Angel Heart (1987)

Writer/director Alan Parker's supernatural-mystery film noir was set in New Orleans, Louisiana. Its themes included black (and voodoo) magic, a Satanic figure and Faustian theme ("Mephistopheles is such a mouthful in Manhattan"), soul transference, and multiple bloody murders. It was immediately controversial for the nudity and sex scenes of one of its stars, Lisa Bonet in her film debut, who was a child star as Denise Huxtable in the family TV show The Cosby Show.

The unsettling plot line was simple but still very macabre, atmospheric and complex - a Brooklyn NY private investigator was hired by an enigmatic, black-clad Satanic-like businessman to conduct a missing persons case (for a singer named Johnny Favorite) from the war years. He was haunted by various sights during his investigation in Harlem and in the New Orleans area (dripping blood into a bowl, a dark-clad and hooded figure, bloody walls being scrubbed clean, malfunctioning rotating fans, bloody voodoo rituals, one red-lit window in a tenement building apartment, a winding staircase, a descending freight elevator (to Hell), a singer's tune "Girl of My Dreams," a shattered mirror image, etc.), and he soon left behind a trail of five corpses - many of those he questioned and interacted with during his quest ended up brutally murdered due to an attempted cover-up of his own past.

The true identity of the depraved principal character was fairly predictable from the start, yet it was still fascinating to follow the twists and turns, and appreciate the atmospherics and attention to detail. It offered the cryptic tagline: "It will scare you to your very soul. Harry Angel has been hired to search for the truth... Pray he doesn't find it."

The thrilling film set in the year 1955 opened with the seedy Brooklyn private detective Harry Angel (Mickey Rourke) meeting in Harlem with mysterious satanic client Louis Cyphre (Robert De Niro in a masterfully-acted devilish role, as "Lu-ci-fer") who had long fingernails and a pentagram ring. Cyphre hired Angel to investigate a missing persons case. In a later NYC diner scene, Cyphre remarked: "Some religions think that the egg is the symbol of the soul, did you know that?" -- before meaningfully biting into a hard-boiled egg, and offering Angel $5,000 for his efforts.

Cyphre had hired Angel to locate a disgraced big-band crooner and WWII draftee named Johnny Favorite (nee John Liebling) who owed him a debt, and was known as the "guy with the golden tonsils"; he had been neurologically wounded during military action, and was admitted to a Poughkeepsie Nursing Home. Subsequently, Favorite was secretly transferred out in late 1943 with fake documents.

As Angel tracked down Favorite, many of the individuals he questioned or came into contact with ended up dead. The dead included Dr. Albert Fowler (Michael Higgins) at the Poughkeepsie Home - who was shot through the eye (with brain splatter), Johnny's one-time fiancee Margaret Krusemark (aka Madame Zora) (Charlotte Rampling), a fortune teller and voodoo practitioner who had her heart cut out with a sacrificial knife, and Margaret's wealthy father Ethan Krusemark (Stocker Fontelieu) who was drowned in a large vat of boiling gumbo.

Death of Dr. Fowler (Michael Higgins)

Death of Margaret Krusemark (Charlotte Rampling)

Death of Ethan Krusemark (Stocker Fontelieu)

During the course of his work, Harry encountered an illegitimate, 17 year old, half-Creole, teenaged voodoo practitioner Epiphany Proudfoot (Lisa Bonet), reportedly the mixed-race daughter of both Favorite and Evangeline Proudfoot (a now-deceased black voodoo queen). Angel witnessed Epiphany's participation in a voodoo ritual in which she was scantily-clad as she slit a chicken's throat and let the spurting blood drip down her face, neck and breasts.

The film also included a notorious, steamy sex scene (originally NC-17-rated, but trimmed for an R-rating) of abandoned sexuality (with the theme of blood sacrifice) between Angel and Epiphany. They made love on his hotel room bed with raindrops (mixed with chicken blood) dripping from the ceiling through the leaky hotel roof during a rainstorm, after listening to the radio playing the sultry tune "Soul on Fire" by Laverne Baker.

The Notorious Sex Scene Involving Lisa Bonet and Mickey Rourke: Incestuous Sex - Then Rape-Murder

In the film's well-known plot twist, missing piano player/singer Johnny Favorite's identity was revealed. Johnny had sold his soul to the devil (Lu-cifer) for fame and stardom, but then reneged on the contracted bargain, hid out, and took the alias and soul of Harry Angel. Favorite had transferred his soul through a bloody, Satanic ceremonial ritual, with the help of Margaret Krusemark, into the original Harry Angel's body twelve years earlier. Favorite had randomly picked WWII GI Angel in Times Square on New Years' Eve in 1942, and assumed Angel's identity and inhabited Harry's body.

Then, because of the war, he was traumatically brain-injured, hospitalized, and had extensive facial surgery so that he was unrecognizable. He also suffered amnesia and couldn't remember who he was, even after Margaret's failed plan to drop him off in Times Square a year later on 12/31/1943 to force him to remember who he was. Favorite was fooled into believing he was Harry Angel for his entire life (and henceforth fooled others about his real identity).

Harry Angel was actually Johnny Favorite, the evil man he was being paid to find, who had fathered Epiphany with her mother Evangeline. And Louis Cyphre was a gloating and knowing 'Lucifer' - who had been waiting for Angel to realize or remember that his true identity was Favorite. Harry, however, was convinced that Cyphre was framing him for the murders.

Actually, Harry was the murderer of all the people he discovered dead - all magic and voodoo practitioners who were involved in Johnny Favorite's cover-up. Harry had been 'guided,' however, by Cyphre to commit the numerous murders:

All killed by your own hand. Guided by me naturally. Frankly, you were doomed from the moment you slit that young boy in half. Johnny - for 12 years, you've been living on borrowed time and another man's memories...The flesh is weak, Johnny. Only the soul is immortal, and yours belongs to ME!

(Cyphre's eyes turned a glowing pale yellow - a sign of the demonic, as he pointed his long-nailed index finger at Harry!)

In the shocking ending, it was also revealed that Favorite/Angel had actually killed his own daughter Epiphany, the daughter of Evangeline Proudfoot, but he had no memory of committing the crime; he rushed back to his hotel room - the murder/crime scene (notice the hooded and black-cloaked figure sitting on the veranda - revealed to be a clean-shaven Cyphre!). He viewed Epiphany's half-naked body, and the bed drenched in blood; after incestuous intercourse with the young teenager, he had fired his gun into her groin area in the rape-murder; she died wearing his military dog tags around her lifeless neck.

Angel revealed to Detective Sterne (Eliott Keener) that he was the murderer - the film's final lines of dialogue:

Detective Sterne: Why'd you come back?
Harry: I live here.
Detective Sterne: Who is she? (He reached for the dog tags and read the identifying name) She ain't 'Angel, Harold.'
Harry: She's my daughter.
Detective Sterne: Bulls--t. Who is she?
Harry: She's Epiphany Proudfoot. She stayed here for a little while.
Detective Sterne: Long enough for you to kill her, right? Or ain't that your gun up her snatch? You're gonna burn for this, Angel.
Harry: I know. In Hell.

At the crime scene, Det. Deimos (Pruitt Taylor Vince) carried Epiphany's toddler son, Harry's/Johnny's grandson, into the bedroom; the boy had glowing eyes - strongly hinting that the boy was probably fathered by 'Lucifer' (Satan had impregnated Epiphany during a wild, orgiastic voodoo ceremony briefly viewed) - and he pointed at Harry.

Presumably, Harry - who descended down a very lengthy elevator shaft as the film ended (during the entire credits sequence) - was convicted of the murder of Epiphany and doomed to the electric chair - and afterwards fated to burn in Hell; when the elevator reached its destination at the end of his ride, the soundtrack's fast-beating heartbeat stopped; with the final black screen, one could hear a very faint conversation whispered by Cyphre (in voice-over), who asked about the two souls he had acquired: "Harry?" "Johnny?"

Aria (1987, UK)

Compiling the short works of ten different directors, this uneven and semi-indulgent film (originally unrated for sex and nudity, but re-rated as R) combined MTV-style images in brief vignettes to various operatic arias:

• Jean-Luc Godard's Armide
  Two naked gym attendants (Marion Peterson and Valérie Allain as Les Jeunes Filles) attempted to get the attention of disinterested muscle-bound bodybuilders in Paris's Weider Gym by flaunting themselves and threatening to stab the dehumanized men.
  
  
• Bruce Beresford's Die Tote Stadt ("Spirits of the Dead City")
  A young and then-unknown Elizabeth Hurley (as Marietta) appeared nude as the ghostly deceased wife of lover Paul (Peter Birch).
  

Die Tote Stadt ("Spirits of the Dead City")

• Franc Roddam's Liebestod
  Bridget Fonda (in her first 'credited' film debut) was featured as part of a couple who committed suicide together in a Las Vegas bathtub (by slitting their wrists with shards of broken glass) after making love in a cheap hotel room lit by flashing neon signs. They hugged as they expired together - although maybe it was only a fantasy?

Franc Roddam's Liebestod

• Ken Russell's surrealistic Nessun Dorma ("...And None Shall Sleep")
  This segment paralleled Egyptian goddess worship with a scene of a blonde car wreck victim (British pin-up Linzi Drew) with a disfigured left side of her face (and other major injuries), being operated upon and given heart-shock treatment - although she hallucinated being adorned with sparkling jewels and was segmented into the body parts of a mannequin.

The Big Bet (1987)

This low-budget sex comedy from writer/director Bert I. Gordon was very similar in part to Risky Business (1983) and Private Lessons (1981). It featured two taglines regarding a 'big bet' made by a teenaged high-schooler with his high school rivals about whether he could have sex or not:

• "The Ultimate Teenage Fantasy"
• "An Older Woman Helps a Teenager Seduce a Schoolgirl"

The main character was:

• Chris Collins (Lance Sloane), a 17 year-old day-dreaming guy (with an active fantasy sex life) who was without a current girlfriend; he was a frequent masturbator and a perpetually sexually-aroused male (in the film's description on the video box): Narrator: "Most of the girls are in his mind, fantasies, dreams."

