Naked England (1969)

Currently only around in an Italian language version with Japanese subtitles, Naked England is an Italian made, Mondo movie look at British customs, sexuality and eccentricities. A subject matter that dictates Naked England has more in common with Arnold Louis Miller documentaries like Primitive London and London in the Raw than the Italian made Mondo Cane. Thus giving you the unusual spectacle of Italian filmmakers imitating British filmmakers who were in turn imitating Italian filmmakers. Naked England opens with a man on a tranquil golf field, his launching of a golf ball then quickly cuts to a ball of the wrecking variety making short work of old tenanent housing. This metaphor of the new demolishing the old is reflected in the ensuing crowd shots, Naked England was made at a time when top hats and bowlers were still a common site on the heads of Londoners, but were beginning to share pavement space with girls in short skirts... young, dandy fellas and the bald heads of Hare Krishnas. The timing of Naked England certainly can't be faulted, this was a period when the rest the world looked to London as a colourful, cultural trendsetter, and the makers of the film sure managed to grab a generous slice of the Swingin' London pie. The film might have been more accurately titled 'Mondo Kings Road'.

Some of the subject matter of Naked England includes women's wrestling, trepanation, and a ''School for Wives' where a professional stripper teaches the average housewife how to act sexy for their husbands. As is the nature of the beast, Naked England is mainly bogus, highly sensationalistic, and must have had the effect of getting red blooded Italians on the next plane to England while being treated with much amusement by a UK audience, where it's fakery would have been more apparent. Particularly questionable are scenes of Jesus freaks holding a public crucifixion and the depiction a Nazi themed restaurant, where customers pay to be brutalised by staff dressed in SS uniforms, then suffer a mock gassing...an experience akin to the 'be black baby' sequence in Brian De Palma's Hi Mum. Saying that the film does specifically identify the restaurant in question- Alexander's club on the Kings road- which does check out as being an authentic location back then, and for libel reasons surely wouldn't have been name checked in the movie had there not been some credibility to this Nazi fetish sequence. 

Another authentic London restaurant, Melita, is similarly portrayed here as a sexuality transgressive hotspot...with a montage of transvestites preening and making out memorably scored to 'Eloise' by Barry Ryan. The use of too theatrical, too red looking, stage blood rules out the crucifixion and trepanation scenes as being real, ditto a scene of the police tangling with criminals, which leaves the latter with faces full of Kensington gore and plays like a warm up for a scene of a blag going down in The Sweeney. On the other hand, scenes of junkies shooting up in the underground toilets of Piccadilly Circus are as grueling and real as anything in Tony Klinger's Extremes.

Distributed by Miracle Films on the lower half of a double-bill with Pete Walker's Man of Violence, Naked England played the Leicester Square Jacey cinema in July 1969, before resurfacing at the Edinburgh Jacey cinema in January 1971, then transferring to the Liverpool Jacey cinema in March 1971. The more titillation orientated Mondo movies were all welcomed in British cinemas, with the likes of Naked England, The Queer....The Erotic, Mondo Sex and Excuse Me, Do You Like Sex, showing up on the Fleapit circuit during the late sixties and early seventies. By the time VHS came along though, the perception seems to have been that these films were then too tame, and too dated to warrant being preserved on the new media. The copy of Naked England that is currently on the film collectors circuit looks to have been recorded off Italian television, and has managed to acquire Japanese subtitles along the way.

Unlike many foreign Mondo movies which turned an eye towards Britain, but faked the location work, Naked England was predominantly shot on British soil, meaning you do get lots of late 1960s London here. From a Brit-Sleaze perspective, there's also footage of an exhibition of Harrison Marks' photographic work, with Marks' friend and straight man Stuart Samuels seen manning the counter and selling prints of Marks work. While a suspect look at Nude psychotherapy, which just seems to be an excuse to fill the screen with naked glamour models, offers a fleeting glimpse of Esme Johns, thus shattering the idea that Groupie Girl was her only movie.

Stanley Long(er) :His XXX rated adventures

 

Stanley Long always maintained that he never made stronger, hardcore versions of his British sex films, separating himself from such practitioners as his former business partner Derek Ford. However, around 44 minutes of recently unearthed footage has a different tale to tell. We have 'Under the Counter' author Oliver Carter to thank for saving this 35mm footage from imminent destruction, which reveals that Long did in fact shoot hardcore for at least three of his productions. Namely, Groupie Girl (1970), Naughty (1971), and On the Game (1974).

