars Heta Trosor, aka Dagmar’s Hot Pants, Inc., premiered in Italy today in 1971. 

Above we have two striking Italian one-sheets for the French porn production La fille à la fourrure, aka I porno zombi, aka Naked Lovers, aka The Girl in the Fur Coat, aka Starship Eros, released in 1977. That’s a lot of akas, but the plot here is really simple. Aliens from planet Eros come to Earth and re-animate the bodies of the recently deceased in order to do some kinky sexual experimentation with humans. We find all this out when two newlyweds honeymooning at a secluded cabin are rudely interrupted by the groom’s former wife, who’s supposed to be six feet under. He chases her into the woods, discovers she’s actually a resurrected corpse and, well, cue the synthesizer music. As a side note, you may have noticed that the posters list an actress named Barbara Moose. With a name like that, we knew you’d want to know more, so we located a shot of the elusive Moose in her snowy habitat. These creatures can tip the scales at up to 1,400 pounds, but strangely, this one looks like it weighs less than a tenth that amount. Probably climate change has endangered her food supply. So next time you start up your SUV remember this sad photo and recognize—we’ve got to learn to share the planet. 

If there’s one indisputably true statement about Japanese cinema, it’s this: they will try anything. 1974’s Hana to hebi, aka Flower and Snake, is a bondage comedy based on a novel by Oniroku Dan, who specialized in S&M fiction. For the screen version, Nikkatsu Studios recruited reliable sexploitation queen Naomi Tani, who had already appeared in a previous version of the same film entitled Hana to hebi yori: niku no shiiku, aka Flower and Snake: Rearing the Flesh. Where that version was a mere pinku film, this new version would be a Roman porno—which simply meant Nikkatsu would spend more money in an effort to elevate the genre into something mainstream Japanese would accept. In the film, Tani plays an aristocratic wife who asks for a divorce but instead is forced into bondage and submission by a man hired for the task by her husband. She experiences a sexual awakening, the employee forms an emotional bond, and complications ensue from there. We haven’t read the novel, but apparently it’s very different from the film and its adaptation was a source of friction between studio and author. But it didn’t matter—Hana to hebi was a smash. It was the first of Nikkatsu’s many Roman porno flicks, and the first of what would become a Hana to hebi franchise. It premiered in Japan today in 1974. 

Less than five minutes into Yasagure anego den: sôkatsu rinchi, aka Female Yakuza Tale: Inquisition and Torture, Reiko Ike is already hanging nude by her wrists being, well, queried and tortured. But as the poster makes clear, her tormentors pay for their indiscretions at the point of her sword. The plot here concerns Reiko being framed for a crotch-gouge murder (self-explanatory, no?), and the featured set pieces include one in which a man throws bullets almost as effectively as if he’d shot them from a gun, and another in which a gang of about thirty nude women get into a melee against various hapless Yakuza. Naturally, Reiko strips down as well, once during a reprise of her nude sword fight from the classic prequel to this film, and once to prove she isn’t hiding something up her sleeve during a card game. She is hiding something, but a little misdirection goes a long way—when she whips off her kimono to expose her tattooed body she also flings the evidence away undetected. The gangster who accused her must pay with three fingers and Reiko—always a friend to other women—spares the middle one because every man needs that one to keep his girl satisfied. Yep, it’s that kind of film. Filled with slapped faces, avulsed digits, and invaded body cavities, Yasagure anego den: sôkatsu rinchi is pretty much everything we expect from pinky violence, and more. It opened in Japan today in 1973. 

Two promo posters for the Japanese pinku film Tokugawa sekkusu kinshi-rei: shikijô daimyo,  aka Tokugawa Sex Ban: Lustful Lord. Lust is certainly the operative word here. There must be fifty-seven breasts in this film. But girls, there are also close to fifty-seven cocks. See below. Tokugawa sekkusu kinshi-rei: shikijô daimyo premiered in Tokyo today in 1972. 