In particular, he repeatedly fantasized about servicing:

• Mrs. Roberts (Stephanie Blake) - his married next-door neighbor's wife
• Angela (Mary Elena Deir), the Roberts' young daughter

Two of Chris' Recurring Fantasies: With Next Door Neighbors
Mrs. Roberts (Stephanie Blake) - Next Door Neighbor's Wife
Angela Roberts (Mary Elena Deir) - Neighbor's Daughter

Both seductions succeeded until Mr. Roberts (Ermal Williamson) returned home - with an axe, in Chris' fantasy.

The main plot was about Chris' 'big bet' with school bully and jerk Norman (Ron Thomas) - wagering their cars ("my wheels against yours") regarding whether he would have sex within about a week with:

• Beth Lowell (Kim Evenson, Playboy's September 1984 Playmate), a new blonde schoolgirl, the daughter of the town's minister who had just moved into town from Iowa

After the bet, the bully blackmailed Beth into playing hard to get. Norman threatened to reveal a "little secret" in her sordid past (she was wrongly accused of being in a bathroom sex orgy at her previous school and suspended) unless she followed his directive:

"You just keep your legs crossed, that's all....and you keep them crossed until one week from midnight Saturday."

During their first date, Beth warned Chris: "I don't fool around." She also claimed she was "terrified" of sex - and added: "I'm afraid of getting pregnant." She admitted she had been adopted out and never knew her father who had impregnated her mother (who then became a hooker).

While he was struggling to romance Beth, Chris was given practical advice from:

• Michelle (Emmanuelle's and Private Lesson's Sylvia Kristel), Chris' pretty, knowledgeable, sexy and experienced 29 year-old French neighbor, a fashion designer

At first, he got to know Michelle when he gave her help with her plumbing and broken pipe, then spied on her with binoculars. Eventually he snuck into her bedroom as she was showering and then drying off. Then, he boldly asked her to provide advice on sex, pleading: "I have to make love with a girl in 8 days or it's all over for me" - he explained how he faced humiliation if he "struck out," and would have to change schools.

The softcore film was filled with fantasy sequences completely WITHIN Chris' mind - in two dream-like scenarios by the swimming pool:

• Beth removed her black bikini top; in the first instance, he urged: "You know, Beth, it's a lot more fun to swim without a suit" - and she promptly removed her top
• in the second instance, Chris directly suggested: "Beth, do you know that they just discovered that women who wear bathing suits age much faster than women who don't?" She responded: "Really?" and quickly untied and removed her top; however, fearing failure with the second approach, Chris said to himself: "Oh, boy. She won't buy that one either"

Fantasy Scenarios with Beth (Kim Evenson): Removing Black Bikini Top to Show Her Breasts by Pool

In a third dream-fantasy scenario, Chris was stuck in a broken-down elevator during a power outage, and A/C system stopped functioning. He started to strip down in the heat, and was encouraged by the only other passenger in the elevator - Dream Woman (Monique Gabrielle). She stripped naked and had sex with Chris on the floor of the elevator - but then when the elevator door opened, he was the only one seen on the elevator floor by a group of onlookers, who called him a "weirdo." He ran off down the hallway - humiliated.

Then in real-life when Chris was in an elevator with Beth, he pushed the Emergency STOP button and then shorted out the control panel. He repeatedly tried removing her sweater top by telling her it was a way to cool off, but she was upset: ("Chris, what are you doing?...Have you gone crazy?"). Due to his claustrophobia in the darkness, Chris began puking.

Later, when he was finally able to convince Michelle to help him because he had lost all hope, she undressed for love-making lessons. She showed him how to lightly and gently touch her bare breast and nipple: "A woman needs to be caressed" - before they made love.

Eventually, Beth succumbed to Chris' advances, in the revolving orange-reddish off-and-on light of a cherry-top that he had brought with him. She was temptingly naked and encouraged him: "You can have me if you can catch me. Try to catch me, Chris. You can't get me. You can have me if you can get me. Come on. Come and get me. Come on."

He caught her and they ended up in each other's arms for love-making.

[See other entries: "Raunchy Teen-Sex Comedies of the 1980s."]

The Big Easy (1987)

Director Jim McBride's romantic, neo-noir crime mystery-thriller was set in New Orleans, LA. About a decade later, it was followed by USA Network's TV series of 35 episodes from August 1996-October 1997.

The romantic thriller's taglines hinted at intrigue between two officers of the law during an uprise in gangland murders involved in the drug peddling trade:

• "He's got to hide the truth. She'll stop at nothing to find it. But tonight everything's off the record."
• "It's easy to make a killing in New Orleans..."

The main plot line was about a suspected deadly drug war in New Orleans between Mafia mobsters, led by Vinnie "The Cannon" Di Motti (Marc Lawrence), and African American drug lords led by Daddy Mention (Solomon Burke, a soul/blues singer).

It featured two unlikely and uptight romantic partners investigating cases together in 'The Big Easy' city of New Orleans:

• Remy McSwain (Dennis Quaid), a brash but easy-going, talkative and good-natured New Orleans Cajun police lieutenant-detective in the Homicide Division
• Anne Osborne (Ellen Barkin), an antagonistic, crusading Assistant DA from 'out of town,' sexy yet highly repressed, an uptight straight-arrow outsider in charge of a task force on police corruption

As the film opened, McSwain was investigating the murder of local mobster-gangster Freddie Angelo (Jim Chimento) (a "wise-guy scumbag"), whose employer was Mafia kingpin Vinnie "The Cannon" Di Motti. Angelo had been storing $5 million dollars worth of heroin in a dock warehouse owned by Di Motti's hitman, Carmine Tandino.

During the course of his work, Remy soon met the state's ADA Anne Osborne, with whom he immediately experienced a love-hate relationship. She was investigating a possible case of crooked cops - involving officers who were secretly on a murder spree to take over the drug market. On their first dinner date at a Cajun dance hall-restaurant, she realized how he took advantage through his job - parking anywhere he wanted, cuts into the restaurant line, and free dinners. After their first date, Anne asserted herself, claiming they should keep their relationship "strictly professional" and avoid a "conflict of interest."

Remy McSwain (Dennis Quaid)

Anne Osborne (Ellen Barkin)

First Dinner Date

However, a volatile love affair developed between the persistent Remy and Anne, when he asked if she thought he was a "dirty cop" before kissing her. They experienced a clumsy and awkward, but realistic sex scene (praised by critics) - to the tune of "Closer to You" (performed by Quaid himself), even though they were fully clothed and the sex was unconsummated.

The detective let down Anne's blonde hair and caressed her under her clothes, but after a few moments, she nervously confessed that she was very anxious: "I can't do this now, Remy, I'm too nervous. I can't relax. I'm very embarrassed." He tried to calm her: "Just relax, darlin'. This is the Big Easy. Folks have a certain way of doing things down here." They had a short and humorous back-and-forth about his approach as he touched and kissed her, ultimately causing her to moan:

Anne: "Oh, stop that!"
Remy: "Stop what?"
Anne: "That."
Remy: "What?"
Anne: "That."
Remy: "What, that, or that?"

He climbed up over her and laid atop her, as she helped lower his pants as they began to have sex. But then his pager beeped and he learned over the phone that he must report to the scene of a triple murder in Storyville. When he apologized, she admitted:

"It's okay. I never did have much luck with sex anyway."

He passionately responded with a kiss: "Your luck is about to change. (after the kiss) Oh boy, ooo-la-la!" She said she would await his return in a few hours, but then appeared at the crime scene with him. Afterwards, they returned to his apartment to continue where they left off, although she at first was sickened and nauseous by the sight of the bloody killings, and was puking into his toilet bowl. He believed that the cops weren't involved: "Cops don't do that sort of thing. Not even the rad cops. You're always accusing the cops of everything," although she wasn't so sure. He playfully chased after her as she fled to the bedroom: "Look out for the gator, baby!"

The next morning, she half-draped her nakedness in a blue sheet from their bed and approached 'McSwain' from behind, as he bent down in front of his refrigerator. She grabbed him from behind between his legs, causing him to jump - and realized with shock that it was Remy's brother Bobbie (Tom O'Brien) instead! She hurriedly fled, and passed Remy returning to the apartment with a bag of breakfast groceries.

Shortly later during a clear frame-up or set-up, Remy was caught accepting a payoff of $400 in an envelope (from the so-called corrupt and fraudulent "Widows and Orphans Fund") - cash that the police were illegally extorting and laundering. He was given the money at the Club Sho-Bar on Bourbon Street by its bartender/owner George Joel (Eliott Keener) and was arrested during an FBI Internal Affairs sting operation. Remy's boss Police Captain Jack Kellom (Ned Beatty) promised that he wouldn't suffer the consequences: "We take care of our own, remember that."

Anne faced off against Remy in court, but was unable to prosecute him when he tampered with videotape evidence, and he was cleared of the charges against him.

After dancing with her at a Cajun BBQ and music fest, she told him off. She knew that he was enjoying favors in the city due to his position, and wasn't very convincing that he was one of the "good guys." She chastised him after he was unjustly acquitted:

"You're a cop, for God's sake. You're supposed to uphold the law, but instead you bend it and twist it and sell it. I saw you take that bribe and, and resist arrest and tamper with evidence and perjure yourself under oath...Why don't you just face it, Remy? You're not one of the good guys anymore."

Over time, however, she gradually relaxed and surrendered to him, and they eventually married by the film's tacked-on conclusion. Their reconciliation came after apprehending and killing the bad guys on a dock during a shoot-out (with flares and guns), including Remy's boss Police Captain Jack Kellom (Ned Beatty) and two detectives Andre DeSoto (John Goodman) and Ed Dodge (Ebbe Roe Smith).

Dirty Dancing (1987)

Director Emile Ardolino's popular, coming-of-age, sexual awakening romantic tale, set at an upstate New York Catskills resort (fictional) known as Kellerman's Mountain House in the summer of 1963 (Virginia's Mountain Lake Hotel in actuality), revolved around sexy dance scenes in the staff quarters or the dance studio (or outdoors on a log or in water).

On a budget of $6 million, the film grossed $64.6 million (domestic) and $214.6 million (worldwide). It became the #1 video rental in 1988, and was the first film to sell a million copies on video.

