Week 7 (Aug 2 – 8) – Muscle Distribution Catalog
Muscle Distribution is an exciting new venture that’s hard to sum up with words alone, but if you dig into the catalog, you find a shape that’s more well-defined than any mission statement. Liz is keeping it hot for us. From Muscle’s website: Muscle is a new film distribution company with a heavy repertory slant from historian, programmer, and filmmaker Elizabeth Purchell. Borne out of an understanding of the role that accessibility plays in shaping cultural histories, we’re dedicated to complicating and expanding the canon by shining a light on works that either never received their proper due or that have unjustly faded into obscurity, and championing uncompromising new works by some of today’s most exciting underground filmmakers. We love scrappy, misfit films that don’t fit into any particular box.
A seemingly idyllic pleasure-cruising yacht getaway quickly transforms into a pressure cooker of tension and passion. It follows three couples—including newlyweds Janet (Iris Brooks, the blonde cult member in I Drink Your Blood) and Bill (Ted Heyck using the screen name Michael Hanes)—who take to the open water for what should be a celebratory honeymoon voyage. However, things take a dark and unpredictable turn almost immediately.
Jealousy, simmering paranoia, and sudden accusations of adultery rip through the group, eventually leading to Bill mysteriously vanishing into thin air. Adding to the psychological turbulence onboard is a mysterious passenger named Layne (adult star Jennifer Welles), who proceeds to systematically seduce anyone and everyone she sets her sights on, including the second couple aboard, Pete (Blaine Quincy) and Dorothy (Hollis Solomon). As the boundaries blur between an innocent weekend trip and a web of deceit, the remaining passengers are left questioning if Layne has a sinister connection to the groom’s sudden disappearance.
One of the most amusing things about this is that Larry Hunter, who played the ship captain, has on so much makeup that he appears to be trying to be another race. It’s not blackface, just ill-applied concealer. It’s super obvious, too.
Before he became a name in the adult film industry directing major titles throughout the 1970s and 80s (often credited under names like Ron Sullivan), Henri Pachard was crafting exploitation features that tested the boundaries of cinema. This is a sex film without sex and instead of insertion shots, plenty of dialogue. But if you’re the kind of person who just likes to hang out and have stuff slowly happen — I am speaking to myself here — this is the kind of fuzzed-out, just had a painkiller, a beer and maybe an edible sort of jaunt that you’re looking for. Also: Jennifer Welles with dark hair might be proof of a higher being.