We’re contrarians here—warned away from something we usually jump in neck deep. That’s how we ended up eating beef tripe last week, as our friends screwed up their faces in disgust. It’s why we went to that Anthrax concert, and to this day can’t hear tones above 19 kHz. And it’s the reason we just watched 1973’s Bummer, a film so scathingly reviewed we immediately did bio checks on director, cast and crew, to make sure mobs of critics didn’t douse them all in kerosene and barbecue them on a giant pyre. The filmmakers survived, as far as we can tell, but we almost didn’t. In fact, we finished Bummer about an hour ago and our girlfriends still won’t let us near the silverware drawer unless we renounce the suicide pact we made about twenty minutes into the film.

Bummer has all the trappings of sexploitation cinema, but with none of the insouciance that makes it palatable. It’s about a rock band and their groupies on tour together, and the problems that ensue when the bassist—a hairy, obese, psychotic rube named Butts—starts to spin off his axis. Butts is too repulsive to score, so he compensates by humiliating the groupies instead (hence the film’s tagline, above, “You don’t have to assault a groupie… you just have to ask!!”). Butts’ daily abuse escalates to rape, then the strangulation of another girl, and finally to an unconvincing shooting that could only have been less believable if we’d actually seen the victim break a ketchup packet on himself to simulate blood. When finally Butts gets shotgunned by a vengeful Carol Speed his dying words are, “Why..? Why..? Why..?" Which is exactly what we’re still asking ourselves. This one is going to sting for a while. 

Vintage poster for Jitsuroku onna kanbetsusho: sei-jigoku, aka True Story of a Woman Condemned: Sex Hell, directed by Koyu Ohara and starring Hitomi Kozue. It premiered in Japan today in 1975. 

Maybe the English word “sex” is to the Japanese what the French word “soirée” is to English speakers—i.e., a foreign word that carries more meaning than its indigenous equivalent. Maybe “sex” sounds really dirty to Japanese ears. Maybe it’s just conveniently short. We don’t know the answer, but below are six one-sheets using that magical English syllable. However you say it, just do it. 

Are you getting a sense of déjà vu? Well, you’re not crazy. This does have an identical bondage theme and color palette as a poster we shared last week. The main difference is that this victim has shaved her armpits, which is good, because you always want to look your best for a torturing. The film here is Kifujin shibari tsubo, aka Noble Lady Bound Vase, and it stars Naomi Tani, who we’re going to get know real well on this site. She was Japan’s queen of bondage cinema, garnering notoriety for her roles in flicks like Wife To Be Sacrificed and Colorful Bed of Violent Desire, before retiring to become a restaurant owner. As we mentioned before, though we like pinku films, harder ones are not exactly our cup of T&A. We do realize that rope bondage is considered fine art in Japan, but as Americans—even ones who have spent years abroad—we can’t completely shake a lifetime of conditioning that makes us see something weird here. But on the other hand, we seriously doubt the Japanese can understand why we glorify violence to such an extent in American cinema. So we won’t judge them if they don’t judge us. One of the reasons we started this site was to explore how art varies from culture to culture, and so of course we’ll keep discussing these films, but we’ll also be looking seriously into the Japanese bondage arts kinbaku-bi and shibari. Hope you’re looking forward to that. Now we have to go shoot some people. Kifujin shibari tsubo opened in Japan today in 1977.

Hana to hebi: kyûkyoku nawa chôkyô was released with the English title Flower and Snake 4: Rope Magic, which is a very pretty collection of nouns for an exercise in torture porn. Fairly hard torture porn, too, probably because by the time this was made by Nikkatsu Studios, adult video was taking a major bite out of Japan’s pinku market. The plot here is simple: a gambler with debts loses his wife and daughter to the Yakuza, who proceed to humiliate the women in various fiendish ways. There’s an escape attempt that goes awry, but basically the story is just a framework for increasingly devilish forms of sexual degradation. You got your dildos. You got your hot wax. You got your urine. This is soooo not our thing. But what is our thing is the promo art, which is just lovely, even while evincing the film’s highly dubious nature. Experienced pinku fans, or those into the Japanese art of Kinbaku-bi (beautiful bondage) may dig this movie. All others proceed with caution. Hana to hebi: kyûkyoku nawa chôkyô, premiered in Japan today in 1987.