Daddy Knows Best

Taboo-busting was all the rage in the early days of hardcore, and, to its credit, DADDY KNOWS BEST (aka "Family Jewels") at least leans into that trend hard. That's probably about the only (debatably) good thing you can say about it, but this storefront flotsam at least distinguishes itself early with its tastelessness.

Film is currently available in at least two versions, a smeary video one from Gourmet and a compromised film-sourced copy from Alpha Blue Archives; an even more truncated version is available from Something Weird under the title "Best Friends," but that's not worth mentioning. As far as completeness, Gourmet is the one to go with, otherwise you'll miss the entire opening scene: sisters Alice Doe and Lynn Holmes trying out a dildo on each other as a makeshift substitute for sibling Tommy, generally the one to take care of the needs of his sisters. High- or lowlight, depending on your taste for the outrageous, is the peeping-prone older sister remarking, "It makes me horny to watch my sister ball my brother."

Seeing as this clan already seems to have a far too literal interpretation of "family relations," it's unsurprising to next find the sisters getting felt up by their creepy dad (Bill Scott) at dinner, which they share with their brother, apparent super-stud Tommy (he just looks like a regular guy). He's planning to go on a hot date, but the girls stay home and retreat to bed after dad falls asleep on the couch. Once the dildo comes back out, however, he barges in, insisting they'd be much more satisfied by a real man - and he's more than happy to oblige. As the sisters protest, he reminds them he's only their stepfather, dropping a bunch of backstory about a divorce and the death of their original dad in Cuba. It's funny to see the film anticipate this modern technique of controversy-skirting, where titles abound with step-fathers and -mothers and -sisters and everything else necessary to get around state issues regarding intra-genetic contact. Nevertheless, the film's already made it explicit that all three blood siblings are sleeping together, so it's unclear what it hopes to accomplish via this weird sop toward decency.

Following the familial menage, we arrive at the film's sole point of entertainment, a minute-long dialogue sequence between the sisters of the most thuddingly leaden variety, wherein they muse about all the joys of incest and how it's far less weird to be screwing their brother than their creepy old adoptive father. After that, a bunch of friends come over, and everyone has a giant orgy in the living room (with one girl, Sibyl, pairing off with dad in the kitchen) that eats up the remaining 30 minutes of the film. A ham-fisted twist in the final seconds abruptly brings things to a close.

There's little to write home about in DADDY KNOWS BEST, aside from the tastelessness of its opening minutes. While some films of the era just arbitrarily throw in a bit of implied incest, or have characters engage in it so casually as to achieve zero impact (the ultimate impression for the audience is that the performers are just actors), DADDY does its best in its opening half to foreground the concept, featuring an entire family where everybody screws everybody. This mostly fades out in the back half, which devolves into the usual bump-and-grind of an early '70s storefront film, so pro forma it acts as a soporific. Some of the cast is reasonably attractive, but the cinematography is so "point-'n'-zoom" (albeit featuring some of the crane-and-jib movements that suggest this uncredited feature might be another James R. Haskin effort) that it renders any potential eroticism moot. As if that weren't enough, a numbing soundtrack of wall-to-wall Muzak should do even the most ardent pervert in before the hour runtime is through. Daddy may know best, but these bungling cineasts could barely manage to hack a movie together without putting the audience to sleep!