| Vintage Pulp | Mar 26 2020 |
Caroselli chooses wisely for Italian book cover.
Inspiration is everything. Always draw from the best. Italian artist Benedetto Caroselli used a photo of svelte Austrian model Susan Denberg, aka Dietlinde Zechner, for this cover of Sonnie Hale's La donna bianca. That would translate as “the white woman,” but we think of her as the right woman. So did Playboy magazine, which made her its August 1968 Playmate of the Month. We doubt Denberg ever knew she was on this paperback, but we imagine she'd have been pleased with the result. It appeared in 1967 from Grandi Edizioni Internazionali as part of their I Romanzi Diabolici series. See plenty more from Caroselli, including other pieces he painted for this particular book series, by clicking his keywords just below.
ItalyAustriaGrandi Edizioni InternazionaliPlayboySonnie HaleBenedetto CaroselliSusan DenbergDietlinde Zechnercover artliteraturenudity
| Femmes Fatales | Mar 23 2020 |
If heaven were like this it would get crowded mighty fast.
We don't believe in angels, but if we did this is pretty much what we'd want them to look like. This photo shows heavenly adult film actress Shauna Grant, who, like several other ’70s and ’80s adult film actresses, we've featured before. One reason we do it is because we see a line that extends from pulp all the way into porn via the former's focus on sex. Though authors were not generally able to write explicitly about it at the time, sexual gratification was the prime motivator for many pulp characters. You also see it where pulp intersects film noir, but serious legal risk prevented filmmakers of the ’40s and ’50s from exploring the themes deeply. The pulp influenced literature of the ’50s, and the films of the ’60s pushed the envelope more, but were still constrained by censors.
Around the time Grant was making her debut in porn in 1982, directors en masse were beginning to rework pulp and film classics into thrillers with sex centrally placed. 1981's Body Heat and The Postman Always Rings Twice, 1982's I, the Jury and Cat People, 1984's Against All Odds, and 1987's No Way Out, are just a few examples. The trend continued through 1990's The Grifters, 1994's The Getaway, and beyond, with all these films making clear what was only hinted in source material dating back to the 1930s, ’40s and ’50s—guys will go to almost any length for sex. For real world proof of that, scroll down to yesterday's Barcelona orgy story.
But usually it isn't just sex that gets fictional males in trouble—it's amazing sex. If it were just vanilla sex they wouldn't lie, cheat, steal, and murder. No, it's sex that blew their fuses. So that thread weaves neatly into porn, because porn was designed to implant concepts of sex that average people had never experienced—even if the experiences shown were not reality, but something more like performance art. Grant was one of the art's most popular practitioners. And she fits with our ideas about pulp for another reason too—she's freighted with pulp-like tragedy due to dying early via suicide today in 1984, two days after shooting herself in the head. We have a couple of other Grant items that might interest you, here and here.
| Intl. Notebook | Mar 19 2020 |
Got the coronavirus blues? We've got just the medicine.
How are you doing out there? We realize some of you aren't quarantined—yet—but give it time. Here at the Pulp Intl. metroplex we've been on lockdown for a while, and we've been spending most of that time in our cavernous wine cellar. Which reminded us we had this old French postcard sitting around that depicts almost exactly what daily life looks like for us now. We don't have a copyright on this item, but we can look at it and guess it's from the mid-1970s. We can't identify the model, but who cares? The point is that big-ass cask of vin de Bordeaux behind her. What we wouldn't give for one of those right now. Not that we're likely to run out of wine. That's the first thing we stocked up on. But it never hurts to have more.
This would be an excellent moment in time for Muddy Waters or maybe even Johnny Cash to rush release a single called the Coronavirus Blues, but alas they're not around. Second choice? Maybe Pulp Intl. We find ourselves with extra time, so we'll be ramping up the frequency of our posts, to make it an even better time eater. Also, we've prided ourselves on always coming up with new content and never reusing what we wrote before, but for a limited time only we're going to repost some of our favorite entries from Pulp history. If you've visited the site often but never wanted to dig through our more than five-thousand individual entries, here's your shot to see some of that old material. Our Pulp Intl. retrospective starts today. We'll position the reused entries beneath our new posts.
| Intl. Notebook | Mar 15 2020 |
Star light, star bright, first star that really, really wants it tonight.
