Taboo IV: The Younger Generation (1985)

Some Pornonomy reviews have an obvious and natural jumping off point. Others require two or three false starts to find the way in. Sometimes, if I take the time to recap the plot, some aspect of the movie - story or otherwise - will jump out.

And then there's Taboo IV: The Younger Generation. For some reason, none of my normal approaches bore fruit. So instead, I'm going to cop out and use the copy Vinegar Syndrome wrote for their release and take it from there:

In the fourth installment of Kirdy Stevens’ popular TABOO series, the focus shifts to Dr. Jeremy Lodge (Jamie Gillis), a prominent psychologist who deals with clients who have been traumatized by incest. Unknown to him, his wife Alice (Cyndee Summers) has been having an affair with his brother (John Leslie). After their teenage daughters Robin and Naomi (Ginger Lynn and Karen Summer respectively) are expelled from boarding school, things come to a head when Jeremy discovers the affair and he and Alice split up, each taking one girl. Soon erotic tensions build as Naomi begins to lust after her uncle and Robin becomes more and more fascinated by the concept of incest…



The last TABOO film to receive a theatrical release, TABOO 4 features writer/producer Helene Terrie’s most accomplished and daring script along side exceptional performances from Karen Summer, Lynn, Leslie, and Gillis, as well as Honey Wilder reprising her role of Joyce McBride. Easily among the greatest erotic features of the 1980s.

The only statement I'd question is when it says Dr. Lodge's clients are "traumatized by incest." While the therapy sessions look like they're of the support group ilk, in practice they're basically salons for the patients to share their taboo stories to the seeming titillation of everyone else. When Joanne (Robin Cannes) tells how she and her brother peeping on each other masturbating progressed to them having sex, it felt like it was leading to fellow patients Betty (Ami Rogers), Jeffrey (Klaus Multia), and Joyce (Wilder) having a threesome on the office couch. Frankly, I'm shocked that wasn't worked into the story somewhere. Rogers and Multia both had non-sex roles, so maybe it was planned, but at 106 minutes, their pairing may have been a casualty of time. (Worth noting that Rogers and Multia never did perform together.)



(Taboo 4 was the second longest of Kirdy Stevens's Taboos - 1-5 and 7, although apparently, Taboo 7 is a repackaged version of a movie called Woman's Dream from 1980. Taboo 6 was directed by Robert McCallum, for what it's worth.)

Expose Me, Lovely (1976)

The entry for Expose Me, Lovely at the Internet Adult Film Database claims that the "[f]ilm's title and plot capitalizes on the mainstream movie Farewell, My Lovely released a year earlier." I haven't seen Farewell, My Lovely, but reading the plot summary, while it's not a one-to-one, I could see where there would be certain elements and story beats drawn from the Hollywood adaptation of Raymond Chandler's novel.

Here, Karen (Catherine Burgess) hires Frosty Knight (Ras Kean, excellent names, both character and actor) to find her brother Keith who'd been in New York for five years and had lost touch. Apparently, their father's health is failing and the old man, Frank, wanted to repair his relationship with his son before moving on to the Pacific Northwest estate in the sky.



Frosty's investigation leads him into a world of artists and hustlers, cryptic phone calls and unseen assailants. There are twists, turns, and revelations that Frank Spencer's interest in finding his son may not be as heartfelt as it seems.

Easy Alice (1976)

You'd be forgiven for assuming, as I did, that Linda Wong's character was named Alice. Despite the poster heavily implying that's the case (Easy Alice starring "Hustler" cover girl Linda Wong) and the opening credits outright saying so (Linda Wong as "Easy Alice"), the only time she's addressed by name - twice by her boyfriend Joey (Joey Silvera) and once by friend Bob (Turk Lyon) - she's called "Carol."

The name "Easy Alice" is used once and may refer to Carol, but it's not explicitly evident. More on that in a bit.

First, a brief overview of the plot (such as it is) of the film.

Joey is an easygoing, happy-go-lucky guy who makes his living as a adult film actor. He refers to himself multiple times as a "model," but when asked to elaborate, says he's a "porno model." He may shoot stills, I guess, but the insight into his profession the viewer is offered is in regard to performing on film. His career doesn't sit well with his girlfriend, Carol, but despite assuring her that he's leaving the industry behind, he isn't making any strides to bring those promises to fruition.

