EMANUELLE IN AMERICA (1977) (Mondo Macabro Blu-ray Review)

EMANUELLE IN AMERICA  (1977) 

Label: Mondo Macabro
Region Code: Region-FREE
Rating: Unrated
Duration: 100 Minutes
Audio: English & Italian DTS-HD MA 2.0 Mono with Optional Newly Translated English Subtitles  
Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (1.85:1) 
Director: Joe D'Amato
Cast: Laura Gemser, Gabriele Tinti, Roger Browne, Riccardo Salvino, Paola Senatore, Lorraine de Selle

Here we are once again with a filth-ridden film from director Joe D'Amato (Sex and Black Magic), coming at us with a slice of lurid exploitation starring the always striking  sex-goddess Laura Gemser (Violence in a Woman's Prison) as intrepid investigative journalist/fashion photographer Emanuelle. The film opens in New York City with Emanuelle being assaulted by a man with gun, the motivation for this attack is that he is mad at her for photographing his model girlfriend in the nude, but she turns the tables on him by seducing him with her mouth, which scares the prude off. It's a strange opening, but perhaps not as strange as a notorious sex-act seen later in the film, or how little of the film actually takes place in America given the title.

After the opening Emanuelle travels to Europe on assignment, going undercover in a sex harem run by an arms dealer, rubbing shoulders and bumping naughty bits with various men and women as you might expect from an Emanuelle film. On a purely erotic level the film does not disappoint, there's lots of sex and orgies with plenty of organic hardcore action, these apparently aren't the usual hardcore inserts. The most shocking stuff by a country mile would the the notorious image of a woman pleasuring a horse named Pedro by stroking it's stallion rocket - that's right - this film has a smidgen of  bestiality in it, so strap yourself in and prepare to be pummeled. To be fair there's no penetration happening with the horse but it's definitely getting a hand-job!

Emanuelle's investigative travels eventually land her on a tropical island where wealthy sex-deprived women pay for stud-men to sex them up. It's on this island that Emanuelle uncovers an underground snuff film operation, and I was a bit surprised how gory and visceral the snuff film footage is, it's pretty gruesome stuff, and wouldn't have been out of place in a harder edged exploitation film. That's what I love about director Joe D'Amamto, he throws a little bit of everything into his films, unafraid to mix up violence and sex in preposterous but entertaining ways, and this film is no different. 

Audio/Video: Emanuelle In America (1977) arrives on region-free Blu-ray from Mondo Macabro with a fresh 4K scan from the original 35mm negative, framed in 1.85:1 widescreen in 1080p HD. It's a wonderfully filmic presentation with natural-looking grain and some nice depth and clarity throughout, only looking softer during some steamy - on more ways than one -  spa scenes. There's not much damage to the source either, it's a solid looking presentation, with the colors looking accurate and well-saturated. The multitude of skintones seen throughout also look natural, with some good-looking fine detail in the close-ups accentuating every nipple and naughty bit.  

Audio on he disc comes by way of both Italian and English DTS-HD MA 2.0 Mono with optional English subtitles. Dialogue is always crisp and clear, and there's some good depth and fidelity to the score from  Nico Fidenco (Emanuelle and the Last Cannibals) which sounds terrific. 

Extras begin with an excellent audio commentary from Euro-cult enthusiasts Bruce Holecheck (Cinema Arcana) and Nathaniel Thompson (Mondo Digital), it's a well-researched and entertaining commentary that touches on the history of the Emanuelle films, star Laura Gemser and her relationship with director Joe D'Amato, and digging into both of their careers as well as the Emanuelle series of films. It's a solid track, loaded with info and colorful commentary on the film. 

We also a 62-min archival interview with the late director Joe D'Amato who speaks about his career, starting out in westerns before getting into horror and exploitation films, his views on erotic film and hardcore sex in those films, plus his relationship with star Laura Gemser. This is an interview I've seen before, not sure which release but it was, but definitely something from Shriek Show back in the day on DVD. We also get a new 36-min interview with author David Flint who deep dives into the history of the Em(m)anuelle films, beginning with the source novel, into the Sylvia Kristel films and the ensuing cash grab films including the Black Emanuelle films with Laura Gemser that were directed by D'Amato. It's a good watch, to be honest I'm not all that familiar with the lineage of the series so I appreciated him filling in the cracks so to speak. The disc is zipped-up with a Mondo Macabro trailer reel that runs about 14-min and is an event unto itself. 

The single-disc release comes housed in a standard Blu-ray keepcase with a reversible sleeve of artwork, I I also like that the spine logo font for the film are different for each option. The film was previously issued by Mondo Macabro as a Red Case Limited Edition featuring a red keepcase with an exclusive reversible artwork option, plus a booklet containing an essay on the film by Heather Drain and a set of collectible postcards, none of which are found on this standard release version, but the feature and disc-extras are exactly the same. 

Special Features: 
- Archival Documentary: Joe D'Amato Totally Uncut: The Erotic Experience (62 min) 
- Audio commentary by Eurotrash aficionados Bruce Holecheck and Nathaniel Thompson
- From To M’s To One: The Story Of Em(m)anuelle: Brand new interview with author David Flint (36 min)
- Mondo Macabro Trailer Reel (14 min)

For me just seeing sexpot Laura Gemser in glorious HD is reason enough to need this Blu-ray, on top of that if you're a fan of the Black Emanuelle series or are into naughty Euro-trash this is a must-own slice of D'Amato directed exploitation, it's hot stuff, and peppered with plenty of D'Amato's trademark lunatic touches that keep it interesting for the whole 100-minutes. 