The additional 4 minutes, 48 seconds from Naughty -Long's 1971 look at the history of pornography- consists of Long filming Scottish blue filmmaker John Lindsay in action. In front of Long and Lindsay's cameras are porn actors Peter Vernon and Lucienne Camille alias Sylvia Bayo having real sex during the making of Lindsay's blue movie 'Sex After School'. There is, of course, a great deal more explicit imagery here than in the softcore version of Naughty that we are more accustomed too. In a memorable moment Vernon shows off his physical prowess by lifting Lucienne up in the air, then displays his sexual prowess by bringing her down in the reverse cowgirl position, before proceeding to have real sex with her, first on a couch and then on the floor. 

It's valuable footage in the sense of allowing us a prolonged look at a Lindsay film being made, and of the elusive 'Sex after School' a Lindsay short which I don't believe has ever resurfaced in full. At the same time, Long is merely filming someone else filming hardcore here, rather than being the instigator of the material himself. This is not the case with the footage from Groupie Girl and On the Game.

The general consensus among those who have so far viewed the 17 minutes, 41 seconds of hardcore material shot for Groupie Girl is that it may have been made a couple of years after the film itself, since it features no actors from the original film. In their book 'Immoral Tales', Pete Tombs and Cathal Tohill claimed that Groupie Girl was released in France as 'Les Demi-Sels De La Perversion' with hardcore scenes. 

Immoral Tales assumed that the hardcore must have been filmed and inserted by a French distributor. The existence of hardcore footage specifically shot for Groupie Girl however now makes it more likely that Long himself went back and shot new footage for the film in order to meet the demands of more liberal territories like France. The IMDB records July 1974 as the French release of Groupie Girl, tying in with the idea of the hardcore footage being filmed later than the film.

-In the first additional scene, a band member, travelling in the back of a van, unzips his fly, wakes up a sleeping groupie and insists on her giving him a blowjob. He then throws her onto a filthy mattress, tears off her clothes and has rear entry sex with her, this is followed by further fellatio. The male lead in this scene is Mike Gallagher, who was in the John Lindsay blue movie 'Betrayed' alongside Mary Millington, and later resurfaced in the Millington documentary 'True Blue Confessions'.

-In the 2nd additional scene, two groupies -one of whom is played by Jacqui Rigby- make out with each other.

-The third scene ventures into S&M. Handcuffed to a bed, Jacqui Rigby is ridden from behind by a band member. She has a gag in her mouth and is hit several times with a cane. The scene ends with the couple stopping their activities and the man responding to something said off camera, presumably taking direction from Long.

-In the fourth scene, two groupies in the back of a van jointly fellate a band member.

-In the fifth scene, there is more fellatio, this time being performed under the bedsheets. It is likely this footage was intended to be inserted into the scene where James Beck's character wakes up the band and complains about them sleeping in late.

-In the sixth, and final additional scene, a man and a blonde woman become sexually aggressive towards a groupie, tying her spread eagled to the floor and stripping off her underwear. They then start breaking raw eggs over her body, and sensually rub egg yoke over her, in what could be seen as a prelude to On the Game's creme bun/food fetish scene, albeit using the raw materials. The egg yoke rub down is intercut with a separate couple having more conventional, non egg based sex. The egg man begins beating the bound groupie with a cat o'nine tails before receiving a blowjob from her.

My initial reaction to this footage was to attribute it to Groupie Girl director Derek Ford, it's combination of kink and hardcore seemingly being more in Ford's wheelhouse. The problem with that line of thinking is that the additional footage for On the Game is near identical in terms of the shooting style and sexual content. On the Game was a solo Stanley Long project, with no involvement from Derek Ford at all, therefore Ford can't be held responsible for the On the Game footage, nor the additional Groupie Girl footage. It should be mentioned that the original Groupie Girl cast members I have spoken to, do tend to remember Stanley Long over Derek Ford. One even expressed surprise that Long wasn't the credited director of the film, since Long appeared to have directed a fair amount of Groupie Girl, but for whatever reason never took a co-director credit. It is ironic that Ford has been historically vilified as the wrong 'un of the Ford-Long team, and the one more willing to push the envelope. Whereas the reality now seems to be that while Derek Ford was indeed shooting additional 'continental' style footage for his early 1970s productions, he didn't film any hardcore until a few, reportedly brief scenes for his 1974 comedy Keep It Up Jack. Meanwhile Stanley Long may have beat Ford to the punch by filming hardcore for Groupie Girl and On the Game, much of which is of a disturbing and sexually rough nature. From a 21st century perspective, Long's porn footage doesn't quite behave in the way we've come to expect hardcore too. While real, penetrative sex is visibly taking place in this footage, Long rarely lingers on it in close-ups, as is the universal approach in hardcore. What's also notable is the total absence of money shots in these scenes.

The additional footage for 1974's On the Game -Long's companion piece to Naughty about the history of prostitution-runs 23 minutes, 6 seconds, and unlike the hardcore material for Groupie Girl does feature original cast members, sets and costumes from the film itself.