Memphis Cathouse Blues (1982)

Plots surrounding the world's oldest profession and the hypocrisy of the religious right, politicians, and/or men in power are evergreen. Were it not for the film version of The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, Louie Lewis's Memphis Cathouse Blues may not have been made in 1982, but it probably would've been made eventually.

Mavis (Annette Haven) is the third generation madame of the Feline Farm, the South's premier brothel. She has a long-standing relationship with Sheriff T.J. Thomson (Mike Horner), but unfortunately, Reverand Noble Pritchit (Paul Ross) has had his fill of the community turning a blind eye to the Farm and convinces Judge Franlkin (Dale Meador) to shut Mavis down.

Battle of the Stars 2: East Versus West (1985)

There were sixteen reasons I moved down one spot from Battle of the Stars to Battle of the Stars 2 when the former came up in my random movie picker. Based on the scene breakdowns, the formula looks pretty consistent: two female stars (Kristara Barrington and Heather Wayne) are pitted against one another by pairing them with the same guy (Tom Byron), with each other, and then in two separate small group scenes (Barrigton with Gail Sterling, Don Fernando, and Jonathan Younger; Wayne with Nina Hartley, Fernando, and Jessie Adams).

On paper, that's fine. "Getting to know" movies were nothing new, from the OG Inside Jennifer Welles to Deep Inside Annie Sprinkle, Inside Little Oral Annie, and Centerfold Celebrities and its sequels. And the interest in these productions didn't go away as evidenced by Evil Angel's I Am... movies. In practice, Battle of the Stars 2 is fucking exhausting. Both the sax and piano-heavy jazz background music and Kristara Barrington's incessant porn moaning is non-stop and mixed too loud.

Much of the movie - which, like Centerfold Celebrities was shot on video, so looks pretty shitty - was edited like a trailer, cutting between the two women in flagrante and Tom Byron's talking head answering questions and comparing/contrasting the women. Early on, it feels like a novel choice, when, for instance, he was discussing the differences on how the women liked their nipples treated (which was basically a microcosm of the two women's sex styles: Barrington rough and ready, Wayne demure and seductive). After a bit of that, I kept waiting for the bounce-around editing to mellow out and just focus on the sex, and that just never happened.

Skin Flicks (1978)

I like Gerard Damiano, and a film written and directed by Damiano about making an adult film should have been a slam dunk, but Skin Flicks is just under-cooked.

Young director Harry (Tony Hudson) is struggling to complete his film, getting pressure from his best friend and manager Max (Beerbohn Tree) on behalf of - and then directly from - made man financial backer Al (played by Damiano himself). He maintains he needs more time for shooting, more time for editing, more time to get the music right.

It's impossible to tell what sort of movie he's actually making. Of the eight hardcore scenes in Skin Flicks, only two are for Harry's picture and they're shot on wildly different sets. One looks like a bedroom in a low-tier bed and breakfast and is decorated with a bunch of creepy dolls and the other could have been used for Damiano's sci-fi film Satisfiers of Alpha Blue.

During what seems like an audition, Bethanna is paired with Tony Mansfield and they have sex in front of Harry on a set made up to look like the yard of a house, complete with a swing that gets put to creative use.

Every Woman Has a Fantasy (1984)

In Every Woman Has a Fantasy, producer-writer Summer Brown (as Sandra Winters) and husband director-writer Edwin Brown (as Edwin Durrell), let the viewer into the inner sanctum of a group of women who meet weekly to discuss their lives and open up to one another about their sexual fantasies. Nancy Friday's My Secret Garden was published more than a decade before Every Woman Has a Fantasy was made, so I guess it was pretty well-accepted that many women had rich fantasy sex lives. The implication here, at least, was that it was still rare for them to open up about them, with friends, and especially partners.

When Ben (John Leslie) asks his wife, Teri (Rachel Ashley), if he knows any of the women in the group, she explains that the women not knowing each others' spouses is a benefit to opening up since there's no threat of the fantasies getting back to their husbands. Ben's fascination with the group turns to an obsession as he progresses from hearing the fantasies relayed by Teri to convincing her to smuggle in a tape recorder to hiding in the closet when she hosts the group to, finally, dressing in drag and posing as his visiting cousin, Jennifer, to sit in on a meeting.