Lacklust porn with fine production values
Another Teutonic adaptation of the memoirs of turn-of-the-century goodtime gal Josephine Mutzenbacher (known as JANINE in the US versions), this is also known as PROFESSIONAL JANINE and is the official sequel to SENSATIONAL JANINE, one of the best XXX films ever made.
Tall cool brunette Leila Vigso stars. She has an ever wry-smile as she engages in numerous sex acts, but neither she nor the picture ever come to a boil. The erotic scenes are mostly very short, allowing many more of them than usual, but they are also poorly filmed, cheating the viewer of involvement. The director here worked as DP on the prequel, SENSATIONAL, but seems to have learned virtually nothing about the technique of staging erotic sex scenes there.
The cast is attractive, lacking the extremely old people who are found in the first JANINE picture. Karine Gambier appears in 2 sequences. Vigso seems a little smug in the role and, though she looks good, she also looks like a pretty cold fish sexually. Certainly the story calls for a business-like approach, but she gives me the impression she'd be happier in some other business, most of the time.
Janine begins hooking in the park, wins and then loses a Viennese businessman who won't tolerate her cheating, and is left to her wits again. She spends some time at a coffeehouse which fronts a brothel, before being rescued by a Hungarian Hussar who takes her to the country. There is a wacky sex-on-horseback competition with the Hussar and his army buddies (different, but not really very sexy, due to the obvious problems of filming it), and a party at a rural inn turns into an orgy. Then Janine is back in Vienna again, opening her own brothel with another orgy. The ending just segues toward a sequel.
Despite a lot of open-air filming and a large, attractive cast, this version of the story is inferior, as porno, to a competing rendition, JOSEPHINE, made about the same time. Between story bits we visit the park where a gravel-voiced hurdygurdy man croaks out verses of a vulgar ballad about Janine. He's supposed to be funny and may have been more so in the German language version. Overall, film is a disappointment, especially to anyone who has seen SENSATIONAL JANINE.
Tall cool brunette Leila Vigso stars. She has an ever wry-smile as she engages in numerous sex acts, but neither she nor the picture ever come to a boil. The erotic scenes are mostly very short, allowing many more of them than usual, but they are also poorly filmed, cheating the viewer of involvement. The director here worked as DP on the prequel, SENSATIONAL, but seems to have learned virtually nothing about the technique of staging erotic sex scenes there.
The cast is attractive, lacking the extremely old people who are found in the first JANINE picture. Karine Gambier appears in 2 sequences. Vigso seems a little smug in the role and, though she looks good, she also looks like a pretty cold fish sexually. Certainly the story calls for a business-like approach, but she gives me the impression she'd be happier in some other business, most of the time.
Janine begins hooking in the park, wins and then loses a Viennese businessman who won't tolerate her cheating, and is left to her wits again. She spends some time at a coffeehouse which fronts a brothel, before being rescued by a Hungarian Hussar who takes her to the country. There is a wacky sex-on-horseback competition with the Hussar and his army buddies (different, but not really very sexy, due to the obvious problems of filming it), and a party at a rural inn turns into an orgy. Then Janine is back in Vienna again, opening her own brothel with another orgy. The ending just segues toward a sequel.
Despite a lot of open-air filming and a large, attractive cast, this version of the story is inferior, as porno, to a competing rendition, JOSEPHINE, made about the same time. Between story bits we visit the park where a gravel-voiced hurdygurdy man croaks out verses of a vulgar ballad about Janine. He's supposed to be funny and may have been more so in the German language version. Overall, film is a disappointment, especially to anyone who has seen SENSATIONAL JANINE.
- rduchmann
- 11 jun 2000