Review by Pinky Royale | Cult Epics | Buy at Amazon.com
This is my first Tinto Brass film, so I’m reviewing it on its own merits, foregoing comparisons to earlier works. Depending on your experience with his movies, that is either a plus or a hindrance.
A brief synopsis: Free wheeling Euro-hottie Carla goes to London, everyone is horny, public sex is rampant in Hyde Park, she has a boyfriend back at home who is supposed to move in with her, she gets a little loose here and there, he gets pissed, more sex, hilarity ensues. No wait... hilarity... ensues? Yes, it should be posed as a question.
Sound like a soap opera? Well, it is, but with a lot more beaver shots and erect penises than you’re gonna get on GENERAL HOSPITAL. It’s like a cross between PORKY'S and your mom’s afternoon programs. I don’t know what alternate reality Carla has slipped into via Tinto and his raging sex drive, but it seems like a creepy place full of upper class sex parties, insatiable lesbian real estate agents, and dirty old men.
Honestly, I haven’t seen this many erect cocks in a non-porn film since... well, since never. Throughout Carla’s exploits in swinging London you are hit with a barrage of furry boxes, throbbing shafts, bare breasts, hot lesbian action, anal sex with strangers, and loose morals. I’m no purist, but Christ, I have to draw the line at letting a lecherous, cigar chewing stranger rub his fingers up and down my slit while I coyly inspect photo negatives. Even if it DID get me a discount on developing fees, I’d rather pay full price (though in a nice Hitchcockian nod, ‘twas a great cameo for Tinto to place himself. They may have been stunt fingers, though. I can’t be sure. Regardless, it beats Stephen King’s yokel cameos by galaxies).
Carla’s boyfriend, struggling with his fears of Carla’s indiscretions, revisits the past through various hazy flashbacks that consist of nothing but Carla running naked and giggling endlessly through fields of tinny reverb. If it were a horror movie, the constant laughing would be mocking, a fuel and motive for some poor, sexually tormented schlub to pick up an axe, nail gun, or wooden horse head and start killing scantily clad teens. Her sunshiney tittering was kind of grating, even with gratuitous shots of Carla’s perky, bare breasts.
More sex, brown eye shots, the possessive lesbian real estate agent who won’t take Carla’s “No” for an answer (or more accurately, Carla’s “I like cock!” for an answer), and one actual finger penetration scene. That’s more than you’re going to see on the Playboy channel kids, even if it is unscrambled!
The film also boasts a “head-banging soundtrack.” I’m sure that something was lost in the translation here, from the Italian to the English. If the clubby Avril Lavine-ish music is what passes for head-banging music in Italy, then traveling metal-heads beware, don’t be tricked by fliers promoting head-banging concerts, lest you end up at a fucking Il Divo show or some such crap. Instead of head-banging, I believe they meant to put finger-banging, cuz there sure as hell was no shortage of that going on. Yes, the film boasts a finger-banging soundtrack. That’s more accurate.
This was a fun, goofy, laughable flick that would only be referred to for a spanking session in the most dire of situations. Like if there was no real porn around, no Victoria’s Secret catalogs, and that mason jar of warm cow livers and chocolate pudding just weren’t doing it for you anymore.
Watching the extra Tinto interview, one really gets the feeling that men in America are, well, neutered. I’ve had this impression for a few years now, after my first trip overseas to the land of cigarettes, chauvinism, bread, and pastries. This guy is a walking erection, convinced that the only part of a woman that can’t lie is their ass. That kind of talk on Entertainment Tonight will get you killed around these parts. Say that on the Tonight Show and Leno would jump to a Doritos commercial in a heartbeat.
A whole other world.
Bottom line: I liked CHEEKY! and am now planning to casually dig into Tinto’s past works and see just where in the hell it is that he came from. Sex, reverb, ample nudity, and lesbian real estate agents – these are a few of my favorite things.