There were many offshoots of the film:

• Dirty Dancing (1988-1989): an 11-episode CBS-TV series, without any original cast or crew members
• Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights (2004) - director Guy Ferland's remake and prequel set in Havana, Cuba, starring Romola Garai and Diego Luna
• Dirty Dancing: The Classic Story on Stage (2004), a stage musical of the same name, amongst various other stage productions
• Dirty Dancing (2017) - a 3-hour musical made-for-TV remake movie, starring Abigail Breslin and Colt Prattes

The film's soundtrack was very popular, and it was honored with an Academy Award for Best Original Song for its theme song: "(I've Had) The Time of My Life" (recorded by Bill Medley and Jennifer Warnes).

Its main tagline was:

• "First dance. First love. The time of your life."

It offered an introduction to 'dirty dancing' and forbidden love between:

• Johnny Castle (Patrick Swayze), the macho resort hotel resident dance instructor and streetwise sexy suitor
• Francis "Baby" Houseman (Jennifer Grey), an impressionable 17 year-old resort guest, the youngest of two daughters in a wealthy family, with an older sister named Lisa (Jane Brucker); 'Baby' had just graduated from HS and was starting at Mount Holyoke in the fall (and planning to major in "Economics of Underdeveloped Countries"), with future plans to join the Peace Corps

The film's opening credits appeared over slo-motion B/W footage of provocative early 1960s "dirty dancers" during a sweaty, off-limits, secret party among the resort staff in their dormitory quarters.

This was followed by two voice-overs:

• radio DJ voice (legendary and popular radio personality "Cousin Brucie" or Bruce Morrow, who broadcast from 1961 to 1974 on WABC, a top 40 radio station in NYC at AM 770): "Hi, everybody, this is your Cousin Brucie. Whoa! Our summer romances are in full bloom, and everybody, but everybody's in love. So cousins, here's a great song from The Four Seasons."
• voice-over narration provided by "Baby": "That was the summer of 1963, when everybody called me 'Baby' and it didn't occur to me to mind. That was before President Kennedy was shot; before The Beatles came; when I couldn't wait to join the Peace Corps; and I thought I'd never find a guy as great as my dad. That was the summer we went to Kellerman's."

Frances 'Baby' Houseman (Jennifer Grey)	Dr. Jake Houseman (Jerry Orbach)
Johnny Castle (Patrick Swayze)	Penny Johnson (Cynthia Rhodes)

17 year-old 'Baby' was introduced to 'dirty dancing' at a secret party (with reddish light) held in the 'staff quarters' only' facilities, to the soundtrack's playing of "Do You Love Me" (by the Contours) and Otis Redding's "Love Man." There, she watched in awe as Johnny, the resort's working-class dance staff instructor, vigorously danced with his long-time dance partner Penny Johnson (Cynthia Rhodes). She was completely intimidated when Johnny brought her onto the dance floor to teach her a few moves, but obviously she thoroughly enjoyed the experience.

In a major sub-plot, Penny became pregnant by irresponsible hotel waiter Robbie Gould (Max Cantor) who refused to pay for her abortion. As Penny angrily put it: "Penny got knocked up by Robbie the Creep." The snobbish and uncaring Robbie told 'Baby': "Some people count, and some people don't."

'Baby' chose to intervene and asked her father Dr. Jake Houseman (Jerry Orbach) for a loan of $250 cash. The day of the abortion in New Paltz, NY was scheduled the same day as a dance show ("Mambo Magic") at the neighboring Sheldrake Hotel, meaning that Johnny's partner Penny couldn't dance that night - and cancellation wasn't a real possibility: ("If they cancel, they lose this year's salary and next year's gig"). 'Baby' volunteered to train and take Penny's place. As they began training, he gave her advice: "The steps aren't enough. Feel the music." Over the course of about a week, he taught 'Baby' expressive mambo dance moves, in one sequence to the tune of Hungry Eyes. Tempers flared, though, when Baby became fed up with Johnny's harsh training:

"We're supposed to do the show in two days, you won't show me the lifts, I'm not sure of the turns, I'm doing all this to save your ass. What I really want to do is drop you on it!"

Dance Practice Lessons: With Johnny

They further practiced balance on a log in the forest (to the tune of "Hey Baby" performed by Bruce Channel), and perfected lifts in a cold nearby lake. Their "Mambo Magic" dance act at the Sheldrake went well, although 'Baby' hesitated to do the lift.

When 'Baby' and Johnny returned to Kellerman's and learned that Penny's abortion was botched, Baby called upon her father to treat Penny, but then was reprimanded and scolded for lying about the reason for borrowing the cash ("You're not the person I thought you were, Baby"). He also forbid her from further contact with the dance staff or Johnny, who he wrongly blamed for the pregnancy.

The film's most sexual scene took place next, when she disobediently visited Johnny in his cabin-bungalow to apologize for her father's treatment of him. Surprisingly, Johnny thanked her for her father's miracle cure, and then admitted: "The reason people treat me like nothing is because I am nothing." He claimed he had never met anyone as idealistic as Baby: "I've never known anybody like you. You look at the world and you think you can make it better." He complimented her on her bravery to go seek help from her father, but then she expressed her own fears:

"I'm scared of everything. I'm scared of what I saw, I'm scared of what I did, of who I am, and most of all, I'm scared of walking out of this room and never feeling the rest of my whole life the way I feel when I'm with you."

She then invited the shirtless Johnny to symbolically "Dance with me." Incredulous, Johnny asked: "What, here?" and she replied boldly: "Here." To the tune of Solomon Burke singing "Cry to Me" in the dim light, they danced sensuously. After a few moments, he removed her blouse. She was stripped down to her white bra and jeans as he held her as she dipped backwards, before the scene dissolved to them in bed kissing - presumably before sex.

The next morning, Dr. Houseman surprised the family by announcing they were leaving early before the weekend's end-of-season talent show, but then he was persuaded to change his mind. During the rainy day, Baby returned to Johnny and found herself in bed naked with him. Baby was atop Johnny - when she asked: "Have you had many women?... Tell me, I wanna know," but he was reluctant to talk about his sex partners; but then he did speak about his past relationships mostly at the resort with older rich women, and his own lower-class background:

"You gotta understand what it's like, Baby. You come from the streets and suddenly you're up here and these women - they are throwin' themselves at ya and they smell so good. And they really take care of themselves. I mean, I never knew women could be like that, you know? And they're so rich - they're so goddamn rich, you think they must know about everything. And they're slippin' their room keys in my hands two and three times a day -- different women -- so, here I think I'm scorin' big, right? And for awhile, you think - 'Hey, they wouldn't be doin' this if they didn't care about me, right?'"

When Baby assumed that he was just using the rich older women, he claimed it was just the reverse: "No, no, that's not it. That's the thing, Baby. See, it wasn't like that. They were usin' me" - and then they kissed passionately. He learned that her real name was Frances ("the first woman in the Cabinet"), and he called it a "real grown-up name." Later, while other resort guests were being entertained, Baby returned to Johnny for more playful cha-cha dance moves, and lip-synching to the tune of "Love Is Strange" by Mickey & Sylvia.

Johnny was pressured into changing up the final dance routine (for the closing night talent show) from the Mambo to the Pechanga, without being able to offer his own suggestions. When Baby suggested he should "fight harder" for his ideas ("Make them listen"), he spitefully reminded her that she never had any intention of being courageous enough to tell her family about their serious relationship ("I don't see you running up to Daddy telling him I'm your guy") before stalking off. However, they soon reconciled, and spent another evening in bed together in his cabin, to the tune of "In the Still of the Nite" sung by the Five Satins. He shared a dream he had of being embraced by her father. When she left Johnny's cabin late that evening after sex, one of Johnny's spurned would-be lovers (amongst the rich guests) spotted her and reported them to the management.

As the film wound down to its conclusion, Johnny was fired by the hotel's manager Max Kellerman (Jack Weston), a friend of the Housemans, for intermingling with the guests, including Baby. She had been forced to reveal that she had been with Johnny that evening, to provide him with an alibi when he was spitefully and wrongly accused of theft. With her father, 'Baby' confessed and apologized that she had lied about the cash for Penny's abortion - for good reason - and then accused her repressive father of elitism:

"I'm sorry I lied to you. But you lied, too. You told me everyone was alike and deserved a fair break. But you meant everyone who was like you. You told me you wanted me to change the world, to make it better. But you meant by becoming a lawyer or an economist and marrying someone from Harvard. I'm not proud of myself. But I'm in this family, too, and you can't keep giving me the silent treatment. There are a lot of things about me that aren't what you thought. But if you love me, you have to love all the things about me. And I love you, and I'm sorry I let you down. I'm so sorry, Daddy. But you let me down, too."

After Johnny informed Baby that he had been let go, she felt her dreams with him had been dashed: "So I did it for nothing. I hurt my family, you lost your job anyway, I did it for nothing!" He was still thankful for her faithfulness to him: "No, no, not for nothin', Baby! Nobody has ever done anything like that for me before." Johnny left the resort with Baby's father still believing that he had fathered Penny's child. His goodbye scene with Baby was accompanied by "She's Like the Wind" (performed by Patrick Swayze with Wendy Frazer), as he told her: "I'll never be sorry." She answered: "Neither will I" - and they kissed.

Goodbye Scene Between Baby and Johnny

In the film's finale at the smaltzy end-of-season show, Johnny returned to the resort and confronted Baby's parents (mostly her protective father). He told him that Baby shouldn't be seated in the corner at their family's table:

"Nobody puts Baby in a corner!"

Then, he led Baby to the stage. Although he had been fired from the staff, he interrupted and announced to the crowd:

"Sorry about the disruption, folks, but I always do the last dance of the season. This year somebody told me not to. So I'm gonna do my kind of dancin' with a great partner, who's not only a terrific dancer, but somebody who's taught me that there are people willing to stand up for other people no matter what it costs them. Somebody who's taught me about the kind of person I wanna be. Miss Frances Houseman."

And then to the tune of Bill Medley and Jennifer Warne's "(I've Had) The Time of My Life," he and Baby danced together (performing the dance moves they had practiced all summer), including Johnny lifting Baby above his head in the midst of the audience, and encouraging the many other guests at the Catskill Resort to loosen up and dance with them.