VIOLENCE IN A WOMEN'S PRISON (1982) (Severin Blu-ray Review)

VIOLENCE IN A WOMEN'S PRISON (1982)

Label: Severin Films
Duration: 99 Minutes
Region Code: Region-Free
Rating: Unrated
Audio: English DTS-HD MAMono 2.0 with Optional English Subtitles 
Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (1.85:1)
Director: Bruno Mattei
Cast: Laura Gemser, Gabriele Tinti, Lorraine De Selle, Franca Stoppi,Ursula Flores, Antonella Giacomini, Leila Durante,  Franco Caracciolo

Italian schlock-maker Bruno Mattei filmed this WIP flick back-to-back with Women's Prison Massacre (1983) (available on Blu-ray from Scream Factory) with both films starring Indonesian sex-kitten Laura Gemser of the Black Emanuelle series, these WIP flicks came a few years after the legit Emanuelle series had ended but when Mattei saw an opportunity to exploit the series with a double-dose of sleazy WIP wickedness starring sexy Laura Gemser he just couldn't pass it up. Much like Women's Prison Massacre this one stars the captivating Gemser as a reporter named Emanuelle, this time going undercover as a whore to uncover the prison's human rights abuses for Amnesty International, you have to admire the lengths to which she will go for a story! Also appearing in both films are Lorraine De Selle (House On The Edge of the Park) as the thoroughly wicked warden and Franca Stoppi (Beyond The Darkness) as her wonderfully sadistic lesbian guard, both of who get their rocks off while watching lady inmates get it on with each other. Gemser's husband Gabriele Tinti (Cut and Run) also appears in both films and gets the most dramatic role-reversal of the bunch, in Women's Prison Massacre he was an over-the-top rape-y death row inmate, but here he's a sympathetic prison doctor, and he does decent in the toned down role, even though I kept waiting for him to turn bad at some point, and whle that doesn't happen his character does have a dark wife-murdering past. Also making appearances in both films are are Ursula Flores and Antonella Giacomini as female inmates, plus we get notable newbies by way of Leila Durante as Pilar, an older female inmate with a pet cockroach, and Franco Caracciolo as effeminate male prisoner named Leander who is imprisoned at the adjoining male prison, a character who seems to only be there as an on-going male-on-male rape joke, the character sounding a bit like Ed Wynn (the voice of the Mad Hatter from Disney's Alice In Wonderland).

 

The film has the requisite amount of brutality and sleazy WIP tropes, but the graphic rape stuff is absent for the most part, but notably Gemser appears nude in this film while she did not do so in Women's Prison Massacre for whatever reason, and a nude Gemser is always welcome, she was a lovely lady to look at. Once it is revealed that she's an undercover reporter she suffers tortures such as red-eyed rodents, a bell-ringing, drugging, and the unwanted molestation at the hands of a corrupt prison official (Jacques Stany, Four Flies On Grey Velvet). All the while though she's been plotting with the sympathetic prison doc to make a daring escape, which allows for her to have sex with him several times throughout the film, of course. Fans of prison exploitation should find plenty to delight in, there's loads of girl-on-girl brawling and sex, plus some a surprising turd-wrestling scene, Emanuelle and two guards fall onto the floor during a scuffle and end up wresting in some human feces, so it's got that going for it.  

Audio/Video: Bruno Mattei's WIP sleazefest Violence In A Women's Prison (1982) arrives on Blu-ray from Severin Films sourced from a "2K scan from an uncensored inter-positive" in 1080p HD framed in 1.78:1 widescreen, looking very nice overall with some peripheral roughness by way of some minor speckling and small scratches, but nothing too awful. Colors look reasonably strong and grain looks natural if a bit course during the darker scenes, fine detail could be generously called modest, but having never watched this one before on any format I found the HD presentation very pleasing all shortcomings considered. 

The English-dubbed audio is more problematic than the image, though not ruinous to the whole experience either, it's a noisy track with plenty of hiss, crackling and pops, sounding at moments like there's someone eating a bowl of rice krispies in the room, but dialogue is never hard to discern and the Luigi Ceccarelli (Rats: Nights of Terror) score sounds good, optional English subtitles are provided.

Onto the extra we get a few beginning with the Freak-O-Rama produced 'Brawl in Women's Block', an interview with co-director/co-writers Claudio Fragasso (Troll 2) and Rossella Drudi - each discussing how they came to be in the movie business, working with Bruno Mattei and shooting this film and Women's Prison Massacre back-to-back over a five week period and the challenges that provided. We also get an archival interview from director Bruno Mattei from a previous DVD release from Media Blasters, plus a radio spot for the film.

The single-disc release comes housed in a spiffy black Blu-ray keepcase with a sleeve of reversible artwork - the b-side is pictured below - the disc artwork is an excerpt of the a-side artwork. It's a good looking release with an handsome looking spine. 

B-Side Reversible Artwork 

Special Features: 
- Brawl in Women's Block - Interview with co-director/co-writers Claudio Fragasso and Rossella Drudi (29 min)
- Archive interview with director Bruno Mattei (3 min)
- Radio Spot (31 sec)

It's always great to see another Bruno Mattei schlocker get an HD release with some extras and good A/V, as 80's women-in-prison films go this is an entertaining slice of Euro-sleaze, the nudity from Gemser is appreciated but I think I like Women's Prison Massacre (1983) just a tiny bit more, that one's just a bit more gonzo and creative when to comes to the violence and crazy dialogue.