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This early Seventies release is a bit of a historical oddity, an intriguing piece of pornography heavily influenced by 1960s avant garde film.
The piece opens with a shot of Chuck, an average-handsome, furry blond fellow rolling around in bed, his hefty balls peeking out of his white shorts. Next comes a whirlwind montage, shot in harsh white light, of this man in a suit, picking up a paper, going to his job at a bank. Next we find him back at his pad, champagne music playing in the background, reclinining in a blue silk robe on his sofa, sipping scotch and pleasuring himself.
Following his opening j/o scene, our hero visits an "Egyptian sexologist" to discuss his lack of sexual desire for his wife. He explains he has no trouble masturbating, as demonstrated in the previous scene. The sexologist is an odd-looking, balding man with a sideburns-beard combo – think "Tobias" from Arrested Development, only with grime slathered all over his face to imply Middle Eastern ethnicity. The specialist suggests that a little homosexual dabbling might help Chuck with his "sexual maladjustment." In a speech that sounds like bastardized Masters and Johnson, the sexologist explains homosexuality's place in history. He then describes a ritual from ancient Egypt in which young men are sodomized as a means of preserving the sacred status of the high priests.
The explanation is awfully convoluted, but the viewer soon is treated to a re-enactment, complete with fog, capes, and paper masks. A bearded, uncut, well-hung guy writhes on an altar. Four priests, in preposterous hoods and Egyptian-esque skirts, surround the lad. He undresses each one, exposing their soft cocks. He then peels off each priest's wings/cape and takes turns sucking their dicks. Discordant music implies that the young man is in peril, a "sacrificial lad", if you will. But even when he is held down and fucked, neither the priests' cocks nor their thrusts are hard enough to be a convincing threat.
The scene looks like low-rent Kenneth Anger or the Kuchar brothers. Oddly enough, the filmmaker's name is Kenneth Andrews – perhaps a nod to Anger? Regardless, the Egyptian scene and the final orgy (in which all the bodies glow iridescent red) indicate that this director is familiar with the various movements in experimental film.
The artsy approach continues in the next scene, in which Chuck visits a go-go bar. Two skinny, sunshine-blond dudes, one in a blue speedo, the other in white, dance and strip to some weird ragtime-rock hybrid. Their gyrations are unlike traditional stripper moves of this or any other era, but they are arresting nonetheless: the pair bop and shimmy and even semi-hula, with glassy, too-bright smiles plastered on their faces. Blue and yellow flesh fuses with a red background, and countless colored lights flash and fade in an effect that is as sublime as it is gimmicky.
Apparently the Dance of the Sunshine Twins was not enough to get Chuck in proper touch with his gayness, because our hero leaves the bar and drives to a dirty bookstore and to view a little man-porn in a preview booth. He pulls his dick from his pants and strokes along with the sex on the screen. He doesn't climax; instead, more frustrated than ever, he climbs back into his car to keep searching for satisfaction.
Chuck cruises around in a convertible, jacking his half-hard wiener. When he stops at a garage to get his cigarette lighter fixed, a smarmy mechanic with a greasy pompadour offers lucky Chuck a blowjob. The oral action is average, certainly not intensely hot, but we do get to see Chuck ejaculate and piss in a restroom papered in pretty-boy nudie pics.
Without transition, the film launches into the aforementioned red-lit orgy. Six or so men are fucking around on a dark set bathed in lurid red light. The action is punctuated by the sounds of whip cracks and peals of thunder. The flesh glows like a burning log, reds and yellows pulsing against a black void, blurring details and looking just plain scary. One man in a leather vest is whipping some of the other guys. Another man, suspended from the invisible ceiling, is getting jacked off. The men pile on top of each other, writhing hellishly.
It's all truly beautiful; the stark coloring posterizes and depersonalizes the action. But in the end it comes off as rather pretentious – a beautiful and horrifying exercise, but an exercise nonetheless, one that has little bearing on the rest of the film and isn't terribly arousing.
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