During the End-of-Season Talent Show: (Johnny: "I always do the last dance of the season")

Dr. Houseman had learned the truth about Penny's pregnancy and pulled Johnny aside to apologize about misjudging him: ("I know you weren't the one who got Penny in trouble...When I'm wrong, I say I'm wrong"). Then, he congratulated Baby: "You looked wonderful out there."

Fatal Attraction (1987)

Director Adrian Lyne's R-rated hit, Paramount Pictures' cautionary horror thriller, and popular cultural phenomenon was a wake-up warning about the consequences of careless cheating, with its mix of slasher violence and sex - perfect for the AIDS-epidemic era.

Acclaimed by critics and the public alike, it received six Academy Awards nominations (including Best Picture, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actress, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Film Editing and Best Director). but came away winless. Nonetheless, it was a massive hit - on a budget of $14 million, it took in $156.6 million (domestic) and $320.1 million (worldwide). Only one film grossed higher domestically - Three Men and a Baby (1987).

It was criticized as being misogynistic for treating the philandering husband as a victim and excusing his callous behavior, while demonizing his tempting, discarded mistress. One tabloid at the time disparaged the adulteress and downplayed the legitimate reason for her resentful anger, calling her "THE MOST HATED WOMAN IN AMERICA." The film's title became a well-known buzz-word: "fatal attraction" - meaning a lethally dangerous romantic relationship.

The erotic thriller told about the illicit, casual, and dangerous trysting affair-relationship between:

• Dan Gallagher (Michael Douglas) - a happily-married family man (of nine years) and Manhattan attorney
• Alexandra "Alex" Forrest (Glenn Close) - a femme fatale, a frizzy-haired literary book editor who turned into a predatory, terrorizing, stalking, obsessed, unbalanced psychopath when scorned or jilted

(l to r): Dan (Michael Douglas) and Beth Gallagher (Anne Archer)	First Encounter: Dan and Alex Forrest (Glenn Close)	Dan's Very Attractive Wife Beth
Book Editor Alex Forrest (Glenn Close)	Obvious Flirtations with Dan	Dinner Between Alex and Dan Gallagher

The cheating couple had three libidinous sexual encounters over two days, in her kitchen and bedroom and in her apartment's elevator on Saturday night, and then again in her bedroom on Sunday:

1. while Dan's wife Beth (Anne Archer) and their six year-old daughter Ellen (Ellen Hamilton Latzen) were away for the weekend in the country with Beth's parents, Dan and Alex had a Saturday night dinner in a fancy restaurant after work; there, Alex told Dan: "We were attracted to each other at the party. That was obvious. You're on your own for the night. That's also obvious. We're two adults." They retreated to her place, where she sat on the countertop of her kitchen. They both hurriedly stripped off their underwear to their ankles before he penetrated her. She used the tap water from the sink behind herself to cool down and dampen her blouse and exposed nipple while he ravaged her. Still joined to her, he carried her into the bedroom where they had passionate and sweaty sex together. Following sex, she asked: "Are you feeling energetic?" - and they went dancing
2. afterwards, when they were returning to her place, she asked: "Have you ever done it in an elevator?" On the way up to her apartment in a semi-public elevator, he pulled her dress half-way off to expose her breasts and suck on them. She stopped the carriage mid-5th floor to administer fellatio to him
3. the next day on Sunday when they met together again, they first went to the park, and then returned to her apartment for home-cooked dinner; he insisted: "I think you're terrific, but I'm married"; they again had sex in her bedroom when there were the first hints of her possessiveness when he was leaving after love-making and she objected: "I don't think I like this...The way you run away after every time we make love...; she became sarcastic: "'Be reasonable. What? Thank you. Good-bye. Don't call me. I'll call you'"; she made further condemnations: "You thought you'd have a good time. You didn't stop for a second to think about me....What rules?...Please don't justify yourself. It's pathetic. If you told me to f--k off, I'd have more respect for you"
4. when he was leaving, she asked for a 'friendly' kiss - then broke down and smothered him with kisses before showing her slit and bloody wrists that she had just attempted suicide; he rinsed her wrists in the sink, then wrapped them, and was forced to spend another night to tend to her

Alex became nightmarishly vindictive, pathological, obsessed, and scorned through repeated discussions and other actions. She sought vengeance against Dan and his family for being slighted and ignored, by many increasingly-desperate tactics and strategies:

• she visited Dan at his office to apologize for her behavior, and with an invite to performance of Madame Butterfly; there were also repeated phone calls to his office, ultimately also refused by Dan's secretary after he told Alex: "I don't think it's a good idea if we talk to each other anymore"; she also called his home in the middle of the night, demanding: "If you refuse to take my phone calls at the office, you leave me no choice....I've gotta see you"
• she claimed she was pregnant and didn't want an abortion that he was willing to pay for: ("What makes you think I want an abortion?...I want this child. It has nothing to do with you. I want it whether you're gonna be a part of it or not...I was hoping that you would want to be a part of it...I'm 36 years old. It may be my last chance to have a child...It's a big thing, but it doesn't have to be a problem. Really, it doesn't. You play fair with me, I'll play fair with you"); ultimately, Dan changed their telephone number to an unlisted one
• she insinuated herself into Dan's life with an awkward visit to his wife Beth in their NYC apartment (to express an interest as a buyer) since the family was moving to a new suburban home in Bedford; it was a way to tell Dan's wife that she was pregnant and to retrieve Dan's new phone number
• angered by her insinuations into his life, Dan visited her where she asserted that she would continue to harass him with terrorizing threats and demands, although she also asked Dan to hurt her: "It's gonna go on and on until you face up to your responsibilities....I'm pregnant. I'm going to have our child.... I'm not gonna be ignored, Dan...What are you so afraid of?...Go ahead, hit me. If you can't f--k me, why don't you just hit me?...Don't you ever pity me, you smug bastard...I won't allow you to treat me like some slut you can just bang a couple of times and throw in the garbage. I'm gonna be the mother of your child. I want a little respect"; she pressured him to agree to take responsibility for the baby
• and then when he was leaving, she threatened to tell his wife, and he burst into anger: "You tell my wife, I'll kill you"

"I'm pregnant"	"I want this child"	Afternoon Tea Meeting with Beth
"I'm pregnant. I'm going to have our child"	"I'm not gonna be ignored, Dan"	"You tell my wife, I'll kill you!"

• she stalked him at work, and poured acid on the hood of Dan's car in his parking garage
• as he drove to the country in a rented car (with her following in her car not far behind), he played an audio-taped message that she had sent to him that was filled with verbal abuse, and labeled "Play me":
  
  "Hello, Dan. Are you surprised? This is what you've reduced me to. I guess you thought you'd get away with it. Well, you can't. 'Cause part of you is growing inside of me, and that's a fact, Dan, and - you'd better start learning how to deal with it. 'Cause you know, I-I feel you. I taste you. I think you. I touch you. Can you understand? Can you? I'm just asking you to acknowledge your responsibilities. Is that so bad? I don't think so. I-I don't think it's unreasonable. And, you know, another thing is that you thought that you could just walk into my life, and turn it upside down, without a thought for anyone but yourself. You know what you are, Dan? You're a cock-sucking son of a bitch. I hate you. I bet you don't even like girls, do you? Ha! You disappoint me, you f--kin' faggot!" (Dan played more of the tape later that evening, with additional threats: "I bet you don't even like girls, do you? They probably scare you. I know I do. So you're scared of me, aren't you? You're f--kin' frightened of me. You're afraid. You're afraid, aren't you? You gutless, heartless, spineless f--king son of a bitch. I hate you. You deserve everything you get"); her drastic, psychotic transformation undercut her strong, businesswoman character as a liberated, single career woman with a free spirit
• she parked outside their new suburban home that night and spied on the family through a window as young Ellen received a gift of a white rabbit in a cage from her father; the family's pet bunny (named Whitey) was kept in a hutch in the yard
• in a horrifying sequence, Beth discovered the family's bunny boiling in a pot on the kitchen stove at their country Bedford home after they returned - it was the result of Alex's predatory revenge on the Gallaghers, by making 'hare stew' (filmed with suspenseful cut-aways of the child running to the empty rabbit hutch and screaming out: "Whitey's gone!")
• as a result, Dan confessed his affair (and Alex's alleged pregnancy) to Beth; she immediately demanded that Dan leave ("Get out! I want you out of here!...How could you do this? I hate you!"), and also called Alex (who was also alerted by Dan) to warn that she would kill her if the terrorizing behavior persisted ("If you ever come near my family again, I'll kill you. You understand?")
• Alex temporarily kidnapped Dan's six year-old daughter from her school and took her to the Playland Amusement Park (Rye, NY) for a few hours; during her frantic search for her daughter, Beth suffered an injury in a rear-ender car accident and was briefly hospitalized
• Dan retaliated by attacking Alex in her apartment, and almost strangled her to death; she counter-assaulted with a kitchen-knife that he wrestled from her, but then he decided to not use the knife on her - she gave him an enigmatic smile as he left

In the final climactic confrontational scene in the Gallagher's bathroom, Beth was preparing a hot bath for herself. As she wiped the mirror of condensation, the crazed Alex appeared behind her wielding the large kitchen knife - and very upset that Beth was standing in the way of her 'happiness' with Dan - in the film's final lines of dialogue: ("You're trying to move him into the country, and you're keeping him away from me. And you're playing happy family. Aren't you? You wouldn't understand that because you're so selfish...You're a stupid, selfish bitch!"). Downstairs, Dan was alerted to trouble when the bathtub began to overflow and he heard Beth's screams.

Dan came upon Beth being vengefully assaulted and a massive brawl broke out. Although he was slashed a few times, he grabbed Alex around the neck and submerged her in the hot water in the bathtub to again strangle and drown her. Alex's eyes turned white and she stopped struggling and went limp, but then suddenly and explosively although half-drowned, she jolted back to life.

"Return From the Dead" Shock Ending

With a deep breath, she rose up resurrected from the bathtub to strike again, but her rampage was finally subdued for good when shot in the chest by Beth at the doorway. The killing was depicted as justified punishment for her seductive transgressions.

The 'return from the dead' scene paid homage to a similar bathtub scene in the French film Les Diaboliques (1955, Fr.).

