Findlay Week (August 18 – 24) Husband and wife Michael and Roberta Findlay made mean-spirited films. They collaborated on films like Take Me Naked, The Ultimate Degenerate, and the notorious Flesh Trilogy, plus they actually looked like criminals – walking mug shots! You expect to see them glowering on the cover of one of those tabloids next to a headline like “KIDNAPPER COUPLE COLLECTED VICTIMS FINGERS.” Instead they were pornographers which did make them like criminals in their day. A lot of the filmmakers of their era would claim they only made this kind of movie because there was money in it, but Michael and Roberta were sincere adherents. Even when audience tastes changed and the couple were divorced they continued to make their own films that mixed in elements of kink and cruelty. 

There are tons of Bigfoot films to watch. Trust us, we know. We have an entire Letterboxd list packed with the ones we’ve made it through. And we know that Scarecrow has an even larger section in the store that’s all Yeti, skunkape and Sasquatch-based.

We decided to go back to the classics and rewatch this 1974 Michael Findlay film, in which Professor Ernst Prell takes four of his graduate students — Keith Henshaw, Karen Hunter, Tom Nash and Lynn Kelly — into the woods to discover if the Yeti really does exist.

Despite a mysterious dinner the night before — their dish of gin sung is broken up by a drunken former student and his wife who loudly proclaim that the last trip to see a Bigfoot got everyone killed — everyone decides that going into the brush to find the beast is a dandy idea.

As if that isn’t enough, that lout keeps drinking and decides to cut his wife’s throat with an electric turkey knife before she responds in kind by dumping a toaster into the bloody bathwater as he tries to clean himself up.

When the students get to Boot Island, they have more gin sung, meet a mute Native American named Laughing Crow and listen to Tom strum a little tune he wrote about the Yeti, who liked that song so much that he rips Tom apart, leaving only his leg as evidence.

The professor isn’t someone I’d like to have as a teacher, as he’s willing to use that leg and the body of another of the students, Lynn, as bait to catch his white whale. Or white Yeti, you get the allusion.

That said, the reveal of this all — spoiler warning for a 46-year-old movie — is that there’s no Bigfoot at all, but a big society of cannibals looking for either victims to be fresh meat or those willing to help them consume the flesh of their fellow man.

If you’re a big film geek like me — seeing as how you’re reading about a Sasquatch film from the last century when you could be doing something much more productive, I get the feeling that you are — you’ll wonder, did the print Sam saw have Hot Butter’s “Popcorn” in the soundtrack? Yes. It did. It sure did.

In 1982, if you were lucky enough to still have a drive-in around ou, chances are you could have seen this movie as part of an event named 5 Deranged Features. Don’t be fooled by some of these titles, as you may have seen them all before! They’re Coming to Get You is not All the Colors of the Dark, but instead Al Adamson’s Dracula vs. Frankenstein. House of Torture is The Wizard of Gore. Night of the Howling Beast is The Corpse Grinders. And Creature from Black Lake wasn’t so lucky as to get a name change.

Here’s a drink to enjoy while watching this.

Yeti

• 1 1/2 oz. gin
• 1/2 oz. blue Curaçao
• 3 oz. lemonade (you can make it yourself or just go off the shelf)
• Club soda
• Lemon wedges

1. Combine gin and the lemonade in a glass with ice.
2. Add blue Curaçao and top with club soda. Stir using a mixing spoon and garnish with lemon wedges.

Watch it on Tubi.

Rene Bond week (August 11 – 17) Rene Bond could brighten up even the most dreary productions, and she was in plenty of them. In the early adult scene she was one of the better actors, particularly when it came to comedy, though she could squeeze into some leather and throw the whips around when the role called for it. Bond appeared in somewhere near 100 films, thanks to her affable professionalism she worked with many filmmakers multiple times and regularly performed with her boyfriend Ric Lutze. Her career received an enhancement when she became one of the first stars to get a boobjob. She retired from film in the late-70s just as the porno chic era was dying down, but before the video era. You can find her in a ton of SWV titles, so take yer pick!

The adult films of the 70s and the occult cross over pretty often, inspiring movies like The Devil In Miss Jones, High Priestess of Sexual Witchcraft, Sex Ritual of the Occult and so many more. In director Dominic Bolla and writer Jon Cutaia’s Angel Above — The Devil Blow, a teen named Randy Maldemar (Linda York, using the name Brittany Laine; she’s also in A Scream In the Streets and Panorama Blue) conjures up Satan (Lamar Gilbert) with the Necronomicon — the Simon one? — and black candles on her bedroom table. She proclaims that the devil isn’t attractive enough, so she spurns him, which leads to him infiltrating her holiest of holes and speaking through it, as this becomes The Exorcist but, you know, with more penetration even though the inspiration also has crucifix diddling.

