DVD Review : Vintage Erotica Anno 1940

This collection of erotic films from France contains 15 shorts which range from a softcore nudist film to hardcore antics involving bondage, spanking, strap-ons and cumshots. The films come from a range of different formats from 8 mm to 35 mm and have not always been well-preserved, so picture quality can be as rough as the treatment handed out to some of the girl's bottoms. But there is always a special thrill in seeing what might have turned on our grandparents - well, that is, if our grandparents were French deviants. And while there is much that is basic porn material (and some of the overweight moustachioed gents wearing nothing but socks look like villains from 1930s cartoons), there is also some playful charm and imagination on display. This is the second of these compilations I've seen. The 1930s compilation is equally fine. Cult Epics have done a great job of presenting these rare archival materials accompanied by an impressive photo gallery.

After documenting the bedroom antics of some very enthusiastic lesbians, things mellow out somewhat with a film about two pretty nudists who love to throw a beach ball and dance with each other. Then it is time for some body painting as one cutie turns another into a snake and proceeds to tame her with some flute playing. Of course we don't hear the flute. As was generally the case with stag films at the time these shorts are silent and presented with an added musical soundtrack.

And there is no translation of the French titles, title cards or text in letters and books which was supposed to explain aspects of the action in some of the films. So some of the finer points may be lost. This is particularly the case in what is probably the highlight of the collection - Esprit de Famille (Family Spirit), starring Julot La Terreur, Anna Macaroni and Pauline Pan-Pan, and directed by Cecil B. De Mézig. Their real names? Who knows.) It begins with a brunette reading a letter addressed to "Ma Grande Soeur" - "my big sister". That's about as far as I can go in translating. But this does suggest that the blonde who turns up at the brunette's place is her younger sister. She is just hanging up her things in the closet when her sister comes up the stairs with a shady looking gent. Blondie hides behind the closet curtain. Her sister would appear to be a prostitute, and, considering that the money is going from her to the gentleman and not the other way around, one would assume that he is her pimp. It doesn't take him long to lift her skirt to reveal she is wearing no panties. He then starts attacking her nether regions with his fingers with all the delicacy of the guards in a Turkish jail carrying out a routine drug check. Young sis in the cupboard looks shocked as fatso loses his shirt and starts getting all vaginaterian. It isn't long, however, before our voyeuristic heroine's skirt is sliding up and the curtain starts jerking in and out suspiciously. A noise alerts big sister to the fact that they are not alone. She pulls back the curtain and discovers her younger sibling rubbing one out. This leads to a vicious sisterly spanking followed by a belt thrashing from the gent, who gets kind of distracted by his victim's pretty butthole. He probes it with his finger, but that isn't enough and soon he's buggering her with a vengeance. He didn't ask her permission, but judging by the way she is grinning and running her hands up and down his thighs, she's not displeased with this turn of events. But when he pulls out and sprays her cheeks with his own unique brand of moisturiser, the older sister gets jealous and starts fighting with her guy. What alternative do he and his new love have than to tie her hands together and string her up from the ceiling while beefy boy metes out the discipline with his belt. Our bound babe looks on and gnashes her teeth as Blondie eats her man's meat and thumbs her nose at her sister. They do it every which way and, at one point, our hero (or villian, I'm not sure which) applies some of his very own brand of shampoo to Blondie's nether hairy bits. When he has finally given all he's got Blondie looks dejected as she pulls discontentedly on the foreskin of his floppy willy. At first she is about to take to her sister with a riding crop, but then her heart softens and she decides to free her so that they can engage in more affectionate sisterly feelings. First they feel each others boobs, then older sister brings out her strap-on and lets Blondie try it on for size. And finally the pair prove that, when it comes to a cunnilingus competition, they can lick each other.

Equally wild is Petit Conte de Noël (Little Christmas Tale), in which Santa Claus (a man in a scary plastic Santa mask who looks like he stepped right out of a Seventies slasher film) catches a naughty girl masturbating when he comes down her chimney. He's tempted to take advantage of the situation, waving his hand over his crotch to make an instant magical boner appear. But the Christmas fairy appears and tells him off. He decides that the best present for the yuletide wanker is a mechanical fucking machine, kind of the 1940s version of the Sybian. It's basically a vaulting horse with a piston-mounted dildo at the back end and a lever at the front to make it move forward and back. At first she is too high, but eventually he gets her positioned just right and the dildo starts doing its thing. Watching this thaws out the frigid Christmas fairy and soon she and Santa are banging like the Easter Bunny.

Next we have a little flick called La Clinique en Folie (A Clinic Gone Mad), and they're not kidding. This is that venerable staple - nurse porn. But here the nurses are not wearing the little mini-dress uniforms of the seventies nurse porn movies. This looks more like a porno version of A Farewell to Arms. Fairly quickly, though, it's a farewell to clothes. These nurses are really enthusiastic about caring for there one patient, a lucky nude man who receives some vigorous massage to his obviously painfully swollen penis. Eventually they resort to trying to suck the germs out and wrapping the afflicted organ in a pussy lip poultice. What is shocking however is their neglect of duty when their patient's penis finally flatlines and they just abandon him in favour of some recreational activity involving a strap-on.

You also get a door-to-door panty saleslady and a woman whose search for a pesky flea upon her person forces her to strip and masturbate while a gentlemen in a trench coat watches through the keyhole and leaves a telltale puddle on the floor.

Nobody does filth like the French!