From The Baby to The Pink Angels, Graduation Day, Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins, Love at First Bite, Michael Pataki is in so many great movies. He’s even the Klingon Korax who starts a fight in the Tribbles episode of Star Trek. He’s everywhere —  The Sidehackers, The Return of Count Yorga, Airport ’77, Grave of the Vampire, Dracula’s Dog, Dead and Buried, The Glove, Sweet Sixteen, Rocky IV, Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers…man, I love Pataki! He’s even the voice of George Liquor on The Ren & Stimpy Show!

What you may not know is that he also directed this movie, a soft core musical version of the Cinderella story that played on Cinemax After Dark off and on throughout the late 80’s and early 90’s. That’s where I first encountered it, with no idea that Pataki directed it. I certainly did take notice of its star, Cheryl Lynn “Rainbeaux” Smith, however!

If Cheryl Smith didn’t exist, someone would have to invent her. Much like Pataki, her resume literally reads like a list of some of my top films of all time: Lemora, Caged Heat, Phantom of the Paradise, The Incredible Melting Man, Laserblast, Up In Smoke, Nice Dreams, Vice Squad, Parasite…she shows up in so many films worth watching. For example, the movie Video Vixens has her and pretty much the entire cast of The Last House on the Left in a silly sex comedy.

She was even a member of The Runaways after the band broke up during the making of We’re All Crazy Now. She even played drums for an early version of Joan Jett’s solo band. Sadly, she died at just 47 years old after two decades of heroin abuse. But let’s not dwell on the negative. Let’s celebrate this ridiculous film.

Cinderella features Smith in the title role, as she suffers at the hands of her incestuous stepsisters and maneater stepmother (Yana Nirvana, Marilyn Corwin and Jennifer Stace, who were all members of the LA Knockers, an all-female dance troupe that has a crazy history that I’ve been exploring online. One of their members, Lissa Kastin, was killed by the Hillside Stranglers, for example.). Until she can escape, she sings songs and dreams of a better life.

On the other side of the kingdom, The Prince no longer can enjoy sex and his parents are fighting over the fact that he won’t get married. So the King throws a party where his son can find the one woman who can satisfy him. He sends the Royal Chamberlain to find willing women, but the servant is too interested in getting those women for himself. And keep in mind — throughout these sexy shenanigans, there are songs for each scene.

Cinderella is left behind to have a nightmare about being assaulted, which is such a 70’s thing that wouldn’t appear in movies today. She’s saved by her fairy godmother, who is a black gay man who happens to be a kleptomaniac and transvestite. Basically, this is the kind of movie that if it played in a hipster movie theater in 2019, there’d have to be all manner of social media apologies and handwringing over problematic content.

Sy Richardson, who played this role, does a similar turn in another sexy take on children’s stories, 1978’s Fairy Tales. He also shows up in Petey Wheatstraw as Petey’s father, as well as Detective Wasserman in Bad Dreams.

Somehow, a magic wand the fairy godmother once stole works, so he helps her get to the party while he gets to work stealing the crown jewels. He also enchants Cinderella’s private parts so that they become a snapper, whatever that means. Honestly, it sounds painful.

The Prince has a blindfolded orgy with every willing girl in the land, but Cinderella’s magical ladybusiness is exactly what he’s been looking for. Now, the Prince has to go back throughout every single bedroom all over his father’s land to find that perfect fit. By the time he gets to Cinderella, he’s on a stretcher, but she takes care of him and together, they save the fairy godmother from an angry mob.

Obviously, this entire movie is completely goofy. You kind of have to watch it through the lens of 1977, when people didn’t really worry about offending anyone. I’ve always loved that it’s also called The Other Cinderella, just in case you’d mix it up with the Disney movie. No, this is the one with titties.

You can get this on DVD from Full Moon.