Lust and the Flesh

It is hard to recommend LUST AND THE FLESH because of its stilted MOS format (hey, even Chaplin eventually started directing talkies!), but director Tony Orlando's atmospheric visuals finally won me over. The other drawback to mention upfront is its bloated running time, exceeding 80 minutes, in a genre suited to 50 or 60 minutes worth of soft porn.

The story is told in voice-over, with only a minimal amount of dubbed dialog that is crudely synched. The actors are walking around in distracted fashion (no Silent Era histrionics here), so the most obvious comparison would be with Experimental Cinema of the Maya Deren school.

Action is set on an island where a couple preys on newcomers/tourists in true swingers' fashion. It's quite downbeat and lacking in any positives, but marked by excellent Gothic photography by NYC stalwart C. Davis Smith. I haven't seen this many shots of waves crashing on the shoreline rocks even in vintage horror films.

The hero, played by one-shot Joe Perry, does most of the narration, pining away after his lost love while putting up with his slutty (but it's another one-shot, Georgetta Giles, sporting erotic Michelle Angelo-style dark nipples) wife. Several times another character Ilsa takes over the narration, ruining the film's structure but I guess no one was supposed to take such niceties seriously. Played by Marlene Eck, Ilsa makes a good impression, sort of a Lisa Marie type with, oddly enough given her profession, smaller boobs.