CAFE FLESH (1982) Mondo Macabro 4K Ultra HD Review + Blu-ray Screenshots

CAFE FLESH (1982)

Label: Mondo Macabro
Region Code: Region-Free
Rating: Unrated
Duration: 75 Minutes 38 Seconds
Audio: English DTS-HD MA 2.0 Stereo with English subtitlesVideo: 2160p HD Fullscreen (1.33:1), 2160p Ultra HD Widescreen (1.85:1)
Director: Stephen Sayadian
Cast: Andy Nichols, Paul McGibboney, Michelle Bauer, Marie Sharp, Tantala Ray

Cafe Flesh (1982) is a dystopian, post-apocalyptic porno-offering directed by Stephen Sayadian (Dr. Caligari) under the amazing pseudonym "Rinse Dream". Opening text crawl establishes that this takes place five years after a nuclear war where 99% of the survivors of the fallout not only cannot experience sexual pleasure, but physical contact makes them physically an violently ill, they are called “Sex Negatives”, those who have been affected by "The Touch". Oh, they want to make love, but cannot. The remaining 1% who can be turned on and get it on are known as “Sex Positives,” and are forced to sexually perform in a weirdo cabaret for the pleasure of the Sex Negatives, at the Cafe Flesh, emceed by provocateur Max Melodramatic (Andy Nichols, Nightdreams) who regularly taunts Cafe Flesh regulars Lana (Michelle Bauer, credited as Pia Snow, Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama), a secret sex positive and her sex-negative husband Nick (Paul McGibboney), who at the start of the film is unaware that his wife is not like him. When a famous sex positive performer named Johnny Rico (Kevin James, Taboo II, Droid) shows up at Cafe Flesh Lana's hidden sex -drive presents itself, causing marital strife, as does her association with a recently discovered sex-positive performer Angel (Marie Sharp, Electric Blue 8).

A porno unlike any other Cafe Flesh is both scintillating and thought-provoking, it has a keen visual style, a synth score and a story that itself could be seen as a dissection and send-up of the pornography industry itself. The erotic entanglements are presented as entertainment, like some horny Busby Berkeley performance, that are both unsettling and nitrifying, if not exactly masturbation material. Do not get me wrong, this is hardcore porn with all the penetration, cock, twat and cum-shots you would expect, but it's just so fucking weird. That said, I was turned on, I'm a weirdo, sure, but I also love it for the garish lighting and set design, and bizarre performances, including men dressed up as infants in highchairs in the background, a bizarre office hook-up wherein the boss has a giant pencil head (Eraserhead?), and a bored housewife hooking up with a guy in a rat costume! Cafe Flesh is just a wild, weirdo-erotic time, that it gives you provocative material that activates both your mind and libido, and is just visually cool to look outside of watching characters fuck. I would say this is a pretty essential slice of thought-provoking smut, if that's your thing, get at it!

Audio/Video: Cafe Flesh arrives on 4K Ultra from Mondo Macabro in 2160p UHD framed in both 1.33:1 open matte and 1.85:1 widescreen versions. This is sourced from 4K scans from a pair of 35mm film prints, and some brief "analog sources". Film grain is nicely resolved, marginally more so than the Blu-ray, texturing looks terrific, especially in the close-ups, colors are solid, and black levels are good and deep, yeah baby. As this is a composite source there are some minor transitional things you will notice, but overall the restoration is absolutely lovely. Audio comes by way of English DTS-HD MA 2.0 dual-mono with optional English subtitles. The audio was pulled from the 35mm optical tracks, and while it's flat and narrow in range, and has some light clicks and pops from time to time, like the video presentation it's pretty great all things considered.

Extras are plentiful, starting off with a terrific Audio commentary with director/co-writer Stephen Sayadian who talks about the era in which the film was made, the many pseudonyms used in the credits, the hardcore sex scenes, and the themes explored in the film. Next up is a 58-min Interview with Stephen Sayadian, it regurgitates some of the commentary talking points, but also expands on a few things, he talks about working with scream queen Michelle Bauer, shooting the film illegally in Los Angeles, and expanding on the possibility of considering an R-rated non-porn cut of the film. Then into the 15-min Interview with co-writer Jerry Stahl who talks about his career, where he was at at the time, and how it wa intended an an anti-porn porn flick. In the 16-min Interview with Jacob Smith, an academic from from Northwestern University tackles the film from a more academic approach, discussing it's themes and execution, which sets it apart from porno of the era. The 10-min Interview with Jessica Stoya, a former porn star turned author, notes how the film serves as a commentary on porno filmmaking. Disc extras are end with the 3-min Theatrical Trailer and three-minutes of On-set Footage. The single-disc release arrives in a black ecocase keepcase with a single-sided sleeve of artwork which if I recall was the VHS original artwork.

