Sweet Sugar (1972): or My Mojo's Working, But It Won't Work On You

Michel Levesque's Sweet Sugar (1972) is a movie with a split personality. On the one hand it plays out like a weird attempt at a spoof of Women-in-Prison flicks, with a staff of guards who come off more like bumbling teens in an 80s sex comedy than the sadistic keepers they're meant to be, an eccentric but largely ineffective warden-cum-mad scientist, and a two-dimensional heroine as quick with a sassy double-entendre put-down as she is to drop her top. On the other hand, the oddball comedy of the guards and summer-camp camaraderie of the girls is punctuated by sick ideas and gore scenes that are less shocking for their presentation than for their stark incongruity in tone. As a result the whole is not really equal to the sum of the parts, but those parts are kind of interesting in their own right and keep the flick from being a complete waste.

As the film opens, our heroine Sugar (Phyllis Davis of Beyond the Valley of the Dolls [1970]), who is either a prostitute or just a super-aggressive girl who knows what she wants, is bringing a prospective john/pickup back to her apartment for a little slap and tickle. Her male companion fends off her advances and laughs in heavily Spanish-accented English, "Can't you keep your hands to yourself, Sugar? There are more important things in life than sex!" Sugar raises an eyebrow and challenges, "Name three." Yes folks, that's our girl!

Recommended Pregaming

Unfortunately Sugar has been a little careless in selecting her bar pickup--not Diane Keaton-careless, but still. Providing her with a big fat spliff and then excusing himself to the powder room, Sugar's male friend quickly returns with the vice squad in tow, who promptly arrest her for possession of illicit drugs and an outstanding rack. These are serious offenses in the unnamed Latin American country we find ourselves in, and after rejecting the police chief's offer of tat-for-tit, Sugar's only chance of staying out of prison is to agree to work in the government-owned sugar cane fields as unpaid labor. The irony of a girl named Sugar being sentenced to cut cane for two years is--dare I say it?--delicious.

Next thing you know Sugar and a group of other wayward girls are loaded into the back of a flatbed truck for transport to the sugar plantation, all to the strains of an earnest title-track theme song of the sort we just don't get enough of these days, imo. Along the way she meets fellow female ne'er-do-wells Simone (Ella Edwards), a sassy black hooker with attitude, and Dolores (Pamela Collins), a 17-year-old blonde bombshell of a virgin who has basically been sold into slavery by her old man. The girls get their first taste of what life on the plantation will be like when a wide-eyed innocent tries to escape the truck, only to be brutalized by the guards, who then make as though to rape her. But Simone, possessing the heart of gold her profession obviously requires, steps in to lure the lecherous lugs away and jumps on the...um, grenade? in her stead.

Into the fortress with El Capitan America's female sidekick, Spunky.

Once at the plantation proper we meet the guards who will be watching over our girls: old hand Max (Albert Cole, who looks and acts like All in the Family-era Rob Reiner) and new kid Ricky (James Houghton). It's here we get to see the beginning of the movie's somewhat tiresome running gag, as Ricky, who has apparently never seen a "women in chains" movie before, behaves like a bashful, lovestruck teenager on getting his first look at Sugar, and tells Max he'd "really like to get to know her." Similarly unclear on the whole sadistic guard/helpless captive relationship, Max sets about peddling a variety of products to Ricky he guarantees will win over the ladies and make him a man.

Not unclear on the concept at all are head guard Burgos (Cliff Osmond) and plantation boss Dr. John (Angus Duncan). Burgos is a disciplinarian of the old school, not above checking the new recruits' teeth as if they were horses nor whipping them when they get out of line. Dr. John doesn't wield his authority quite as strongly (an early scene where he propositions Sugar from his bubble bath starts out promisingly, with the good doctor boasting, "I know the secrets of UNDREAMED-OF pleasures!"--but when she refuses he merely pouts and sends her away in a huff), but makes up for it with his interest in ethnopharmacology (the study of traditional tribal remedies to see if they have modern application), which sets the stage for some subsequent mad-science flavored goodness.

Dr. John and his cravat of SCIENCE!