[Note: In the original ending, Alex killed herself, leaving Dan to be framed for her murder. The victimized husband was led away after being arrested by police on suspicion of murder. The scorned pregnant Alex had committed suicide with a knife (with Dan's fingerprints on it) while dressed in white, to the tune of "Madame Butterfly". When preview audiences demanded a more satisfying and catharctic ending, a new ending (the current theatrical ending) was reshot. Its crowd-pleasing new ending was determined by focus groups and preview audiences and substituted for the original version found in the script and filmed earlier - demonstrating how test audiences can have a profound effect on the movies.]

Law of Desire (1987, Sp.) (aka La Ley Del Deseo)

Writer/director Pedro Almodovar's breakthrough serious melodrama (known as the director's first official gay film) was censored in the US for its explicit and disturbing scenes of gay sex and its complexity of gender-confusing characters. However, it was the first of his films to be released in the US, and regarded as one of the first films to treat homosexuality as a normal occurrence.

It told about a love triangle, which concluded with tragic (amour fou) consequences (deaths of two of the three main male roles, a murder and a suicide), between three unusual male characters (all gay):

• Pablo Quintero (Eusebio Poncela), a gay, narcissistic, cocaine-snorting, sexually-promiscuous man, also a very successful Madrid film and theatre director
• Juan Bermúdez (Miguel Molina), a handsome, curly-haired blue-collar worker and bisexual; also Pablo's regular, younger long-time gay lover, although Juan was fearful of commitment, and was leaving for the summer; Juan was an actor in Pablo's latest film; he had one final night of love with Pablo before departing
• Antonio Benítez (Antonio Banderas), a handsome but novice, closeted, uptight and unstable homosexual, both possessive and obsessed (over Pablo), who experienced penetrative anal sex for the first time with Pablo; over time, he became a dangerous and psychotic stalker - in a shockingly jealous act because of Pablo's love for Juan, Antonio traveled to the seaside summer resort where Juan was working with his family, and killed him by pushing him over a cliff (marked by a phallic lighthouse)
  
  [Note: Many regarded this film as the gay male version of the same year's Fatal Attraction (1987) - see above.]

Pablo with Antonio (including a Gay Kiss and Penetrative Anal Sex) - A One Night Stand in Director Pablo's Apartment
Other Sexual Encounters Between Pablo and Antonio

There was also a fourth involved character named Tina (Carmen Maura), Pablo's sister, and a struggling actress. (Pablo wished to film his/her life-story.) She was a voluptuous, male-to-female trans-sexual who had been incestuously involved with her now-estranged father and subsequently hated men. She was strongly rumored to be a lesbian, but she eventually took a dangerous and manipulative lover - Antonio. For much of the film, Tina served as a surrogate single mother for a 10 year-old named Ada (Manuela Velasco), the daughter of Tina's lover - a statuesque model (Bibi Andersen, a famous trans-sexual) who had abandoned Ada and eloped with a photographer.

The film included masturbation, gay sex, and anal sex - all presented realistically. In the opening sequence on Pablo's film set ("a film within a film"), a male film model (Juan A. Granja) was instructed to follow directions by Pablo's off-screen voice. He removed his clothes down to his underwear, kissed his own lips in a mirror, and then rubbed his genitals against the mirror. After removing his briefs, he was told to touch himself. He began to masturbate on his stomach (viewed from his buttocks-side) until orgasming. He was paid cash for his film appearance.

One of the more striking and memorable scenes (allegedly inspired by the similar fountain bathing scene in Federico Fellini’s masterpiece, La Dolce Vita (1960) with Anita Ekberg) was one in which Tina reveled in her femininity and cooled off on a hot night, when she was hosed down (a phallic symbol) and soaked to the skin by a street-cleaning man on a nighttime Madrid street, as Pablo and Ada watched.

Trans-Sexual Tina (Carmen Maura) Hosed Down as Pablo and Ada Watched

Lethal Weapon (1987)

Director Richard Donner's Lethal Weapon (1987) a mismatched buddy-cop action film, was the first in a long-running series starring Mel Gibson as suicidal cop Sgt. Martin Riggs, a Vietnam vet (Green Beret) and ex-Special Forces sniper. He worked alongside Sgt. Roger Murtaugh (Danny Glover), a 50 year-old family man and LAPD homicide detective. Its tagline was:

• Two cops. Glover carries a weapon. Gibson is one. He's the only L.A. cop registered as a LETHAL WEAPON.

The film opened (during and after the credits) with the drug-induced homicidal-suicide of scantily-clad 22 year-old prostitute and drug-user Amanda Hunsaker (Jackie Swanson). She was lying half-naked on her bed in an LA high-rise penthouse apartment where she was snorting lines of a powdery drug (from an opened pill capsule), then went to the balcony and climbed up onto the railing. She performed a somersaulting swan dive to her death many stories below onto the roof of a car.

Drug-Induced Death (Murder) of Prostitute Amanda (Jackie Swanson)

It appeared that she had committed suicide, but her autopsy showed that she had been poisoned with liquid drain cleaner laced into her pills and was about to die anyway - and therefore was potentially murdered. Her prostitute friend Dixie (Lycia Naff) had been with her and had laced her barbituate pills with Drano. Later in the film, it was revealed that Amanda was involved in prostitution and pornography, and that she was the daughter of one of Riggs' ex-war buddies Michael Hunsaker (Tom Atkins) involved in the CIA.

To provide equal time in this action film for female viewers, Sgt. Riggs emerged from his parked camper-shell-trailer bed to strut bare-assed into his kitchen for a cold beer and greet his collie at the door, while a day-time game show played on his television. His introduction was a preface to a more disturbing scene in which Riggs suicidally jammed a service revolver halfway down his throat, due to substance abuse and a deep depression regarding his wife's recent death in an auto accident. He was literally labeled as a "lethal weapon."

A Man in Love (1987) (aka Un Homme Amoureux)

French director/writer Diane Kurys (with her first English language film) told a romantic tale of infidelity. The passionate and erotic art film (a film about film-making itself) was about the life of the suicidal Italian poet Cesare Pavese and his last love, Gabriella. According to the director Kurys, her film was based on her experiences as a bit-part actress in Fellini’s Casanova (1976, It.).

Its taglines were:

• "Love Devours Only the Hungry."
• "They should never have met, now passion can't keep them apart"

The tale of extra-marital adultery opened with an excursion to Rome, Italy undertaken by an English-born actress and her British journalist-father Harry Steiner (John Berry). She was offered a small role in an American film set in the 1950s - a film about the writer Cesare Pavese.

She became an ardent and infatuated lover involved in an extra-marital affair while on the Italian set during film-making with her male co-star:

• Jane Steiner (Greta Scacchi), an earthy and sensual leading lady, an English-born starlet actress, portraying the character of Gabriella; at the time, Jane had been involved with her fiancee - French lover-friend Bruno (Vincent Lindon)
• Steve Elliott (Peter Coyote), a self-possessed, temperamental, egotistical American movie star, portraying the character of Cesare Pavese; Steve was married to Susan (Jamie Lee Curtis) with two children and they lived in NYC - she had remained at home during filming, while he was renting a villa on the outskirts of Rome during the film's production

The first sexual encounter between Jane and Steve was while they were dancing together to a scratchy phonograph record, and he impulsively touched her breast through her bright red dress. He suggested, "Let's go" and they went to his room. There as he sat on the bed, she unbuttoned the front of her dress and unhooked her bra to reveal her breasts to him. As he hugged her body to himself, he then let out a terrifying series of primal screams, causing her to beg: "Don't hurt me."

[Note: It was revealed to be part of a film scene - when the crews and camera were shown from another angle.]

Jane (Greta Scacchi) with Steve - Their First Sexual Encounter: In A Film Within a Film

During dinner that evening, Steve bluntly asked Jane: "Will you stay with me tonight?" but they didn't become intimate, because she was too paranoid after smoking too much marijuana.

Their secretive romance was threatened by various circumstances in other relationships that hindering their passionate love-making:

• the unexpected arrival of Steve's neglected and estranged wife Susan
• the discovery by Jane's own French fiancee-boyfriend Bruno that Jane was having an affair
• the lingering terminal illness of Jane's dying mother Julia Steiner (Claudia Cardinale) with cancer back in France

However, they had another chance later on, when he began slowly touching her under her blouse, and they purposely hesitated to kiss each other until their erotic tension was so great that they couldn't resist each other. He dropped his pants and they began to make love against the wall, as they continued to nibble at each other with love bites - the camera tracked in for close-ups of their faces.

A Very Amorous Encounter and Kiss

They had many other opportunities to make love, and in one instance, he bought her a black piece of lingerie that she put on to model for him.

However, it was fairly clear that Steve would never leave his wife for her, and they were almost discovered together when Jane was showering and Steve's suspicious wife arrived for a surprise visit.

After returning to Tuscany, France to care for her mother and mourning her loss, the character of Jane - the actual protagonist of the film (not the 'man') - was self-awakened and transformed by film's end. She typed a semi-autobiographical manuscript for her first book - titled: "A Man in Love."

Mannequin (1987)

Director Michael Gottlieb's PG-rated fantasy romance/comedy was about the unlikely occurrence of a young artist falling in love with a store mannequin. In preparation for the silly urban fairy tale, the film's female star Kim Cattrall, later one of the co-stars of HBO's Sex and the City (from 1998-2004), posed for a sculptor in Santa Monica who created six life-sized dolls in her likeness.

If this plot seemed appealing - love with a "dummy," "doll," or "statue" - other similar films included:

• One Touch of Venus (1948), starring Ava Gardner [Note: Mannequin (1987) was a modern-day remake of this film]
• Mannequin: On the Move (1991), a sequel, starring Kristy Swanson
• Lars and the Real Girl (2007), starring Ryan Gosling as a delusional young man with a life-like sex-doll bought off the Internet to serve as his girlfriend Bianca

One Touch of Venus (1948)

Mannequin: On the Move (1991)

Lars and the Real Girl (2007)

The main department-store 'mannequin' character was:

• Ema 'Emmy' Hesire (Kim Cattrall) - actually an ancient time-travelling Edfu, Egyptian princess. In the film's opening, Emmy was protesting her mother's (Phyllis Newman) plans for another arranged marriage to a fuel merchant ("a camel dung dealer"), and hiding out in a tomb disguised as a mummy. She complained: "Mother, I don't want to settle down. I want to do things and invent things. I want to try things that nobody's ever tried before." She prayed to the gods: "Mother, there's got to be a better way. Please, gods. Please help me find it."