Her mother Turgid (Starlyn Simone, Video Vixens!) attempts to help her by talking to her about sex, but when your daughter has a pre-Chatterbox possessed vagina that can’t be satisfied, the problem needs more than just the talk. Even modern medicine and psychiatry — Dr. I.M. Moribund (Chesley Noone) and Dr. Max Wanker (Nimrod Sappho), come on down — aren’t enough. She nearly eats Wanker’s tongue and launches another man down the stairs. Meanwhile, her mother is too busy sleeping with handyman George (Robert Bedford) and politician Lucius Watergag (John Keith), using the same trick of bending over and looking for the booze they’ve asked for. I was half expecting her to pull out a bottle of J&B at this point.

The only people who might be able to help her are Bible salesmen Peter (John Barnum) and Dennis Harp (Robbie Roberson), who arrive just in time. Sure, Registered Nurse Prudence Enfusoria is being assaulted by the handyman downstairs, but somehow Dennis falls in love with the devil-owned Randy and his strong, confident and romantic lovemaking is enough to push the Devil out of her and…into the nether regions of se Prudence. And she’s played by Rene Bond, so of course if I were a demon who could infiltrate the anatomy of women, that’s exactly where I would enter the devil, so to speak.

Beyond just Chatterbox, this predates another talking ladyparts movie, Le sexe qui parle. I have no idea who wanted this in the 70s, but someone did.

Bolla only made this movie, while Cutaia would go on to make the adult film Judgement Day in which Saint Peter stands before Heaven and reviews the final sex acts of numerous dead people. It has an actress named Morning Star in it, which is another name for Lucifer, in case you want to get hellish.

It’s kind of incredible that this movie exists, another version of the possession movies that I love so much, except, you know, with adult moments. I laughed out loud quite a few times during this and it actually has some cool effects, using slow motion and its small budget to be way more effective than it should be.

The amazing Barefoot and Independent YouTube page has posted a PG cut of this, which is about a quarter of the film’s length. But hey — you could watch it at work. Maybe.

Rene Bond week (August 11 – 17) Rene Bond could brighten up even the most dreary productions, and she was in plenty of them. In the early adult scene she was one of the better actors, particularly when it came to comedy, though she could squeeze into some leather and throw the whips around when the role called for it. Bond appeared in somewhere near 100 films, thanks to her affable professionalism she worked with many filmmakers multiple times and regularly performed with her boyfriend Ric Lutze. Her career received an enhancement when she became one of the first stars to get a boobjob. She retired from film in the late-70s just as the porno chic era was dying down, but before the video era. You can find her in a ton of SWV titles, so take yer pick!

Shot in 1971 for around $470,000, producers Bill Osco (who produced one of the films that brought about the Golden Age of adult films, Mona, as well as three Jackie Kong movies, The Being, Night Patrol and The Underachievers), Walter R. Cichy and Howard Ziehm (who directed this movie) held out in the hopes that a big studio would release this movie. Maybe they should have waited until Star Wars came out and really got people into science fiction!

The film was made with a mix of adult industry people, special effects talent like Mike Minor (the first two Star Trek movies, as well as The Man Who Saw Tomorrow. The Beastmaster and Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins), Greg Jein (1941), Jim Danforth (whose name is backward in the credits; he worked with Harryhausen on a number of films), Dave Allen (Equinox, pretty much all of Full Moon’s effects for their early films) and Rick Baker (do you need to know what he’s worked on?) and science fiction fans like Bjo Trimble, Tom Reamy, George Barr and Cornelius Cole III.

Originally featuring both straight and gay hardcore penetration, this footage was surrendered to the L.A. vice squad to avoid a charge of pandering. There was also a legal challenge from Universal Studios, who claimed — and was pretty much correct — that the movie completely copied the first chapter of the Flash Gordon serial. The filmmakers added a text scroll claiming that the movie was a parody and included “not to be confused with the original Flash Gordon” in all of the advertising for the film.

The FX guys hated the porn producers so much by the end of the shoot that they held film of the effects until they were paid (Dave Allen insisted on being paid in cash every day) and they were not listed in the credits of the film.