German actress and glamour model Christiane Schmidtmer claims on the cover of this Midnight published today in 1965 that she'll do anything to be a star. Back then, that was music to unscrupulous producers' ears. Today, producers that cross the professional line would run a serious risk of going to jail. Did Schmidtmer ever actually say this? There's no way to know for sure, but with Midnight you can reasonably suspect that its quotes are fabricated to thrill its preponderantly male readership. As we've mentioned numerous times before, this was its m.o.—the provocative cover quote paired with a slinky handout photo, and an interior article bought cheap off a freelance writer who had managed to carve out ten minutes with an actress during a film junket.
So how did Schmidtmer's career go? The quote requires we ask. Well, she appeared in about a dozen motion pictures and about the same number of parts on television, and she played, among other roles, a passenger in 1963's Stop Train 349, a flight attendant in 1965's Boeing, Boeing, a passenger (named Lizzi Spoekenkieker) in 1965's Ship of Fools, and another passenger in Airport ’75—which weirdly came out in 1974. Unlike in astronomy, in cinema you sometimes have to define the term star for yourself, and we judge that she didn't quite make it, though it's an accomplishment of sorts to play roles in or on all the major forms of commercial conveyance—trains, planes and boats. But even if she never attained real stardom, she dazzles below, and we'll probably see her again a little later because: Lizzi Spoekenkieker. How can we resist?
GermanyMidnightStop Train 349Boeing BoeingShip of FoolsAirport ’75Christiane Schmidtmertabloidnudity
| Femmes Fatales | Mar 13 2020 |
She surfed a wave that lasted four decades.
The wonderful surfing themed photo you see here shows Japanese actress, model, and singer Maria Anzai, who debuted in show business in 1973, and that year won the Japan Record Grand Prize Newcomer Award. As an actress she appeared in a handful of television shows and two movies, one of which was Rupan Sansei: Nenriki chin sakusen, which in English had the amazing title Lupin the Third: Strange Psychokinetic Strategy.
Obviously with such a slight filmography, the wave we suggest she caught isn't her film career. Nor are we referencing her music work, though she was quite popular for awhile. That leaves only her modeling. Anzai, like luminaries such as Rita Moreno and Helen Mirren, looked amazing until a very late age. The photo above appeared in 1975, when she was twenty-two, but below you see her aged fifty-plus, in two shots published in a photo book devoted entirely to her called Dear M.
The cover text says something like, “The legendary diva also had a legendary body.” We should say so. Even if you factor in a little photo retouching she looks great. She even outlasted Japan's 1970s-era censorship of pubic hair and was able to go full frontal in the new millennium. But where her beauty genes were excellent, other genes may not have been—she died only two years after Dear M. was released, victim of a heart attack. You can see another image of her next-to-last in this group of magazine covers we posted several years back.
JapanRupan Sansei: Nenriki chin sakusenLupin the Third: Strange Psychokinetic StrategyDear M.Maria Anzai安西マリアtelevisionnudity
| Vintage Pulp | Feb 20 2020 |
Age is just a number—except when it comes to vintage memorabilia.
Often when a vendor sells Technicolor lithographs online they just make up a copyright date. Older is obviously considered better, so there's a strong incentive to lie. For instance the lithograph above, entitled “Fun Loving,” was listed as being from 1956. Since there's no easy way for potential buyers to confirm the age of these things, that's a nice, safe date. Old enough to be collectible, but not so old someone can immediately see that the model can't possibly be from that era. But sometimes these obscure models are actually identifiable, and in this case the woman pictured is without doubt Australian model Deanna Soutar, who we just saw a few months ago inside a 1971 Police Gazette. If this litho were really from 1956, Soutar would be six years old in the photo, which she clearly is not. She began modeling around 1970 when she was twenty, so we can safely say this particular litho dates from between ’70 and ’72. If you visit our website a lot you know how hard it is to identify litho models, so we have to call today a victory.
| Vintage Pulp | Feb 10 2020 |
Lindberg gets full exposure in Japan.
This is a very interesting Japanese poster for the Swedish sexploitation flick Exponerad, which premiered in Japan today in 1972 as 露出 or Roshutsu, which both mean “exposure.” The film was known in English speaking countries as Exposed and (misleadingly) Diary of a Rape. There are some scans of this piece online, but not of this quality. We talked about the movie last year. Check here.
And as a bonus, because Exponerad is a movie that deals with daydreams, we have below all of our most dreamlike images of Lindberg. No surprise, right? If you visit our site often, you know she's a mainstay, so today we're just adding to what was already a substantial treasure trove. All of these ethereal shots are Exponerad promos, and all are striking. We have many more Lindberg rarities, and you can bank on us sharing those down the line.
| Femmes Fatales | Feb 7 2020 |
There are no small parts. Only small casting agents.
