Die Insel der tausend Freuden

Erotic thrillers tend to be about shady dealings centred around the wealthy elite based in exotic or well-to-do locations so Island of 1000 Delights certainly has a lot going for it, being shot in Mauritius and populated by beautiful people. However, the script is far from watertight and certain actions by some characters do not ring true.

From the opening scene we see that there is human trafficking going on and this is being investigated by PI Peggy (Olivia Pascal) who is in the employ of Lady Henriette, matriarch of the richest family on the island. Lady Henriette's niece, Julia is married to Michael, (Philippe Garnier) a heavily indebted gambling addict who has a mistress Sylvia (Elisa Servier, here credited as Marine Mervil). Sylvia hatches a plan that will net them a fortune but there is betrayal and double-cross to contend with and the relationships between the characters is not all they seem. In the meantime, Peggy is captured by the slavers.

Erotic thrillers by their nature have to feature sex and nudity situations and the women in this film show us what they've got. It is a pity that some of these scenes are rather brief and one scene is in almost total darkness. Some things do not make sense; Lady Henriette's house seems to be open to all and sundry to come and go as they please and when Peggy escapes from her captors it seems that she was being held on Lady Henriette's property and despite there being people in the house she tells no-one of her ordeal and runs off to hide in town. Olivia Pascal does not convince as a hard-nosed PI and she displays an unbelievably nonchalant attitude to explosives. With the right resources this could have been a decent thriller.

This review used a VCD from Hong Kong with a run time of just over 86 minutes. The audio track was English with embedded Chinese subtitles. The picture quality was no better than VHS and because VCDs hold less data than a DVD, the film was spread over two discs. The film gets 4 stars simply because the women and Mauritius are so attractive.

EDIT. On the German DVD the picture quality is a bit better and there is a shower scene that is missing on the Hong Kong VCD. Although the DVD cover states a picture ratio of 4:3 and a run time of 90 minutes, the picture is about 1.66:1 and the run time is actually a little over 85 minutes, probably because of the PAL conversion.

The film contains lots of elements of exploitation cinema: girls are abducted and traded, some dodgy gambling is going on, a bit of rape and torture is thrown in for good measure, some exotic locations complete with bare-bosomed natives - the list goes on.

The trouble is: the stuff just does not fit together, not in the slightest. It is just as messy as anything filmed by Jess Franco or produced by Eurociné, and this impression is helped by Yul Sanders look-a-like Otto Retzer playing the kind of role Yul Sanders would typically play.

One example for the imbalance of the picture: we see private dick Olivia Pascal being bound and tortured by Art Brauss and Otto Retzer, threatening to burn her nipples with a light-bulb, and this gives very much the impression of a nasty S&M flick. But her escape from captivity (after a failed rape attempt by Otto) is filmed like a slapstick chase from one of the many German sex comedies of the era - these chases invariably go through the bedrooms of other people (while they make love, of course) and this is no exception. To top things off, we later find Olivia speaking to Art at a party - admittedly in a hostile tone, but they are still socializing! This rather relaxed attitude towards prosecution of crime is also evident in the conclusion of the film, but I leave it at that hint.

Sexploitation thriller offers muddled action amid some ugly goings-on. Parts of it look very amateurishly shot. The only redeeming feature is the very handsome young male lead, Phillipe Garnier playing the young (but married) playboy Michael who, during the course of his tropical island love life manages to exhibit himself in a Mark Spitz-style bikini and subsequently in several nude scenes including the best co-ed shower sequence seen yet on film. With some judicial editing, more character and plot development,and better dubbing,this could have been quite a sexy little thriller. And why has the so promising Mr. Garnier all but disappeared from the screen?

This is another film by German softcore pornmeister Hubert Frank, the man who also brought us "Vanessa" and "Patrizia". This has much more of a plot than usual, approaching an actual drama at times. A washed-up tennis star and compulsive gambler is on the outs with his wife (Bea Fiedler)--perhaps understandably since at point her wagers her--and loses her--in a card game. He takes up with her sexy best friend (Elisa Servier) who convinces him to try to murder his wealthy aunt in an effort to out-manipulate his estranged wife for the older woman's money. Meanwhile, a female agent for the aunt (Olivia Pascal) is hanging around investigating everything (actually she mostly just watches people have sex). And then there is a bizarre and random subplot involving modern-day slavery and a native servant girl of the aunt who falls into the clutches of the slavers.

Given the murder and slavery plots, the general racial insensitivity (the black hit-man the couple hire doesn't want any money, but only sex with the white mistress), a couple rape scenes, and some other questionable scenes (where women are tied up, have their nipples threatened with light bulbs, have their pubic hair plucked out, or are forced to masturbate with lit candles!), this movie in many ways resembles a Joe D'Amato "Black Emanuelle" film or one of Jess Franco's seedy 70's efforts. It is much sillier than any of those though, and pretty hard to take too seriously.

The main strength of this movie naturally is the four good-looking girls who spend a whole lot of time naked and/or engaged in softcore frolicking (willingly, unwillingly, or semi-willingly) with various partners. Olivia Pascal is perhaps the most well-known, largely from Frank's more widely released film "Vanessa". She's good here too, but doesn't have nearly as much screen time as in the earlier film. Bea Fiedler was another perennial piece of German cheesecake. She is less memorable than Pascal generally, and has an even more perfunctory role here. The real revelation though is Elisa Servier as the devilish mistress, who turns out to be not entirely faithful (or entirely heterosexual). Servier was a French actress who later appeared as one of David Hamilton naked nubiles in "Tendre Cousins". The actress who plays the native girl is kind of in the Laura "Black Emanuelle" Gemser mould, but with even the less acting talent (I know, the mind boggles). They're never great, but I always kinda enjoy the films of Hubert Frank, who is more talented as an overall filmmaker than David Hamilton, less erratic than Jess Franco, and less given to appalling lapses of taste than Joe D'Amato. Like all of his films I've seen, this one is pretty alright.