Secretary (2002) has taken up a disproportionate amount of time in researching and writing The Celluloid Dungeon. I already knew there were a lot of differences between Mary Gaitskill’s original short story and the finished film directed by Steven Shainberg, but I’ve since learned there were significant differences between Erin Cressida Wilson’s script and the finished product. (See Ariel Schudson’s “Secretary and Adaptation: the Telephone theory”) Thanks to inter-library loan, I’ve borrowed a copy of the script book, which also includes essays by Wilson and others.
Continue reading »The notorious “Fur and Loathing” (aired October 30, 2003) episode of CSI is supposed to be about the furry subculture, but it actually demonstrates the investigative procedural’s particular view of sexuality and identity.
A routine traffic accident leads Grissom and Willows to what they at first think is a coyote but is actually a dead man in a raccoon fur suit. This leads to PAFCon (Plushies and Furries Convention), which the deceased, Robert Pitt, attended.
Continue reading »https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AS-ccDTp1NE
TammyJo Eckhart and I review the lesbian romantic comedy S&M Sally (2015).
Roman Scandals is a 1933 American musical comedy, pre-Hays Code film. Eddie Cantor stars as Eddie, an oddball handyman in the present-day, corruptly governed town of West Rome. Without explanation, Eddie is transported back to ancient Rome and gets tangled up in a plot to kill the corrupt Emperor.
For our purposes, it’s noteworthy for two of the musical set-pieces, both designed by Busby Berkeley, famed for his production numbers involving vast arrays of women in identical, often fetishistic costumes.
The first is an elaborate dance number set at the Roman slave market. Women, naked but for long blonde wigs, are chained to walls. Other, brunette women do synchronized dances in scanty outfits on a tiered display like a giant wedding cake. Reptilian-looking men in the crowd eye the captive women. One of the brunette women is dragged to the top of the display, and then jumps off and dies, ending the number.
Continue reading »Police Woman S03E21 “Bondage”, aired March 1, 1977, dir. Arnold Laven, wri. Irv Pearlberg & Frank Telford
Police Woman was a 1974-1978 cop show that starred Angie Dickinson as Sgt. “Pepper” Anderson, set in Los Angeles. Episode “Bondage” involved Pepper infiltrating the porn industry.
The opening scene is set in an old-timey looking room, with a woman tied up by the wrists, standing. A maid (in a completely ahistorical uniform) comes in to help her “Countess”. (The background sound of a camera whirring betrays that this is a performance.) A man in period-ish wig comes in, dismisses the maid, and rips the back of the Countess’ nighgown. (No actual nudity, of course.)
Continue reading »Manny the Director: “And cut!”
Dead Ringers (1988), directed by David Cronenberg, starring Jeremy Irons and Genevieve Bujold. Amazon
The film is based on a true story of a pair of identical twin gynecologists who died in a murder-suicide. Irons plays both Doctors Beverly and Elliot Mantle, and Bujold plays actress Claire Niveau, who catalyzes their disintegration.
In the story, Beverly does most of the work that makes them wealthy and famous in their field, while Elliot does the glad-handing and schmoozing. Beverly is fascinated by the “trifurcated uterus” of Claire, a troubled actress searching for a cure for her infertility. As they have done before, the confident Elliot seduces Claire and then passes her on to the shy Beverly, who claims to be Elliot. However, Beverly develops deeper feelings for Claire, and that reveals a hairline fracture in the partnership of the Mantle twins.
Continue reading »A Woman in Flames (Die Flambierte Frau) is a 1983 German film about a woman who leaves her husband to become an escort. Amazon
Eva (Gudrun Landgrebe) is a housewife whose husband criticizes and disdains her. When he ignores her at the party she set up, Eva suddenly packs a bag and walks out.
After learning how to be an escort from a friend, Eva hooks up with Chris, a male escort who sees both men and women. He aspires to run a restaurant with an art gallery.
Eva moves in with Chris, and they become like a husband and wife who are both sex workers.
Continue reading »Jade is a 1995 erotic thriller directed by William Friedkin (director of the previously discussed Cruising (1980)), and written by Joe Ezterhaus, who also penned Flashdance (1983) Basic Instinct (1992).
Continue reading »My friend TammyJo and I explore Professor Marston and the Wonder Women (2017), covering how to be bi and kinky in the 1930s, negotiating polyamory in the closet, and the femdom episode of Speed Buggy.
I Love a Man in Uniform (also released as A Man in Uniform) is a 1993 Canadian psychological drama. IMDB
Henry Adler, a bank clerk and would-be actor, witnesses a police officer be shot. He seems excited by this.
Henry auditions for a secondary role, Officer Flanagan, on a TV cop show, Crimewave. He shows an aggressive and domineering side as he pushes around a female production assistant.
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