Projected into the present day in Philadelphia, she would ultimately come to life for:

• Jonathan Switcher (Andrew McCarthy), a young aspiring sculptor living in Philadelphia, who was initially employed (until fired) at Naython's - a mannequin-manufacturing factory

Jonathan's first line of dialogue was delivered to a female mannequin (without arms and legs) that he was working on, to the tune of "My Girl" (by the Temptations): "What would you say if I told you, you get more beautiful every day?" He had been slaving away on the mannequin for six days, and boasted: "I could turn out three or four of these a month," but his boss demanded three or four a day! He was summarily fired.

Later in the film, after failing at other jobs for being too much of an artistic perfectionist, during a thunderstorm, he was shocked to see his mannequin displayed in the store window of downtown's Prince & Company Department Store (nowadays Wanamaker's or Macy's). He was very proud of his creation:

"It's you! I wanted to take you home, but they wouldn't let me. You know you're the first thing I've created in a really long time that made me feel like an artist."

The store was celebrating its 100th anniversary. Through good fortune, he acquired a job there as a stock boy, and in private, was able to speak to his creation to express his love for her: "All artists must fall in love with their creations, but you seem so special." He began working with the store's flamboyant window-dresser Hollywood Montrose (Meshach Taylor).

Jonathan's perfect creation suddenly came to life (with Emmy's 4,500 year-old spirit), while he felt that he was either hallucinating or going crazy:

Emmy: "When you were making me, didn't you feel a certain inspiration? Almost like your hands were being moved by force not of this world? You made this body so that I could come to life!
Jonathan: "Am I in the twilight zone or am I just nuts?"
Emmy: (hugging him) "I'm so glad I picked you!"
Jonathan: "I'm gonna create someone who doesn't like me?"

Soon after, Jonathan 'stood up' a date with his girlfriend Roxie Shield (Carole Davis), and then told her the next day: "I really think I'm goin' crazy. I saw things I know couldn't have happened....You know the mannequin I told you about, the one that I made? Well, she's here, Roxie. She came to life and she knew who I was, OK?...I'm not lying. I'm insane."

Henceforth, Jonathan's magnificent mannequin-window displays with Emmy helped to bring back business to Prince & Company - in fierce competition with a newer and trendier store called Illustra across the street where his ex-girlfriend Roxie worked. At the same time, Jonathan was carrying on a secret romance with Emmy, who became his inspirational artistic muse.

For his initial productive efforts, Jonathan was promoted to visual merchandising. Emmy had to remind him that she only came alive to him:

Jonathan: "Just when I think you're real, you vanish. What's with you?" Emmy: "What's with me? Didn't I tell you? You're the only one who can see me like this."

Roxie kept pressuring Jonathan to come to work at Illustra as their chief window dresser. He refused and Prince & Company's profits skyrocketed, while sales were down 89% at Illustra. For his continued success, Jonathan was appointed VP of the department store. However, there were problems looming for him since there were incriminating photos of Jonathan embracing a mannequin, and Illustra's CEO B.J. Wert (Stephen Vinovich) believed they provided enough proof to blackmail Jonathan into working for Illustra.

Emmy: "Are you sure this is right for you?"

Jonathan Photographed in an Embrace with Mannequin

Jonathan Carrying Emmy-Mannequin into Women's Room

Prince & Company's conniving, fired senior manager Mr. Richards (James Spader) (working as a 'mole' to help Illustra), the bumbling night-security guard Felix Maxwell (G. W. Bailey), and other co-workers suspected that Jonathan was having an unusual and possibly perverted romantic affair (and "talking to the dummy again"). The "covert operation" orchestrated by Wert was to have Richards and Felix kidnap all of the female mannequins at the rival store (not knowing which one was a problem) for blackmailing purposes. However, their plan failed when Jonathan refused to be pressured to work for Illustra.

Roxie joined in to gather all of the kidnapped mannequins and destroy them by placing them on a conveyor belt to be dumped into a trash compactor. Miraculously, Jonathan was able to save Emmy - he grabbed her arm - and her plastic appendage turned to flesh as she permanently came to life for him: ("Jonathan, you saved me...I'm alive...He can see me and I'm still alive!...You're gonna have to love me forever"). He answered: "I always have and I always will."

Saved From Trash Compactor, Brought to Life - and Married!

By the film's conclusion, Richards and Felix were arrested, and Roxie was fired by Wert as he was hauled off.

Emmy had found 'true love' with Jonathan. The couple were married in the Prince & Company store window with Hollywood as Best Man, to the tune of "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now" performed by Jefferson Starship on the soundtrack. Bystanders and pedestrians on the sidewalk witnessed them through the store window exchanging marital vows.

Maurice (1987, UK)

This semi-autobiographical and melodramatic film was adapted from E. M. Forster's banned novel (written in 1914 but then posthumously published in 1971 after the author's death). It was the second Forster novel to be adapted for the screen by Merchant Ivory, following A Room With a View (that was released in 1985). Their third film adaptation was Howards End (1992). Its tagline was:

• "A love story of unforgettable passion."

The groundbreaking film was about the problems of coming of age for repressed homosexuals in a restrictive British Edwardian society in pre-WWI 1910. Two Cambridge University undergraduates studied together and engaged in a platonic love relationship between 1909-1913:

• Maurice (pronounced "Morris") Hall (James Wilby), a shy blonde; ultimately a stockbroker
• Clive Durham (Hugh Grant), amiable, young, upper-class, highly intellectual and interested in Greek philosophy; ultimately, he acquired the family estate and became a priggish magistrate

In one of the film's sexier (but non-explicit) scenes, Clive rested his head on the white flannel-trousered knee of Maurice as they stroked each other's hair before embracing.

Clive Durham (Hugh Grant)	Maurice Hall (James Wilby)
Maurice (James Wilby) with Clive (Hugh Grant) - First Physical Affection

Later in the film, Clive gave up his 'forbidden' or illegal love (referred to as 'the unspeakable vice of the Greeks', but never consummated) and married naive, well-meaning and shy Anne (Phoebe Nicholls), to avoid risking his political career or other fortunes.

His desertion left Maurice to seek advice from family Doctor Barry (Denholm Elliott) and unconventional London hypnotist Lasker-Jones (Ben Kingsley) for help in "curing" or understanding his homosexuality. When Maurice decided to not 'convert' his sexual orientation, Lasker-Jones advised him to move to France or Italy - countries that didn't treat homosexuality as a criminal offense. Maurice was hopeful that England would relax its prohibitions, but was told:

England has always been disinclined to accept human nature.

Later, Maurice decided to "share" himself with Alec Scudder (Rupert Graves), the lower-class, uneducated gamekeeper working at Clive's country estate. The much more explicit and physical scene included both rear and frontal male nudity. He admitted his sexual encounter to Clive, both at the estate and in a hotel room: "Alec slept with me in the Russet Room when you and Anne were away...Also in town." Clive responded that he hoped their relationship would have been platonic:

"The sole excuse for a relationship between two men is that it remains purely platonic. Surely you agree to that."

In the film's conclusion, Alec wrote a letter to Maurice, asking for a final meeting in a boathouse before he departed: ("Then come down to the boathouse. Dear Sir, let me share with you once before leaving Old England if it's not asking too much"). There, the two men engaged in a passionate kiss, and Alec decided to abandon his plans to emigrate in order to remain with Maurice: (Alec: "Now we shan't never be parted").

Nekromantik (1987, W. Germ.)

Director Jorg Buttgereit's first time feature film was this low-budget, cultish and controversial German gross-out, depraved horror film. It also started with a quote from V.L. Compton:

"What lives that does not live from the death of someone else?"

It also opened with a disclaimer:

WARNING: Some of this film may be seen as "grossly"
offensive and should not be shown to minors!!!

The sex-horror movie was reviled and banned in many countries for its depiction of necrophilia and other graphic activities and perversions - urination, bathing in bloody water, an autopsy, sex with corpses, rabbit cruelty (killing and skinning), cat disembowelment, graveyard sex, and decapitation by a shovel.

The two main characters exhibited extremely unusual behavior:

• Robert "Rob" Schmadtke (Daktari Lorenz), a suicidal and manic-depressive, passive worker at Joe's Cleaning Agency specializing in body removal after accidents - he was a necrophiliac who often had grotesque dreams/fantasies
• Betty (Beatrice Manowski), Rob's girlfriend, also a necrophiliac

The film opened with the aftermath of a horrific car accident, being cleaned up by Rob, employed by Joe's Cleaning Agency (JSA) - notable for its symbol of a star-shaped pentagram surrounding a skull and crossbones (Totenkopf) on the company's truck/van. There were views of the bloodied, deceased victims (in and outside the vehicle). After work, Rob returned to his apartment where he kept a collection of preserved remains in various jars filled with formaldehyde. He added to his assortment of human parts gathered from his day's work, stored on a multi-shelved rack.

Cleaning Up After a Horrific and Gruesome Car Accident
		Fascist-themed Company
Car Crash Victims

Betty enjoyed bathing in bloody water, while Rob watched a televised interview with a psychiatrist speaking about phobias, including arachnophobia. Rob often had grotesque dreams/fantasies (one was of the slaughter of his childhood pet - a rabbit when he was a boy).

In the next sequence, an unnamed apple-picker/gardener (Harald Weis) was accidentally shot in the neck and killed by his neighbor (Volker Hauptvogel) (who was aiming at birds), who then hid the body to avoid incrimination by depositing it in a pond. In his job duties, Rob was able to make off with the rotting cadaver and brought it home to Betty - and they fondled it lovingly.

During a threesome with a rotting corpse, Betty found pleasure in making love to it with a sawed-off piece of broom handle (outfitted with a condom) stuck in its groin as a makeshift penis. After the menage a trois sequence, Betty pounded a raw steak before frying it in a pan, for a meal served with a blood-red liquid. The decomposing body also served as a "toy" or wall decoration in their apartment (next to a centerfold) - plates were set under the corpse to catch dripping fluids. The next day, Betty performed cunnilingus upon herself with the corpse's head.

