 There's nothing quite as awe inspiring as an ocean view. 
This is one of the more eye-catching posters you'll see. It was made for the Japanese film Waka-goke ama: Uzuku. The movie's English title is supposedly—ready for this?—Nympho Diver: Tingling. Well, we're tingling a bit already. Junko Mabuki gets top billing here, but that's actually Rumi Sasaki adorning the poster because Nikkatsu never passed up a chance to put a naked woman on its promo art. The same has been said of our website, so we aren't criticizing. In any case, this is obviously another film centered around an ama—a female diver for pearls, abalone, and other aquatic treats. In this one you have a widowed ama who gets involved in kinky business in a seaside town. These movies are basically all the same, so we don't have to get into great detail—although we'll note there's a bizarre scene where Junko puts peanut butter on her body and has a dog lick it off. We know—it sounds utterly obscene. Really, there's very little Japanese filmmakers didn't try at some point or another, but always remember that though the plot devices in these may be crazy, the sexual content is never more explicit than your basic late night cable movie. Sorry to disappoint any dog lovers out there. Waka-goke ama: Uzuku premiered in Japan today in 1980 
 Lovely day for a swim, don’t you think? 
Above is a poster for the Japanese comedy Shikijô ama: Fundoshi matsuri, which in English is known as Nympho Diver: G-String Festival. Yes, that’s right—Nympho Diver: G-String Festival. With a title that descriptive, it would be a disappointment if there weren’t nympho divers and a g-string festival, but the movie actually delivers what it preposterously seems to promise. It all comes about when the men of a backwater fishing village recruit five young women to serve as “amas,” which are basically topless divers that forage for pearls or abalone. The main goal is to attract tourists to the village, but if the locals’ bland sex lives receive a boost, well, that’s fine too. The girls dutifully arrive     and commence their diving chores, but the expected hordes of tourists fail to materialize, whereupon one diver reads about an ancient g-string festival. The village fathers decide that such an event is just what’s needed to get the word out, and so there you have it—nympho divers and a g-string festival. Shikijô ama: Fundoshi matsuri is packed with sex, albeit of the clumsy, boob groping, simulated type, but of course Japanese movies couldn’t show pubic hair back then, so everything had to be achieved with camera angles and physical acting. The script actually takes a moment to acknowledge this during a scene in which one diver cavorts about nude except for her hand covering her privates. As she bounces around the room, her panicked minder cries, “Stop! They haven’t lifted the ban on pubic hair yet!” Nicely done, that. The film has other, similarly clever moments, but its comic aspects derive primarily from the fact that nearly all the men of the village are goofy, middle-aged schlubs, which gives the sexual proceedings a slapstick air. We’re not big fans of badly       simulated sex or slapstick comedy, but that doesn’t mean Nympho Diver doesn’t work. It’s good-natured, moves fast, has an interesting romantic subplot, and what can’t be disputed is that lovely star Eri Anzai goes about her role with wit, vivacity and very little clothing, as you see in the below promo shots of her and co-stars Maria Mari and Kazuyo Ezaki. So, is the g-string festival a success? Does it draw those coveted tourists and their yen? You’ll just have to watch and find out for yourself. Shikijô ama: Fundoshi matsuri premiered today in 1981. Today also seems like a good opportunity to mention that we have another little sabbatical coming up here up at Pulp Intl. as we head to the Greek Isles for about ten days. We don’t know if Greece will look anything like the g-string festival, but if it does, that won’t be bad, right? The Pulp girlfriends are coming too, since after Morocco they vowed never to let us out of their sight again. Can’t really blame them. Usually, when we go traveling we hope to find some pulp—this time we’re not even going to promise to search. However, rather than let the website go idle, we’ve pre-written a few things, so keep dropping by to see some great cover collections and a rare surprise involving Bettie Page.   
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The headlines that mattered yesteryear.
1968—Andy Warhol Is Shot
Valerie Solanas, feminist author of an anti-male tract she called the S.C.U.M. Manifesto (Society for Cutting Up Men), attempts to assassinate artist Andy Warhol by shooting him with a handgun. Warhol survives but suffers health problems for the rest of his life. Solanas serves three years in prison and eventually dies of emphysema at San Francisco's Bristol Hotel in 1988.
1941—Lou Gehrig Dies
New York Yankees baseball player Henry Louis Gehrig, aka The Iron Horse, who set a record for playing in 2,130 consecutive games over the course of fourteen seasons, dies of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig's disease, two years after the onset of the illness ended his consecutive games streak. 1946—Antonescu Is Executed
Ion Antonescu, who was ruler of Romania during World War II, and whose policies were independently responsible for the deaths of as many as 400,000 Bessarabian, Ukrainian and Romanian Jews, as well as countless Romani Romanians, is executed by means of firing squad at Fort Jilava prison just outside Bucharest.
1959—Sax Rohmer Dies
Prolific British pulp writer Arthur Henry Sarsfield Ward, aka Sax Rohmer, who created the popular character Fu Manchu and became one of the most highly paid authors of his time writing fundamentally racist fiction about the "yellow peril" and what he blithely called "rampant criminality among the Chinese", dies of avian flu in White Plains, New York.
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