The rest of the movie plays out along the well-worn path of WiP flicks, with the girls alternately catfighting one another and bonding in opposition to oppression. Sugar cements her hero status by mouthing off to the guards and taking up extra work for Dolores, who can't handle the strain, and when a platoon of male laborers is brought in, Simone starts a relationship with Mojo (Timothy Brown), a musclebound voodoo priest with strangely boyish charm.

However, despite the recognizable trappings, there's something about the movie that feels like it's not taking its genre all that seriously, or else just doesn't know enough about it to hit the notes. First of all, there's the continuing oddball humor, mostly centered around huckster Max and gullible mark Ricky, as they try and fail first to seduce Sugar and then several of the other girls. Also, this has to be one of the only captive women films I've seen where after the work day is over, the guards and laborers of both sexes gather round a bonfire for a folk-guitar singalong and beach party-style dance! Rather than guarding the prisoners and quashing joy, which is usually in the guard job description, Max sells them liquor from a huge overcoat and coaches Ricky on how to score with the nearly-raped innocent from the transport scene. And the ease with which Sugar and the other girls can go to and from their bunkhouse after curfew is fairly shocking--to say nothing of Sugar's encounter with a PUMA OUT OF FUCKING NOWHERE, whom she's able to tame with her feminine wiles. Seriously.

The J. Geils Band's rendition of "Sugar's Zigzag Panties" always got a reaction from the crowd.

All this would make the movie seem like a PG-13 attempt at a WiP flick remake, except for periodic and totally incongruous scenes of nastyness or outright batshittery. For instance, Dr. John's "experiments" all seem to involve ancient cures for frigidity, a malady none of his test subjects seem to suffer from. But that doesn't stop him from strapping Sugar to a table, hooking her up to a mad science headpiece, and injecting her with an herbal extract that causes her to have a spontaneous orgasm so strong it sends smoke billowing out of the orgasmometer! A later experiment has Dr. John injecting several domestic cats with a "primitivizing agent," then having the guards toss the cats on the girls to teach them a lesson. I thought we were going to get the elusive "death by cats" scene here, but instead the kitties just scratch the girls up--or rather, sit around looking confused while the girls shriek and rub fake blood all over their arms, which is almost as good.

On the nasty side, right after the aforementioned scene the doc similarly straps down Dolores, and upon finding out she's a virgin, paws her while whispering discomfiting things in her ear before finally carrying out a (blessedly off-screen) rape. Later when Sugar tries to seduce other guard Carlos into helping her escape, Burgos strings her up outside and whips her like he means it. When her would-be lover tries to interfere, the chief guns him down, pumping the corpse full of lead while some rather pyrotechnic squibs spray blood all over! After the Hogan's Heroes-esque tone of Ricky's aw-shucks shyness and Max's good-natured aphrodisiac-peddling, this comes as quite a shock.

That's Entertainment!

Later Mojo uses his...um, powers...to locate a mass grave of previous failed experiments, and the girls try to use the skulls to blackmail Dr. John into better treatment. Instead he has Burgos hunt down Mojo, who hides successfully for a while in the ladies' shower room, which gives the director the opportunity for more Hogan's Heroes-like comedy as the naked girls shriek and toss the embarrassed guards out to cover their (also naked) compadre. This gives Mojo the opportunity to score with Simone before going out to perform a voodoo ritual to "ask the gods" what to do. Apparently the answer is "DIE!" because Burgos captures him (but not before he magically DODGES A BULLET from Burgos's gun) and burns him at the stake while Dr. John laughs maniacally. Later in Mess Hall, Burgos informs the ladies that they've been dining on Mojo's roasted flesh, which is nicely sick but really crossing the line in terms of the overall tone.

Of course it all leads to the expected jailbreak, with Dolores and Sugar seducing the guns off a couple of guards, Max and Ricky joining the ladies in their run for the border, and Sugar running Burgos through with a machete. Somewhere in there Dr. John gets a knock on the head and starts talking about himself in the Maniacal Third Person, shouting "Dr. John cannot die! DR. JOHN IS INDESTRUCTIBLE!" before Simone sacrifices herself in a fiery cataclysm, presumably just to shut the dude up.

Oh, and there's an out-of-nowhere lesbian love scene in a river halfway through, just for spice.