Above is a lovely shot of British actress Zoe Hendry, who we last saw in 1975's erotic epic Butterfly, and whose other credits read like a cautionary tale of cinematic ambition smashed on the rocks of rent paying reality. She's played, in no particular order, “naked college girl,” in 1974's Confessions of a Window Cleaner, “native dancer,” in 1976's Queen Kong, “topless patient,” in 1978's What's Up Nurse!, and, “other girl,” in 1974's The Man Who Couldn't Get Enough. And who can forget 1976's infamous Nastassja Kinski vehicle To the Devil a Daughter, in which Hendry played “first girl”?
Yes, it's quite a résumé Hendry accumulated, but since she originally got her break on The Benny Hill Show—which made an industry of scantily clad women—her stalwart appearances in sexploitation films are no surprise. But she eventually outflanked one-track-minded movie casting agents by shifting back to television during the 1980s, where she got a chance to act more seriously. Probably got paid better too. Still, we're irresistibly drawn to titles like Queen Kong. Maybe we have one-track minds too, but we have to watch that, right? Right. We'll do the heavy lifting so you don't have to, then report back.
Yes, it's quite a résumé Hendry accumulated, but since she originally got her break on The Benny Hill Show—which made an industry of scantily clad women—her stalwart appearances in sexploitation films are no surprise. But she eventually outflanked one-track-minded movie casting agents by shifting back to television during the 1980s, where she got a chance to act more seriously. Probably got paid better too. Still, we're irresistibly drawn to titles like Queen Kong. Maybe we have one-track minds too, but we have to watch that, right? Right. We'll do the heavy lifting so you don't have to, then report back.
BritainWhat's Up Nurse!The Man Who Couldn't Get EnoughThe Benny Hill ShowQueen KongConfessions of a Window CleanerTo the Devil a DaughterZoe HendryNastassja Kinskitelevisionnudity
| Modern Pulp | Jan 27 2020 |
Welcome to Wilson's house of pain and leather.
American actress Ajita Wilson was born in Brooklyn but became a big star in Italian sexploitation and porn movies. She was transsexual, having been born George Wilson, but opting for gender reassignment in the mid-1970s. She launched her career in New York City, making a name for herself in the red light district of the era, which back then was centered around Times Square, these days aka Disneyland east. Not long after she launched her adult career she was seen by a European producer and offered a chance to work across the pond in historic Rome. She jumped at the chance.
Wilson appeared in close to fifty movies, starting with 1976's The Nude Princess. In Perverse oltre le sbarre, which is known in the U.S. as Hell Behind Bars, she plays a killer and jewel thief named Conchita who gets tossed in the prigione and has to negotiate the usual women-in-prison staples—corruption, violence, lesbianism, and a sadistic warden. Oh, and let's not forget screechy girl fights, and sexual harassment showers. Did we leave anything out? Ah, cavity searches. Can't forget those. Torture by high voltage shock. Illicit drugs. Karate chopping double-crossers. Breathy sexploitation soundtrack. Maybe that doesn't count, though, because the prisoners theoretically can't hear it.
Yes, this prison Ajita ends up in is pretty bad, but it could be worse—at least the warden lets the women wear lingerie. Rita Silva and Linda Jones co-star in what becomes a standard WIP escape drama, and of course the escape is more fraught than anyone expected. As prison sexploitation Perverse oltre le sbarre is the same as most others, with the exception that the budget is obviously lower. With nearly fifty films to her credit Wilson almost certainly made something better. We'll take a look and see if we can find which efforts those might be, and you'd be advised to do the same and skip this one. We'll see Wilson again, though. Perverse oltre le sbarre opened in Italy today in 1984.
ItalyBrooklynPerverse oltre le sbarreHell Behind BarsThe Nude PrincessAjita WilsonRita SilvaLinda Jonesposter artcinemasexploitationnuditylgbtmovie review
| Vintage Pulp | Jan 12 2020 |
It took nearly two weeks, but she finally finished that New Year's champagne.
Is it just us or is the woman in this Technicolor lithograph sitting on a giant Champagne cork? Well, it certainly looks like a cork. She was a popular lithograph model of the 1950s—a fact we know because we've seen her on at least four different posters—but sadly we can't identify her. So we're throwing it to the readers. Know who she is? Drop us a line.