Special Features:
- Brand new 4k transfer from 35mm materials, digitally restored.
- Full frame and 1.85:1 theatrical versions, selectable via Set-Up menu.
- Audio commentary with director/ co-writer Stephen Sayadian.
- Interview with Stephen Sayadian (57:48)
- Interview with co-writer Jerry Stahl (15:22)
- Interview with Jacob Smith (15:40)
- Interview with Jessica Stoya (9:40)
- Theatrical Trailer (2:59)
- On-set Footage (3:09)

Screenshots from the Mondo Macabro Blu-ray:

Extras:





















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SLAVE GIRLS FROM BEYOND INFINITY (1987) Full Moon Blu-ray Review + Screenshots

SLAVE GIRLS FROM BEYOND INFINITY (1987)

Label: Full Moon Entertainment
Region Code: Region-Free
Duration: 74 Minutes
Rating: R
Audio: English Dolby Digital 2.0 and 5.1 Surround 
Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (1.78:1)
Director: Ken Dixon
Cast: Elizabeth Kaitan, Cindy Beal, Brinke Stevens, Don Scribner, Carl Horner

Cheese-tastic sci-fi adventure film Slave Girls From Beyond Infinity (1987) is a fun bit of light-hearted space-fluff courtesy of director Ken Dixon (The Erotic Adventures of Robinson Crusoe), a real tongue in cheek space-romp custom made for love of b-movies. The film stars 80's blond-babes Elizabeth Kaitan (Friday the 13th VII) and Cindy Beal (My Chauffeur) as Daria and Tisa, both inmates on an intergalactic prison-ship. Together they manage to free themselves from what looks to be very medieval imprisonment, chained to the floor, and hot-wire a space craft, only to crash land on a nearby uncharted jungle planet.

Surviving the crash the ladies - wearing bikinis naturally - arrive at a castle owned by aristocrat Zed (Don Scribner, The Cooler) who lives there with a pair of whirring androids who do his bidding. The seemingly generous host clothes them and introduces them to another shipwrecked couple who recently landed on the planet, siblings Shayla (Brinke Stevens, Sorority Babes in The Slimeball Bowl-A-Rama) and Rik (Carl Horner). The latter of whom lets on that their host is not as kind and benevolent as he first appears.

The rest of the film is pretty much a b-movie space-riff on the Richard Connell novel "The Most Dangerous Game" with Zed hunting each of his stranded guests through the jungle terrain outside of his castle. It's fun stuff, the film is very tongue-in-cheek and silly, it's not trying to do anything overly dramatic or serious, just having exploitative fun with tried and true premise, and being sure to show off plenty of T&A courtesy of starlets Elizabeth Kaitan, Cindy Beal and Brinke Stevens, who went not nude are strangely clad in rough-cut lambskin loins cloths or skimpy lingerie.

There's some fun sets throughout, the spaceships early on are cheesy, the jungle sets are fun, plus we get a couple of cool matte paintings that add production value. The castle fortress is realized rather well all things considered, they did a lot on what was surely a tiny budget. All three women deliver their unnatural sounding lines of dialogue woodenly, but this stilted delivery is pitch perfect for this bikini-clad b-movie. Don Scribner gets to chew the scenery a bit more with an overly-dramatic and campy reading as the baddie here, also tone perfect for this sort of film.

The special effects while not great are surprisingly good, while there's no real bloodshed or gore, we do get some cool-looking androids, a vagina-mouthed alien and a pair of zombies that show up seemingly out of nowhere just for fun, these coming courtesy of John Carl Buechler (From Beyond) and Joe Reader (Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever).

Audio/Video: Slave Girls From Beyond Infinity arrives on Blu-ray from Full Moon Features in 1080p HD framed in 1.78:1 widescreen. This is the same transfer as the 2019 Blu-ray from Full Moon, grain is present if a bit uneven in places, colors are solid and blacks are much improved over the previous DVD version I've had for some time. It doesn't look like this is derived from the OCN, most likely a theatrical print in great shape or an interpositive. I thought it looked very good with decent clarity throughout, though we do get a a bit of dirt and debris in places, particularly in the optical effects shots, but overall this is a pleasing HD upgrade for this title.

Sadly we are only give lossy English Dolby Digital 2.0 & 5.1 mixes, c'mon Full Moon, you need to commit to offering lossless audio on your Blu-rays, it's been ten years after the launch of the format! That said the lossy audio delivers the trite dialogue and effects well, clean and without hiss or distortion. The score from Carl Dante (Cellar Dweller) sounds decent too, adding atmosphere to the proceedings without really drawing attention to itself.

Extras on this one are slim, we get a 2-min Trailer for the film plus a 6-min clip Tribute to bombshell star Elizabeth Kaitan by the Exotic Movie House. The single-disc release comes housed in a standard Blu-ray keepcase with a one-sided sleeve of artwork featuring the original movie poster, it's very cool-looking and is fairly accurate except for those one-eyed androids that aren't in the film. A commentary would have been appreciated for this one, the film garnered some notoriety in the early 90's after drawing the ire of North Carolina Sen. Jesse Helms who attributed the delinquency of minors to having access to this sort of trash on late-night cable TV.

Special Features:
- Trailer (1 min)
- Elizabeth Kaitan Tribute (6 min)
- Full Moon Trailers: Subspecies 2 (2 min), Subspecies 3 (1 min), Castle Freak (2 min), Puppet Master III (2 min), Vampire Journals (2 min), Dark Angel (1 min), Trancers 2 (3 min), Spectres (2 min)

Slave Girls From Beyond Infinity (1987) is a fun bit of sci-fi adventure that should appeal to anyone with cheese-loving tastes that range from Malibu Express (1985) to Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-A-Rama (1987), highly recommended for fans of b-movie fromage and 80's babes.

Screenshots from the Full Moon Blu-ray: 

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