Le hostess

Die Stewardessen (1971)

*** (out of 4)

Entertaining, if rather unintelligent, "report" film that shows what stewardesses do whenever their flights land and they're stuck in a city overnight. For this film, various stewardesses fly from New York to a variety of European locations where they enjoy various sexual encounters.

This Erwin C. Dietrich film is known under a variety of titles including STEWARDESSES REPORT but no matter what you call it, if you're willing to watch it then it's not going to be for the story. No, if you're willing to watch one of these Dietrich titles then you're expecting a lot of beautiful women in a variety of sex scenes and of course you want them totally naked, which is exactly what you get here.

You can say what you want about Dietrich but there's no question that he knew what his target audiance wanted and more times than not he delivered just that an even more. He might not have been a great filmmaker but as an exploitation pioneer he deserves every bit of credit that he has gotten over the past few decades. DIE STEWARDESSEN features the likes of Ingrid Steeger, Ursula Marty, Margrit Siegel and Evelyne Traeger all of the ladies act out the various fantasy scenes that are shown here.

Obviously the ladies weren't asked to give heartfelt performances but rather just be fun, easy and of course nude. That's all this film tried to accomplish and I found it to be quit entertaining because of the sleaze factor but also because the ladies were so charming, good-spirited and just downright fun. This type of picture is certainly a "male fantasy" picture and there's enough entertainment here to make it worth watching.

This is basically like a German "sex report" film in that, rather than being a single plot-line, it is actually a series of vignettes showing the active (VERY active) sex lives of international airline stewardesses. Of course, it eschews the ridiculous "person-on-the-street" interviews of some of the other "report" films and it doesn't even really have a central frame story tying all the random scenes together. You might also feel a little less like a pervert watching it since it is about adult airline stewardesses rather than schoolgirls like some of the other films (even though pretty much the same group sexy German and Scandavian actresses were in ALL these German "report" films). I should also mention these are early 1970's airline stewardesses (a movie about the sex lives of some of the ill-tempered beasts that work as "flight attendants" today might be better classified as a horror movie).

This movie was directed by Swiss sleazemeister Erwin Dietrich and features the uber-sexy Ingrid Steeger as perhaps the most recognizable actress in the opening vignette. (She meets an older guy on a plane, shags him rotten, and THEN gives him a tour of the city). Like Dietrich and Steeger's earlier collaboration "I, a Groupie" this is kind of a sexy travelogue with (the exteriors at least) filmed in world cities like Munich, Copenhagen, and New York City (which I, at least, appreciate more than most modern-day sex films that seem to take place entirely in some producer's condo in the San Fernando Valley). There's an especially good sequence of a pornography-fueled orgy in swinging Denmark. Unlike "I,a Groupie" or some of the other "report" films, however, this doesn't have wild shifts of tone where some stories are light-hearted and silly and others downright disturbing. This movie is just consistently silly.

As Dietrich-Steeger films go I'd rank this ahead of "The Young Seducers", but definitely behind "I, a Groupie". It's better than most "report" films and pretty much all the American sexy stewardess films I've seen though . Give it a gander.

Actually, the title tells all. We follow a group of air hostesses flying to cities all over Europe. And in each city they have another sexual encounter. What else did you expect from a Dietrich film. He was the king of soft core porn in Europe in the 70's and this is a good and boring example of his oeuvre. He bought quite a lot of stock footage of air craft taking off or landing. Then he bought a lot of stock footage depicting the tourist attractions of Rome and Copenhagen for instance. Then he built a bedroom in his studio where his actors could have sex. Tedious, non-explicit sex, of course: this is 1971.

The result is a boring movie not unlike numerous others made in the 70's. There are a few lame jokes, but actually this movie is not funny. There is sex, but with the exception of Ingrid Steeger the actors are not very attractive. There are pictures of cities in Europe, but you probably saw them before or were there yourself.

I rate this dud 2 out of 10 because of Steeger. If you are not a fan of hers, you may feel 1 out of 10 is sufficient and actually it is for most viewers!