Everything took a downturn when Rob was fired from his job and Betty fled (with the corpse). To reach new heights of degradation, Rob angrily resorted to:

• committing animal torture, mutilation and the brutal killing of his own cat (and submerging himself under the dead animal in his bathtub while bathing in bloody water from its innards)
• watching a misogynistic, cheap teen slasher horror movie in a theatre with other unemotional patrons
• suicidal drug use and excessive alcohol consumption
• and a dream sequence of his own partial decomposition inside a garbage bag

Mutilation of His Own Cat

'Film Within a Film' - Slasher Horror

Dream: Rotting Away in a Garbage Bag

After tossing a decapitated head and some entrails back and forth with a woman dressed in white, Rob enjoyed kinky graveyard copulation with a prostitute (atop a tombstone), but failed due to impotence. When she mocked and laughed at him for his sexual dysfunction, he strangled her and had sex with her corpse. The next morning, he also murdered an elderly man in the graveyard by chopping his head off with a shovel.

In the film's final socially-isolated sequence, Robert simultaneously masturbated and committed disembowelment (hari-kiri) with a knife - culminating in an orgasmic semen-blood mixed expiration, a sexualized suicide. It was intercut with a reverse-motion ungutting of the rabbit from his previous dream.

Rob's Simultaneous Masturbation (Semen and Blood) and Disembowelment Suicide

The last shot - ending in a freeze frame - was his grave plot (marked with a wooden cross bearing his name) being dug up by an unidentified woman (wearing stockings and high heels) - had Betty returned for his dead body to perform more necrophilia?

A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987)

This was the third film in the long-running horror-film franchise, A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987), featuring the taglines:

• If you think you'll get out alive, You must be dreaming.
• He is death itself - Freddy Krueger. And now the dagger-fingered phantom has returned to claim the last of the Elm St. children.

In this second sequel, a group of suicidal teens (the 'last of the Elm St. kids'), all children of the vigilante parents in Springwood, Ohio who had burned and killed demented child murderer Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund), were experiencing a group hypnosis therapy session during their treatment at Westin Hills Psychiatric Hospital.

One of the teens, mute and infatuated Joey Crusel (Rodney Eastman) followed cute candy-striper Marcie (Stacey Alden) wearing her white nurse's uniform down the hallway to an unoccupied room. There, she confided how she was attracted to him now that she was alone with him ("I really like you. Do you like me? I know this sounds crazy, but I make excuses to come into the ward every day, just to see you. I'd get into a lot of trouble for this, but I know you won't say anything, will you?").

In the ward's empty dorm room, the sexy Marcie turned around and enticed Joey by inviting him to "unzip me" - and she soon stood bare-breasted before him, asking:

"Do you like my body, Joey?"

Marcie (Stacey Alden): "Do you like my body, Joey?"

Wearing only a skimpy white thong, she urged him to lie back, crawled on top of him, and then kissed him.

The probing and deep kiss gagged Joey as Marcie's tongue grew supernaturally and burrowed deep into his mouth. Two elongated tongues burst from her mouth and twisted around Joey's wrists on the headboard, and two more tongues lashed his feet to the footboard bedposts. Her face and body were transformed into the grotesque Freddy Krueger, who quipped:

"What's wrong, Joey? Feeling tongue-tied?"

No Way Out (1987)

Director Roger Donaldson's twisting and suspenseful political action-thriller was a remake of director John Farrow's noirish The Big Clock (1948), starring Ray Milland and Charles Laughton. The film's tagline was:

• "Is it a Crime of Passion or an Act of Murder?"

One of the story lines was about the scandalous and hot love affair between:

• Lt. Cmdr. Tom Farrell (Kevin Costner), a uniformed Naval officer, who was posted at the Pentagon
• Susan Atwell (Sean Young), the sexy, high-class mistress-escort of the Secretary of Defense David Brice (Gene Hackman), to whom Farrell directly reported [Note: At first, Farrell was unaware that she was his superior's mistress]

Farrell met Susan wearing a low-cut evening gown at a Presidential Inaugural Ball in Washington DC, and after some small talk, suggested: "Let's get outta here." She replied: "My date's not gonna like that very much" to which he replied: "But, what the hell? His wife'll be delighted."

Farrell seduced her into having sexual intercourse with him in the back seat of a moving stretch limousine (chauffeured by an inquisitive driver named Bill) on the way to a Georgetown apartment. He kissed her, unzipped her dress to reveal a black bra, touched her breast's nipple with two fingers, and then pulled off her dress. She offered him her panties. From the car, a phallic-related view of the erect and tall Washington Monument passed by.

Sex in the Back of a Chauffeured Limousine with Susan Atwell

He then unfastened her lacy garter straps as she reached to help undress him before having sex. Post-coitus, he introduced himself: "My name's Tom," and she replied: "I'm Susan." At her party girl friend Nina Beka's (Iman) apartment door, she stood naked after removing her fur coat as she waved goodbye, laughed, and borrowed Nina's apartment's bed for the evening:

"We need your bed."

When an enraged David Brice suspected Atwell of having a love affair with another man: "Who were you with this weekend?" and she replied: "Why worry? There's plenty left," he slapped her. When she accused him of being a "pig," he accidentally killed her by striking her - causing her to crash backwards off her second-story balcony and break her neck from the fall on a glass dining room table on the first floor.

Susan Atwell's Accidental Murder by David Brice

Farrell was innocent of the murder, but became involved when Brice instigated a top-secret murder cover-up, and Lt. Farrell was assigned to investigate and discover Atwell's lover and supposed murderer. Little did Brice know that Atwell's other lover was actually a KGB spy - Farrell himself.

Brice's own ruthless General Counsel Scott Pritchard (Will Patton) offered advice - that Brice should blame the crime on a bogus, never-seen, rumored Russian KGB mole/spy code-named "Yuri" who was seen leaving Atwell's house. He described the scandalous problem:

Do you realize the magnitude of the scandal? The Secretary of Defense and a Soviet agent sharing the favors of a murdered whore.

Farrell furiously raced against time to find blame elsewhere during an internal investigation that he was assigned to, that might have falsely implicated himself as Atwell's killer (because he also had a sexual relationship with Atwell), and might expose his real identity. Not revealed until later what Farrell's motivations were, he was actually gathering intelligence from Atwell (since she was Brice's mistress) when she shockingly turned up dead.

In the film's climactic ending, Brice shifted the blame to his Counsel Scott Pritchard, naming him as the spy Yuri (arguing that homosexual Pritchard was jealous of Brice's relationship with Susan). Pritchard committed suicide by shooting himself in the head in his office - and was falsely exposed as "Yuri" - the KGB spy.

Brice informed investigators that the search for "Yuri" was over - Pritchard had been exposed as the KGB spy; however, Farrell sent the printout of registered foreign contributions to the CIA director Marshall to further indict his boss Brice, and was able to escape from the Pentagon before a processed Polaroid negative revealed him with Atwell.

Siesta (1987)

This plot-twisting, surreal, often confusing and odd arthouse film was the first time directorial effort of Mary Lambert. (Lambert's next film was the Stephen King adaptation Pet Sematary (1989), and she followed up with its sequel in 1992.) It was praised for its jazzy-trumpet score by trumpeter Miles Davis.

Much of the film reminded the viewer of the film Memento (2000). Its screenplay (by Patricia Louisianna Knop) was based on a novel by Patrice Chaplin (Charlie Chaplin’s granddaughter) first published in 1987. It was a major box-office flop - it was budgeted at $5 million and box-office revenue was only $700,000.

Its title was referenced in its tagline:

• "The time of day when mystery and eroticism become one."

It was nominated for two Razzie Awards in the Worst Supporting Actress category:

• Grace Jones as Conchita
• Isabella Rossellini as Marie

The mystery-drama opened with the intriguing scene of an unidentified female (Ellen Barkin) awakening at the edge of an airport runway near Madrid - on the Fourth of July. She was clothed in a bright red party dress (without underwear) and she noticed that her body was covered in bruises and someone else's blood. She screamed, ran down a roadway (avoiding an oncoming truck) to a nearby stream.

Opening Sequence with Claire (Ellen Barkin)

There, she stripped off the dress and rinsed out the blood. She mumbled to herself that she might be involved in a murder (yes - her own!), although she was completely confused and forgetful of what might have happened to her:

"It's not my blood, must be somebody else's. I must have really hurt him. I must have hurt him pretty bad."

Then, she dried herself by the sun's rays on the muddy bank of the water before reclothing herself. Afterwards, she ran down a road, hailed a taxi, and in the back seat, she exclaimed:

"I'm in Spain! Aw, jeez. What the f--k am I doing here?"

Her passport, money and everything else were in her bag - which she didn't have: "I don't have money. Everything's in my bag. My passport, everything. My god, what's happened to me?...I remember coming here, and I don't remember anything else."

Suffering from amnesia and not knowing her past, the film then flashbacked (with mixed-up or scrambled memories including flash-forwards) to five days earlier, to reveal her identity:

• she was a professional daredevil stuntwoman at Death Valley, CA named Claire, who was lovelessly married for six years to Del (Martin Sheen), her shameless, Southern-drawling promoter
• Del was pressuring Claire to perform a free-fall stunt (death-defying without a parachute) on July 4th into a giant safety net stretched over an artificial, man-made volcano - the event was heralded as "Claire on a Dare" (similar to various real-life stunts performed by US dare-devil Evel Knievel)
• before the July 4th event, Claire had hurriedly abandoned Del and traveled to Spain to see her old boyfriend - Spanish trapeze-artist Augustine (Gabriel Byrne) who had trained her for aerial acrobatics as his "star pupil"
• she left a message on their own phone-answering machine to alert Del to her whereabouts, while standing in front of an insignia ("LIVE FAST DIE YOUNG") [Note: Actress Ellen Barkin was marrried to Byrne in 1988 and then divorced him in 1993.]

The lewd taxi driver (Alexy Syale) with steel-capped teeth dropped Claire off in downtown Madrid, Spain, where she entered a church and prayed: "I must be in some kind of trouble." In a flashback, she met up with Augustine and wanted to reignite their love affair despite the fact that he was married to a very jealous Marie (Isabella Rossellini), a wealthy woman. He warned her: "Go away from here, Claire. Please! There will be trouble if you stay." In the street, Claire noticed a newspaper article about herself - an American Female ("Daredevil") who remained lost. Apparently, she was being pursued by local police who believed that she had murdered someone.