-The first additional scene sees the return of the blonde woman from the egg yoke scene in Groupie Girl. A veteran of the era's porn, she is familiar as Clyda Rosen's Groupie galpal in the Harrison Marks hardcore short Autograph Hour, and also appeared in films by John Lindsay (Desire, Frustration) and Lasse Braun (Rope, Blondie's Lesson in Statistics). The BGAFD website, which ascribes THX-1138 type names to porn performers whose names aren't known has her listed as XNK0161. This scene opens with an exchange of money between punter and prostitute...playing the latter XNK0161 strips down to fetishistic underwear, before the john eats her pussy and ass. Echoing the sexual bent of the Groupie Girl footage, he then takes to ridding her from behind whilst beating her with a cat o'nine tails.

-In the second scene....well I'm come to that later, it's 'something special'.

-The third scene is a sexual assault with lots of face slapping, forced fellatio and spanking, this time taking place in a cell with hay on the floor. Therefore it's likely this would have been inserted into the 'Witchfinder General' type section of On the Game depicting the persecution of prostitutes in 16th century England.

-In the fourth scene two sailors frolic with two prostitutes, the sex here is prolonged but without showing hardcore detail. Given the costumes this presumably would have been used for the section of On the Game set in the New Orleans brothel.

-The fifth additional scene is from the WW1 set, mobile brothel segment. A prostitute reads a book whilst indifferently giving a German officer a hand job. He becomes agitated, knocks the book to the floor and demands fellatio.

-The sixth additional scene is once again set at the WW1 mobile brothel. The same prostitute orally services a second German officer, he wraps a cushion around his head in ecstasy, but eventually runs away.

-The seventh additional scene is an extension of the final scene in On the Game. Lucienne Camille plays a nurse who services an old geezer behind a hospital cubical screen. There's fellatio and penetration shots featuring Lucienne, but it seems the elderly actor in the scene wasn't recalled for the hardcore footage. The male body used in the hardcore shots is blatantly that of a younger man, and tellingly Long keeps the face of the male body double off screen.

I've saved the most mind blowing revelation till last, for the 2nd batch of additional footage from On the Game features none other than June Palmer performing hardcore. June was of course, a legendary glamour model from the sixties, who absolutely no one has ever suspected of appearing in hardcore. I'm rarely surprised by anything these days, but I was taken aback to find myself watching June Palmer sucking cock on film. Her male co-star here was in fact her real life partner Arthur Howell. A stuntman by trade, who later worked on An American Werewolf in London, Howell is another unlikely porn performer. The extended version of their scene together in On the Game also sees Palmer masturbating Howell, before straddling him, although there are no penetration shots. Having only been familiar with this scene in the softcore edit of On the Game, I've often wondered why Howell and Palmer performed the scene wearing facemasks, but since we now know that this scene was originally hardcore, their reasoning for partly concealing their identities now begins to make sense.

To the layman this 44 minutes of footage from Groupie Girl, Naughty and On the Game will just appear to be standard hardcore, yet to those into the history of these things, this footage is a game changer. Altering the way we look at the careers of Stanley Long and June Palmer, maybe even the British sex film in general. Of course, once you become aware of just how widespread the practice of shooting 'continental' footage was, it becomes difficult to watch any British film from the sixties or seventies without wondering if their was ever a sexier, dirtier version out there. In the cases of Groupie Girl, Naughty and On the Game, the answer proves to be a big fat 'YES'.

Again I tip my hat to Oliver Carter for both rescuing this footage and allowing me to review it. An article about his rediscovery of the Long hardcore footage can be found on his under-the-counter.com website. Hopefully in the near future, a boutique label will come along and bring this porn treasure trove to a wider audience.

Celluloid Village of Dreams (1970)

1970, Wardour Street is awash with advertising for it's latest offerings, there is Twinky, the schoolgirl sex comedy starring Susan George and Charles Bronson, Hammer is pushing When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth and Tigon is unveiling their menage a trois drama Monique. There to record it all was ATV and director Ross Devenish for the TV documentary 'Celluloid Village of Dreams' which was shown on ITV on the 13th October 1970 in the 10:30pm slot.

Wardour Street was and is the hub of Britain's film industry, to the movie biz what Denmark Street was to the music industry. As the documentary's title implies, Celluloid Village of Dreams portrays Wardour Street and the surrounding Soho area as it's own little village. One that is unreal looking to outsiders, detached from the rest of Britain, and whose residents toil away in either the film or sex industries, the line between the two becoming very blurred by 1970.

For star spotters there is fleeting glimpses here of Marty Feldman, Julie Ege and Danny LaRue, seen at swanky film industry get togethers. The real stars of Celluloid Village of Dreams though are people who you've either never heard of or know only as names on movie credits.