Just another Employee Appreciation Picnic at the Duchy

As I said, it's kind of hard to know where this flick came from, or what the director might have had in mind mixing TV sit-com comedy with BDSM, cannibalism, and kitty torture (and a few admittedly zang-worthy nude scenes), but it has to be said the strange juxtaposition makes the movie much more interesting (if confusing) than it would have been playing straight one way or the other. The acting is all pretty bad, making me wonder whether Phyllis Davis was the money-man's squeeze and this vanity vehicle was a gift to her. (Note: probably not.) Duncan is entertainingly eccentric as Dr. John, and Albert Cole as Max seems to have a knack for the kind of skit-show comedy he does throughout, ill-placed as it might be. Still, for the most part it just leaves one scratching one's head.

I would call this an average entry in the rather dubious genre, which would earn it a 1.5 thumb rating on a good day; however, the weirdness, Dr. John's mad science, and the sight of slow-motion cat hurling lifts it another quarter point to 1.75 thumbs. Because when you can't get the big things, the little things can still get you through.

"MRRROWWWR!"

Credit where credit's due--I shamelessly stole the poster graphic from Samuel Wilson's review of the same flick on his excellent blog, Mondo 70, which you should check out for this and other cinematic treasures, not to mention scholarly and insightful writing on same.

A few more stills from SWEET SUGAR (1972):

It's a tough life in the Joint.

"Freeze frame! FREEZE FRAME!"

Church of Meathead

"Is that a machete in your pocket? Oh."

Cougar Town

Booby Trap

It's good to be the Doc.

Kitty Apocalypse

"My God, Vicar! It's HUGE!"

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Night of the Howling Beast (1975), Or Leap Attack Fest 2009

Paul Naschy. Paul Fucking Naschy. The name rolls off the tongue with a tremble, the words themselves containing no power yet when uttered together the earth shakes, virgins become pregnant, flocks of birds angrily take to the sky, and small children pee themselves in terror. As most of our astute readers know, the Vicar and I have an, um, "thing", for Mr. Naschy. Let me give a little background on our Lord for those who might not yet understand the mystique.

Paul Naschy was forged on an altar of evil by blind eunuchs invoking the names of the 8 Beasts from Beyond Time. His piercing eyes, his barrel chest, his penchant for sexing every woman who comes within his personal gravity: these are the reasons we love him. His muscles rippling beneath his bronze skin like insane caged pigs, starving for succor. The wild forelock of auburn hair on his head causes us to enter a torpor state of awesome. His unending joy at film making makes us understand why we love movies, and why we write passionately on this blog.

I bring to you one of Naschy's cinematic gems, the superbly titled "Night of the Howling Beast". And what a night it is! Our movie opens with 3 mountain climbers walking uphill through the snow. It is a blustery day in the Himalayas, and these gents are out for a stroll, when suddenly Chewbacca attacks! Driven mad by the keening caw of the minoc, Chewy knows only red rage as he tears into the hapless climbers. Luckily one of them thought to bring a Saturday Night Special and promptly pumps Chewbacca full of hollow-points.


We then cut to what must be an anthropologist's office, given all the stuffiness and plaid-elbow-patched-jacket'ness of it all. Enter Naschy, playing once again Waldemar Daninsky, followed by the professor. Naschy cuts a striking figure, his navy jacket barely able to contain his testosterone levels. We find out that Chewbacca didn't attack at all, and instead it was the fabled yeti of Nepal. (We can only assume Chewy is safe on Endor, feasting on Ewok intrails, which he has acquired a taste for)

"Why yes, Professor, I do wear Stetson cologne."

The professor tells Waldemar that some researchers found a yeti, and were never heard from again, but luckily their backpack had been recovered, along with a diary. The professor presents Waldemar with a "yeti scalp", which looks like someone shaved a beagle and then hot-glued its fur onto a swimming cap. Pronouncing that "there's no doubt it's authentic", he asks Waldemar to accompany him on an expedition to find this yeti, and perhaps sign it to a book contract. The professor notes that not only is Waldemar an anthropologist and a psychologist, but he's also fluent in Nepalese!

We cut to Nepal, where Waldemar drives up to a hotel in an army jeep while smoking a cigarette, a sight that is guaranteed to disintegrate every pair of panties within a 10 block radius. Waldemar meets up with the other researchers, including the professor's daughter Sylvia (grrr, baby, very grrr!) and their hulking guide Tiger, a beastly, bulging man who nevertheless proves to be mostly a coward.