Professor Gordon (John Hoyt, When Worlds Collide) learns that sex rays are being fired at our planet and one of them hits the aircraft that his son, Flesh Gordon (Jason Williams, who would go on to make Time Walker) and Dale Ardor (Suzanne Fields, the daughter of a Mormon bishop who appeared in more than sixty adult films before this), are inside. They end up having sex and parachuting into the lab of Flexi Jerkoff (Joseph Hudgins) who takes them to the planet Porno to stop the sex rays.

They are soon attacked by Emperor Wang (William Dennis Hunt, who would be the only person to reprise their role in the sequel) and his Penisauruses. After a lengthy orgy, they are all sentenced to die, except for Dale, who will be married to Wang. Flash is saved by Queen Amora (Nora Wieternik), but their ship is shot down.

Flash and Jerkoff both survive, however, and almost stop Dale and Wang’s wedding when it is invaded by the lesbian armies of Chief Nellie (Candy Samples!), who tries to keep the Earthwoman for her sapphic soldier squad. Help arrives in the form of Prince Precious (Mycle Brandy) of the Forest Kingdom before a living idol kidnaps Dale, but luckily, the good guys win in the end. Oh yeah — that’s Craig T. Nelson as the voice of the Great God Porno, who was called Nesuahyrrah by the animators (Harryhausen backward).

This movie is pretty dumb and I say that in the most affectionate way possible. It’s like a Mad Magazine parody except, you know, people are naked for most of it. It’s the kind of film that’s made for 16 year olds who totally shouldn’t be seeing it (and obviously will find a way to see it).

Oh yeah! Rene Bond shows up as a sex slave alongside Tricia Opal, using the name Patricia Burns here. You can also spot Bill Margold, Duane Paulson, Dee Dee Dailes, Linda Marie, Jill Sweete, Dalana Bissonnette and Shannon West (Cleopatra from A Clock Work Blue) and Annette Michael.

Doris Wishman week (July 21 – 27) Doris made the loopiest of movies. A self-proclaimed prude who made nudist camp movies, her filmography is filled with contradictions. When she tried to be mean spirited with something like Bad Girls Go To Hell there was always an undercurrent of silliness and fun, but when she tried to be silly and fun in things like Keyholes Are For Peeping there was an underlying seediness and grime that couldn’t be wiped off. It’s hard not to love her!  

Jane Tennay (Chesty Morgan) is Agent 73, given her name because of her, well, large bust. Her agency has sent her to kill heroin dealers one by one. After each murder, she has to take a photo as proof, using the camera that been inserted inside her left breast. And like Snake Plissken with bodacious ta tas, Agent 73’s sweater meat will explode if she doesn’t get her job done in time.

If that all makes sense to you, welcome to the cinematic universe of Doris Wishman, as this is the second appearance of Chesty Morgan, who might even be playing the same character she was in Deadly Weapons.

As she looks for the crime boss Toplar, she starts to fall for a fellow agent named Tim (Frank Silvano). But hmm…could Toplar be someone she’s already close to?

In 2002, Doris Wishman was on Conan with Roger Ebert — which had to be a thrill for him — and let the world know she was still making movies like Dildo Heaven. We should all be praising the woman who said, “After I die I will be making movies in hell!”

The furniture in this didn’t come from the past. It came from a place beyond , a world where everyone has fake eyelashes and too much makeup and is barely able to walk on the highest of high heels, where giant breasts can make a flash so huge it fills the entire screen. We’ll never live in this world but we can visit for a few moments at a time and watch a secret agent cover those boobs with poison so a guy licks them off and dies, never mind that she’s so much bigger in the chest than his girlfriend.

Also, in keeping with my theory that Doris has a lot of Bruno Mattei in her, this takes nudist footage from Blaze Starr Goes Nudist and has the same surgery scene from The Amazing Transplant. Unlike Bruno, Doris made those movies, so I guess she can take from her own work. Maybe that makes her closer to Jess Franco.

Jane’s boss in this, Bill, is played by Peter Savage. He was a boxer that grew up with Jake La Motta and wrote the book Raging Bull. He also made the movie Cauliflower Cupids, which has Jane Russell, Alan Dale and several boxers, including La Motta, Rocky Graziano, Willie Pep, Paddy DeMarco, Tony Zale and Petey Scalzo. Savage wrote, directed and stars, so this is a vanity production, but one very low on cost.

This is probably one of the more coherent of Wishman’s movies and it still makes no sense. And by that, I mean it’s incredible.

You can download this from the Internet Archive.