Newspaper Article About "Daredevil" American

Nancy (Jodie Foster)

Kit (Julian Sands)

After being stalked and propositioned by the cab-driver, she entered a posh photo-exhibition gallery party in progress (one of the photos exhibited was of herself). She met up with a number of profligate individuals, including artist Kit (Julian Sands), his possessive wife Desdra (Anastassia Stakis), and upper-class, bi-sexual socialite Nancy (Jodi Foster) who was sexually-partnered with Kit and also had feelings for Claire.

Claire's Sexual Escapades with Kit and Nancy

Claire expressed her confused worries to Kit: "I killed someone. I'm in love with a man and I killed his wife." When Claire met Marie, Marie stated that Claire's death-jumps without a parachute meant: "Perhaps feeling closer to death makes her feel more alive." One afternoon during 'siesta' time, Claire approached Augustine and propositioned him: "Make love to me," but he declined, although he suggested they get together at the same time in the future.

Meanwhile, Claire was also experiencing premonitions of her own murder, although she didn't realize it. Kit advised her that she might learn from her mistakes: "The marvelous thing about making mistakes is that you can keep making them, the same ones, over and over again," but Claire disagreed with his assessment: ("You maybe, not me. To me, mistakes are desperate things. If I make a mistake, even a very tiny one, I'm through, the end, the eternal black"). Claire seemed to have a death-wish - exemplified by her daredevil-jump: "When I jump, I know that if I make a mistake, I won't have to account for it later."

Strangely, she jumped onto the roof of a tour bus that dropped tourists off at a bull-ring, where she fled and was picked up by the same cabbie who was now threatening rape ("You f--k with me on top, OK?"). Claire claimed she wouldn't feel or know anything if she closed her eyes: "I'll forget it when it's over. I'm forgetting it right now...You call the rules, fat boy. Whatever you say. I'm not going to feel it anyway..." A car crash interrupted his threats.

During a fateful sexual rendezvous between Augustine and Claire at siesta time, she requested that he run away with her. The sequence was interspersed with the cabbie's rape-assault on Claire, as he beat her and yelled: "You're no good!" After Claire removed her panties, Augustine touched her breasts as he pulled down on her red dress. They were both naked and began to make love, with deadly consequences the result.

Police sped to the scene of a murder, and Claire was swept along with a group of townspeople who rushed through the streets to view the crime scene. Kit appeared along side Claire and advised her: "Don't fight it any more, love. Go where you're being taken."

When she awoke in Augustine's arms after sex, Claire was attacked by a crazed Maria wielding a knife, and viciously stabbed in the abdomen. Augustine fought off Maria, and then crouched over the body of his loved one.

The killer Maria was arrested and led away by the authorities - much later it was revealed - after having disposed of Claire's body at the airport: ("Maria, why did you leave her body at the airport?"). Augustine walked by Claire, but he didn't see her as she spoke the film's final line of dialogue to him:

Claire: "Augustine, tell me. If it wasn't her who was killed, if it was me, why do I still feel such love?"

Claire's Love-Making Rendezvous with Augustine - With Deadly Consequences

The film's often-used gimmicky plot twist at the end was that Claire had been murdered by Augustine's crazed wife and her experiences were only the jumbled, fantasy thoughts and dreams of her final moments before her death.

Slave Girls From Beyond Infinity (1987)

From Full Moon Productions, this low-budget grindhouse film with rampant partial nudity and B-movie quality from writer/director Ken Dixon, was notorious for being mentioned on the floor of the U.S. Senate in 1992 by Sen. Jesse Helms (R) from NC, where it was condemned as "indecent" on late-night cable TV. Its video-box advertising enticed viewers with:

"Full Moon drags you back to the cosmos for carnal thrills, human-hunting chills, and sci-fi spills in the 1987 cult classic SLAVE GIRLS FROM BEYOND INFINITY, a controversial and campy riff on Richard Connell's oft-adapted story THE MOST DANGEROUS GAME, but set in space...and with bigger boobs."

Its tagline was:

• Big Movie. Big Production. Big Girls.

It was an obvious imitator (or rip-off) of The Most Dangerous Game (1932), but updated with robots, a mutant, laser guns, and nude Scream Queens. This lesser-quality remake joined other similar adaptations of the 1932 film, including:

• RKO's A Game of Death (1945)
• Run for the Sun (1956)
• Bloodlust! (1961)
• and The Woman Hunt (1972)

The film opened in a jungle with the flight of a loin-clothed, bikini-clad, big-breasted female from a giant, zombie-like, red-eyed, hunch-backed, mutant cyborg-alien creature (Fred Tate). Just as she was about to be killed, a silhouetted figure shot the mutant with a laser crossbow and approached the downed female.

Then the film shifted to two other scantily-clad, buxom and bikinied prisoners or "slave girls":

• Daria (Elizabeth Cayton/Kaitan)
• Tisa (Cindy Beal)

The two were being held in an intergalactic, primitive prison. After tugging on their chains attached to the floor in a slave ship's cargo hold, they knocked out two of the gulag's guards to make their escape.

Daria (Elizabeth Kaitan)

Tisa (Cindy Beal)

Escaping From Planet

They commandeered and hot-wired a space shuttle and zoomed off from the planet, but were pulled into another uncharted planet by a gravitational tractor beam. The two crash-landed on a foreign, jungle planet run by reclusive, scar-faced alien aristocrat Zed (Don Scribner) who lived in a fortress once owned by Space Pirates, but abandoned. He amused himself by playing a holographic theremin and was guarded and served by two intelligent robots:

• Vak (Kirk Graves), a house-servant
• Krel (Randoph Roehbling), a patrol guard (on the beaches and in the jungle)

That evening at dinner, Daria and Tisa met two other castaways who had also crash-landed with the same fate - and were being held or "kept" prisoners (or guests):

• Rik (Carl Horner)
• Shala (Brinke Stevens), Rik's sister

They mentioned that two other crew members (the pilot and navigator) had mysteriously disappeared (the opening sequence?). It was revealed that Zed enjoyed hunting - at night, while sleeping all day. He ominously showed off a trophy room with his collection of stuffed beasts and head-mounted hunting trophies hung on his wall: ("This universe is divided into two types of people - the hunter and the hunted"). Shortly later, Daria commented to her suspicious friends Tisa and Rik: "We may as well face the fact we're dealing with a maniac."

Before the film's main but short action sequence, Daria and Rik snuck out into the jungle late that night to set snares and traps. In the darkness, Daria also suspected that there was another mutant creature in the jungle: "Something tells me there's more in this jungle than meets the eye....I wonder what else is walking, crawling, or slithering around out there."

Meanwhile, Zed had taken Shala away, chained her to a wall, held her onto a table with robotic assistance, and raped her.

Early the next morning, Tisa went skinny-dipping at the beach to distract Zed from finding Daria and Rik, by tempting the robot Val to leave the house: "I'd feel a whole lot safer with a big, strong android like you along to protect me. Of course, I haven't got a swimsuit. But I'm sure you won't mind." After Rik and Daria returned, they pretended to make 'convincing' love to avoid being detected by Zed - and soon weren't only simulating sex. After making love, they laid in each other's arms, with incredible dialogue:

Rik: "Man and woman. A great concept! I love it."
Daria: "I never knew how much I missed making love until just now. I've been through a lot lately, to say the least. You made me feel alive again.
I know what I want. I know what it is I'm fighting for. Thanks."
Rik: "You don't have to thank me. It was my pleasure. If I die today, I wouldn't complain. Right now, this moment, I have to be the happiest guy in the universe."

Shortly later, Zed apprehended Rik and allowed him a 10-minute head-start, to win freedom for his sister Shala and himself:

"Timer on the gun won't activate for 10 minutes. I'm allowing you that much head start. If you can elude me until dawn, or kill me, then you've won your freedom, and hers."

After killing Rik with a cross-bow laser weapon and mounting his head on his trophy wall, Zed apprehended the three females, Tisa, Daria and Shala, and described his philosophy of life: "I have my own special philosophy, consistent with my unique lifestyle. I've always felt that the best of life lies closest to death. Living on the edge -- that's where you find the thrill of life."

He would now be hunting them for sport, with an hour head-start - and he warned them to not get lost in the Phantom Zone:

In the end, no one wins the game of life...You'll have your chance, to pit your philosophy against mine in a contest of skills played on the chessboard of my private planet. I intend to hunt you....I've always found the female of the species to be the greatest challenge. Far more crafty and cunning than their male counterparts. They're devious. Unpredictable. Full of surprises. Wonderful surprises...I'm going to release the three of you simultaneously. I'm going to give you hunting knives and an hour head-start. There's a temple on the far side of my island containing high-powered laser weapons, and if you can make it that far, those weapons will give you more than a fighting chance. Here's a map with directions to the temple. Any last plea for compassion?...It's a cold cosmos.

During the chase, Shala ended up sacrificing herself for the other two - she was shot in the back by Zed's pistol-crossbow. Tisa reacted with what-ifs: "Fate certainly weaves a twisted tapestry. If only the slavers had passed us by."

Daria and Tisa proceeded to the Phantom Zone - actually a temple stocked with laser weapons, and inhabited by a ghoulish guard and the mutant cyborn-alien creature from the opening sequence. Daria took one of the oversized weapons from the temple altar and stunned the creature that was carrying Tisa. After leaving the temple, the two encountered Zed and exchanged laser-gunfire, and Daria appeared to fall to her death into a chasm. Zed took Tisa back to his fortress to rape her.

The film ended with:

• the surprise return of Daria (who had clung to a vine in the chasm)
• a final conflict between Daria and Zed
• the mortal-wounding of Zed by the pursuing cyborg-alien who inexplicably turned on him
• Daria's pummeling of the alien into oblivion

The females escaped back into space in Zed's space launch. As they piloted away, the fortress was destroyed when the dying Zed initiated a self-destruct mechanism from his throne. Tisa asked: "Now what do we do?", followed by Daria's confident response:

"Our universe is vast. Full of wonders. We'll explore, find strange new worlds, together."