Learning that the mountain passes are all but snowed in, Waldemar is angered, until Tiger informs him of a man who claims to know the way no matter the weather. Off they go! I was expecting some ancient Shirpa to fulfill this duty, instead they go to an opium den and find a sweaty bald white guy who for some reason knows his way around the Himalayas. Waldemar goes on with the sweaty dragon chaser while the rest of everyone heads off to base camp.

Waldemar is to meet up with them later, but 2 days pass and he still hasn't shown. Fearing him lost and or injured, the party sets out to find him, despite the ominous warnings from Tiger and his crew about "demons of the red moon" in the high mountain passes. Meanwhile, Waldemar and his "guide" are lost. Instead of consulting with the stars, using a map, or employing any other sort of survival technique, the guide sweats a few minutes, panics, and jumps off the side of K2. Waldemar is left on his own, but not for long!

We have a few scenes here, back and forth, of Waldemar wandering in the mountains and the folks back at base camp, trying to work up the nerve to go out after him. The Shirpas employee a ritual folk dance to work up their nerve, the band resembling a cross between Dexy's Midnight Runners and the J. Geils Band. Back with Waldemar, we see he's almost at the end of his sexy life when he spies a cave! Catching a whiff of freshly baked muffin, he heads inside to find it warm and inviting, with candles and pagan statues everywhere. It reminded me a lot of the Vicar's steam room, only with more candles and less nude gypsies.

"My blood runs cold, my memory has just been sold!"

Just as Waldemar is starting to wonder where the toilet is, a sexy woman in a saucy outfit shows up, asking why Waldemar dropped by without so much as a bottle of Merlot. Before he passes out, Waldemar asks for sanctuary. He gets something, alright, but it isn't sanctuary, unless your definition includes naked women jumping on you while you are semi-conscious. Actually, that is exactly my definition of sanctuary. Waldemar can barely sit up before two wenches have disrobed and started sexing him, one of them rubbing herself all over his prone body while the other works his hog like a ravenous hound gnawing on a deer's femur. Miraculously, this cures Waldemar.

Paul opts for the continental breakfast.

Exhausted, Waldemar passes out again, only to awaken later, alone. He sets out to do some spelunking of a different kind and explore the cave's environs. He soon happens upon two of the wenches engaging in what would appear to be cannibalism. Horrified that their mouths were previously all over his supple body, Waldemar flees in disgust, only to find the way out blocked by a portcullis. Having no choice but to descend further into the cave, Waldemar sets off, but quickly runs into another room where a chick is kneeling before a stone bier upon which rests a shriveled corpse. A thin silver arrow pierces its chest.

Waldemar realizes he has to go through this lady, so he attacks! A fierce battle ensues until Waldemar gets the idea to use the silver arrow. Now, friends, if you've ever watched a Naschy film, you should know that pulling anything silver out of any part of the body of a corpse is a recipe for disaster. Luckily for Waldemar, this movie is different! He runs the chick through with the arrow, and another shows up! He tries to flee, but ends up impaling her as well, but not before she bites him on one of his rock-like pecs! Freed, Waldemar finally finds an exit and runs off into the snow.

If this yeti killing job doesn't work out, there's always the circus...

The full moon is out, and Waldemar clutches his chest as he runs. Soon, the pain is too great... he begins to transform! A time-lapsed shot later and we have the hairy wolfman version of Paul Naschy. Reeking of wolf-stink and man-sex, he sets off in search of prey. He doesn't have to go far. Three bandits have made a camp near some boulders. Using one of the boulders as a launching spot, Waldemar executes one of the most stunning leap attacks in the long, awesome history of leap attacks! Very quickly the bandits are reduced to bloody messes.

Ladies and gentlemen: The Leap Attack

We flash over to the rescue party, who seem to have made their camp in the middle of some snowless woods. The ever-changing environment in this movie brought me no end of mirth. One moment it's a blizzard, the next sunny and green. The rescue party is growing increasingly nervous, as they begin to hear howls in the distance. Sylvia thinks this would be the perfect time to go for an evening stroll. One of the other researchers tries to force himself on her, but Waldemar jumps out and rips out the dude's throat!