Like any village, Wardour Street had it's own societal structure and hierarchy. On top there are big men flaunting their success in the form of fat cigars and rolls royces, but Celluloid Village of Dreams is equally fascinated by the have-nots of this society. Youths lugging film cans around Wardour Street, and the cleaning ladies of film industry offices, dining out on their brief interactions with Stanley Baker and Richard Attenborough. A smoky, boozy pub, where pipe smoking and sideburns are the norm, is described as the film industry's answer to the labour exchange, it's where actors go to talk shop, seek work or just drown their sorrows.

The subjects of Celluloid Village of Dreams are a mix of people on their way down, going nowhere and just occasionally going places. There's a quick glimpse of a very young, very dandy looking Andrew Lloyd Webber, prepping Jesus Christ, Superstar. As well as future Oscar winner Bob Godfrey, here putting the finishing touches to his X-rated cartoon 'Henry 9 til 5', taking to the recording studio and putting on his droning, pervy 'Henry' voice. 

The current big shot of the industry is Nat Cohen, the head of EMI. Cohen is exactly how you'd imagine the man who brought you the On the Buses movies to be...fast talking, chauffeur driven, inevitably the owner of a rolls royce and a racehorse, very Arthur Daley. Celluloid Village of Dreams is an ode to showmanship, with many men of Cohen's generation having backgrounds in the carnival, gambling or boxing promotion, the skills honed there serving them greatly when they transitioned to the film industry. Entrepreneurism is the name of the game in Wardour Street, with Jack Isow's restaurant -located just under the famous Raymond Revuebar signage- playing to the village giants' vanity and love of showbiz razzmatazz by offering amazing, personalised seats embossed with the names of the movie industry elite. Conveniently giving an idea of who was considered the film industry's most valuable assets at the time. Recipients of the embossed seats treatment including the aforementioned Nat Cohen, Colonel James Carreras of Hammer films and the American comedian Jerry Lewis. While visibly a patriarchal society, the documentary doesn't overlook the few female villagers, including hardworking film editor Marlene Fletcher and the elderly female owner of the Playboy strip club.

Sex and showbiz are seen to go hand in hand in Wardour Street, even if they occasionally seem reticent to be seen holding hands in public. Celluloid Village of Dreams takes a detour into the Pigalle nightclub where glamour girls work three backbreaking shifts a night in order to put food on the table of their young families. The odd hours they work, often returning home at 3am, leads to malicious gossip from normy neighbours about what these girls do for a living.

The TV Times coverage of the programme placed particular emphasis on the participation of a Soho stripper called Hazel Longley, who sounded burnt out and disillusioned "My eyes have been open by Soho. Now I'm so hard that if anyone really upsets me in the street I think I'd kill without thinking". Longley is a Soho subject who would have been worth hearing from, disappointingly then that the programme itself barely features her, apart from a few seconds of her strip routine. It wouldn't be until 2022 that Longley would get to tell her full story of stripping, sex work, beatings and her involvement with Maltese gangsters in her autobiography 'Wounds that never heal...broken' which sounds like a harrowing read. More Celluloid Village of Nightmares, than dreams.

Existing some place between the sex and film industries are the fellas of Nymph films, seen shooting an 8mm glamour film starring Lucienne Camille alias Sylvia Bayo. "I like film, I like good looking girls, I think if one has to work one should enjoy what one is doing...and err I like good looking girls" explains glamour filmmaker Derek, as footage from one of his earlier titty flicks, starring Sue Bond (pre-Benny Hill Show) unspools onscreen.

Celluloid Village of Dreams also captures a truly notorious figure to be, in the form of future blue filmmaker John Lindsay, who'd come to prominence in the 1970s for his jailbait fixated hardcore shorts like 'Jolly Hockey Sticks' and 'Schoolgirl Joyride'. Beginning as he meant to go on, Lindsay is here seen doing promotional work for Miracle films in Piccadilly Circus, taking photos of girls handing out flyers for 'Naked England' an Italian Mondo movie that Miracle was releasing. One embarrassed member of the public, sat at the statue of Eros, uses the flyer to conceal their face from the camera. The girls are topless, albeit covered by union jack flags, and true to form Lindsay is ordering the troops to be more daring "let's see a bit of booby, show em what you got, luv" insists Lindsay in his distinct Scottish brogue. One of the girls notes that the police have arrived, a situation that Lindsay would grow accustomed to in the 1970s.

Truth be told, there is nothing too deep or profound in Celluloid Village of Dreams, nevertheless it's an invaluable time capsule of the film industry at the dawn of the 1970s. Many of these people are gone now, but the documentary lives on, because Celluloid heroes, and villains, never really die. The documentary's funniest line, and it's own epitaph, is "there are two kinds of prostitution in Soho...and films pay better".