FILLMORE DISCOS 52 - CHRISTINA LINDBERG SPECIAL

Christina Lindberg's acting career was predominantly in the 70s when she epitomised the sweet-looking and somewhat lonesome submissive young teenager whose voluptuous looks are an unwitting magnet for various types of sexual predator, both male and female.

Exposed (*****)
Catherine Breillat could learn a lot from this early 70s gem, her coming-of-age films whilst being never less than brave are consistently blighted by her own extreme naïvete and seeming lack of personal experience - Exposed ('Exponerad' in Swedish), much like the later Maid In Sweden but with harder and more forceful content, is a masterly look at feminine teenage sexuality that would probably now never be made

Maid In Sweden (****)
once you get past your expectations of Maid In Sweden being a routine 70s softcore entry and the hilarious accents (all the acting is in English with real time audio), you get drawn into what is a minor coming-of-age classic full of courageous touching honesty with extremely rare insights into the usually misrepresented female psyche

Young Playthings (***)
sexploitation director Joe Sarno's hard-to-find Young Playthings is one of the most incomprehensible movies you're likely to ever see; what starts out as conventional softcore fare soon gets indescribably arty weird as the two female protagonists get drawn into an apartment and involved in an arcane mime show - somewhat like Roger Watkins' Last House On Dead End Street without the gore

Sex And Fury (**)
pinky violence with Christina Lindbergh should deliver a lot more fun than the results - she pretty much delivers her side of the bargain seen here at her radiant best with huge anime eyes, unfortunately the whole is let down by a poor Japanese cast and some preposterously amateurish low budget action sequences

Journey To Japan (**)
traditional Japanese porno fare as Christina, after getting picked up by one of the many geeky perverts that appear to troll Tokyo's streets, is predictably subjected to various kinky assaults before falling, also predictably, Stockholm syndrome style, for her nerdy bespectacled captor

Anita: Swedish Nymphet (**)
Lindberg is fantastic as the 17-year-old nymphomaniac, one of her best performances - sadly, the film has dated terribly and is undermined by its ridiculous premise of a lonely teenage girl aggressively accosting random men for sex; this nonsense is made worse when a weedy youth becomes her self-proclaimed therapist attempting to wean her off the 'addiction' - Deep Throat's narrative is more believable than this

Thriller: A Cruel Picture (****)
don't be too put off by Tarantino (and others) referencing this as inspiration, Thriller is an entertaining yet thoughtful revenge action movie with some uncommon nastiness - Lindberg is perfectly cast as the beautiful young girl preyed upon to breaking point by perverts, pimps, and pushers

FILLMORE DISCOS 51 - GIALLO SPECIAL 4
FILLMORE DISCOS 50
FILLMORE DISCOS 49

FILLMORE DISCOS 46

Definitely a bit of a mixture here - for clarity's sake, I've added the year to the more vintage entries.

Who Can Kill A Child?, 1976 (*****)
brilliant highly atmospheric 70s low budget film from Spain about a couple who find themselves on a beautiful Mediterranean island taken over by violent feral children - others have since tried similar plot devices but never with as much unsettling menace and ambiguity of conventional morality

Foxes, 1980 (****)
Adrian Lyne's first feature film is a remarkably honest study of a group of young fairly average teenage girls growing up - and it's thanks to accurate observation and, dare I say it, a brilliant performance by Jodie Foster, that its poignant final act can easily catch you off guard; plus you get the treat of seeing glam rockers Angel doing live their disco hit Twentieth Century Foxes

Une Femme Infidèle, 1969 (**)
Chabrol's story of the tragic outcome of a married woman having an affair has nowhere near the class nor sophistication of Adrian Lyne's wonderfully nuanced 2002 remake Unfaithful

36 Fillette, 1988 (**) / À Ma Soeur! (****)
although she likely considers herself, and is considered by many, as having radical cutting-edge feminist credentials, instead I see Catherine Breillat's attitudes and obsessions with teenage sexual development as rather old-fashioned, betraying a quaint naïvete and lack of real world experience; what you end up with therefore are several of these undoubtedly brave studies of young girls coming of age, whilst employing tediously extended dialogues that are clearly just Breillat's written ponderings - 36 Fillette particularly suffers from this, neither its flimsy virginity plot nor its male or female characters' actions or dialogues are ever for one moment believable; À Ma Soeur!, on the other hand, whilst seeming to go down the same disingenuous path, boasts an extraordinary final half an hour which culminates in the most incredibly perverted happy ending, a true revelation of a uniquely female dimension

Street Trash, 1987 (****)
riotously funny unlegit horror as the local bums and winos end up melting after resorting to the neighbourhood liquor store's dollar-a-pop Viper drink - for such a low budget movie it's amazing how much energy and devotion have clearly been invested in the special effects, the sound, the script, and the acting

Entrails Of A Virgin, 1986 (**)
totally incompetent, yet at times pleasingly bonkers, sleaze-horror-comedy-porno-fest something-or-other from Japan

Capitalism: A Love Story (**) / Let's Make Money (****)
the former is yet another flat propaganda exercise by smug egomaniac Michael Moore, a man who's as much part of the problem as capitalism or any of the other soft targets he leeches from; there are far better documentaries on global finance (assuming one has any interest whatsoever) and the Austrian ueber-serious Let's Make Money is one such - a vastly more considered, wide-ranging film that goes much further than scoring cheap points; much of its content and understandings were new to me, and you never feel a party political subtext being rammed into you

FILLMORE DISCOS 45 - '70s RARITIES 3
FILLMORE DISCOS 44
FILLMORE DISCOS 43 - '70s RARITIES 2
FILLMORE DISCOS 42 - '70s RARITIES 1