The campers go to investigate, and while they are away Tiger gets knifed by his own men, who are "crazy with fear" he says, dying. The researchers break camp the next day, only to be ambushed by a large party of bandits. It turns out they all answer to Sekkar Khan, a local warlord who lives high in the mountains inside a fortress. The surviving members of the rescue party are carted off to meet him.

Meanwhile, Waldemar wakes up covered in leaves wondering what the fuck he's been up to for the last 8 hours. The girl Sylvia is passed out next to him. He gathers her up and they set off looking for the rest of the party. They find one of the members that the bandits left behind, impaled on a pike. With his dying breath he lets them know that the others have been taken to Sekkar Khan's Fortress of Solitude. We cut to said fortress and see Sekkar Khan undergoing treatment for sores on his back. I'm going to assume syphilis. His head wench informs him that a doctor is among the rescue party, so hope for new treatment abounds.

Meanwhile, Waldemar and Sylvia happen upon a monastery out in the middle of nowhere. It is inhabited by an old monk-like guy and his mute friend. The old man knows Waldemar's "condition" and helps him by chaining him to a tree. This doesn't hold Waldemar, however, when the moon is bright and the wolfbane blooms. Tearing the tree apart, wolfy Naschy sets off, happening upon a bandit on horseback. Executing yet another awesome leap attack, he lands squarely on the horse, right behind the rider!

Back at the monastery, the monk informs Sylvia that she should use a rare red bloom from a flower that only grows high in the mountains if she wants to save Waldemar. Or, stab him with this handy silver dagger I just happen to have! The monk gives her the knife and wishes her well. Waldemar comes back from his beastly foray to find the monk and his mute friend dead, and Sylvia hostage. Waldemar, in his weakened state, is taken hostage as well.

"I'm... too sexy for these chains."

They are both taken back to Sekkar Khan's fortress. Waldemar is chained up in a cell, while some captive women are disrobed and beaten. Soon it becomes clear that this new medicinal remedy for Sekkar Khan's back involves the harvesting of skin off the girls to be grafted onto his back. It rubs the lotion on its skin or else it gets the hose again! Was she a great big fat person? At any rate, Sekkar Khan skins his humps.

Waldemar watches this happen with barely contained rage, and utters a fabulous line that I must quote: "The full moon has always filled me with fear, but now I wish it would come, so that I could destroy you!!" Meanwhile, Sylvia is put in with the other women, one of which discovers her secret silver dagger. They use this to kill the guard and escape. They find the head witch, who they also kill, but not before she utters another immortal line: "I'll have you killed, you bitches!"

Waldemar hooks back up with Sylvia, and they start to make their escape. However, Sekkar Khan has other plans! This kicks off one of the most well choreographed fights in Naschy film history! Waldemar executes several leap attacks, as well as a flying kick, all into the skull of Sekkar Khan, who finally falls into a spiked pit, which upon their inspection, also contains the corpse of the professor! The finally flee the castle, whereupon Waldemar informs Sylvia that they must go their separate ways, as it's becoming dark, and he's about to turn.

Ladies and gentlemen: The Flying Kick

And turn he does! Sylvia doesn't make it very far before Waldemar is in full wolf-out mode. Suddenly, a yeti attacks Sylvia! Her screams draw Waldemar like a siren song, and soon another epic battle is taking place. The yeti, however, is no match for Waldemar, and soon has its throat bitten out. Unlucky for Waldemar, however, the yeti gets in a final swipe, which proves to be devastating. At the last moment, Sylvia spots the fabled red bloom flower, which she takes a petal from, and, mixing it with her own blood, heals Waldemar for good! Together they walk off, hand-in-hand, into the snowy sunrise.

Friends, this movie is fan-fucking-tastic. It has everything we know and love about Paul Naschy films, and it cranks it all up to 11 and beyond. Love leap attacks? This movie is full of them! Love Paul's pecs? Pull up a chair! I can scarcely believe the amount of win this movie contains. Yeti scalps, Tibetan folk music, cannibalistic cave-dwelling bitches, I could go on and on. Suffice it to say that if you are a fan of this site at all, you should hunt down a copy of this movie post haste. Three Huge Thumbs Up.

"For great justice!!!"

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