Shanty Tramp

Set in some random town in the south, Emily the Shanty Tramp prowls from bar to barn looking for any kind of action she can get. Shanty Tramp is filled with the broadest spectrum of unsavory characters I've seen anywhere: a corrupt preacher, a drunk and abusive father, bumbling racist police officers, and a caricatured black mamma straight from the old Aunt Jemima bottle label. The only even slightly savory character in the film is a passion-addled black man who... well, better not spoil it, but let's just say what the only even slightly virtuous character meets a tragic end. Shanty Tramp was a marvelously controversial movie from all angles, serving the same purient, voyeuristic "other people's disasters" interests that Jerry Springer shows have today. Pink Flamingoes lacks the genuine, heartfelt sleaze that this film has in spades. I give this movie a 10 for unbelievably, shamelessly trashy cinematic excellence.

The end credits reveal that the original print was burned in a fire and the film was digitally remastered in 2018. It is noticeable with the choppy editing quality and one hour and twelve minute running time.

In spite of those issues, this black and white curiosity is quite entertaining. Eleanor Vaill is Emily, the title character and she is very good here. Miss Vaill must be a ghost because an internet search reveals no biographical information on the actress other than a listing of two other roles in 1967.

A holy roller Joel Osteen type of BS preacher rolls into town and cons the locals into handing over their cash. He spots Emily in the crowd and arranges a hookup with the siren.

In the meantime, a Black man has the misfortune of running into the tramp and he and Emily do not live happily ever after in the deep South of the 1960's.

Do not expect Elmer Gantry but for a quickie low budget effort, Shanty Tramp is worth a viewing.

SHANTY TRAMP is one of those scuzzy, low budget, regional black-and-white exploitation features made in America during the late 1960s and pushing the censorial boundaries; hence this film's surprising amount of topless female nudity. I found it a surprisingly decent production that tells the story of a small town getting stirred up by the machinations of a 'loose' young woman who riles up a local drunk before seducing a black man in a barn. Chaos, unsurprisingly, erupts. It's a film with better characterisation and acting than I expected, quite hard-hitting and grim in its depiction of fallen human characters, and laced with sex and violence.

As a director Charles Laughton made only one film, "The Night of the Hunter" and it's one of the greatest films ever made. Just over 10 years later Jose G. Pietro directed his only film, "Shanty Tramp" and it's ... well, let's just say it's "Shanty Tramp", (the title really does say it all). It's a tale of sex, violence, race and religion but mostly sex and it will fit very nicely into any volume on trash movies. It is very cheaply made and very, very badly acted and yet you could say it was remarkably bold for its time. The hero is a young African-American, the villain, or at least one of them, a crooked preacher and it's 'heroine', the shanty tramp of its title and I loved every sordid, glorious minute of it. As a first feature it was hardly "Citizen Kane", (more like "Titties and Cane"), and as a piece of cheap exploitation it was hardly likely to bring Pietro to the attention of the major studios but neither is it negligible and it certainly deserves its cult status.

Exploitative story of a day (mostly night) in the life of a shanty tramp, southern slang for prostitute. What does this movie have but every cliché you might imagine people think about when they use the phrase 'white trash'.

On this one hot summer night, there's prostitution, religious hypocrisy, misogyny, drunkenness, fistfights, bigotry, interracial sex, biker gangs, incest, lynching, moonshine, a car chase with explosive results, nudity, murder, and even an instance of walking out on the restaurant tab! There's more than can be listed.

All presented in stereotyped characterizations, but the lead female, Lee Holland, does an admirable job in her only film role ever, as does the fellow playing the lecherous preacher, a Paul Newman look-alike. Also nice is the fact that all scenery are actual locations, making for a realistic setting. Most likely someplace in Florida, as the accents are not too deep south, more typical for Florida, and the producer K Gordon Murray worked out of a facility in Coral Gables.

One of the more enjoyable exploitation trash films I've seen.