Les grandes chaleurs

Angel Number 9 (1974)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Steven (Alan Marlow) is a worthless piece of crap who treats women as objects. One day he kicks out a woman who loves him because she tells him that she's pregnant with his child. The "heavens" decide to step it and have Steven ran over by a truck. Once his spirit is in Heaven, he's informed that he's being sent back down to Earth as a female so that he can understand the pain that he has caused them. Now, Stephanie (Darby Lloyd Rains) is back on Earth and wants to experience what it's like to be a woman and she must find someone to love her or else Steven will never come back.

This Roberta Findlay directed film also goes under the title ANGEL ON FIRE but no matter what you want to call it there's no question that it's a strange one. Look, there's a gigantic plot hole that never gets worked out. Steven is a really stupid and bad man and yet this side of his personality never comes through as Stephanie. Even though, as Stephanie, the "man" knows what's going on and he also understands that he's in a woman's body. Do you really think this "man" in this "woman's" body would be so willing to just hop in bed with every guy?

Yes, that's a logical issue with the screenplay but then again, how many people are going to be coming to a porno and questioning the plot? For the most part I found this to be a rather entertaining picture thanks in large part to the rather stupid plot. The dialogue is extremely bad at times but thankfully it's also quite laughable and especially the sexist things that the men are saying to the women before they're thrown out. Rains was actually very entertaining in the role and she certainly adds a touch of erotic nature. Jamie Gillis is fun in his role as the jerk of a man she falls in love with.

Findlay's ANGEL NUMBER 9 isn't a masterpiece or even a good film but it's an interesting woman's take on the subject of jerk men and what women go through.

I'm a fan of Roberta Findlay's erotic films (never liked her horror efforts), and ANGEL ON FIRE is an entertaining one. Not breaking new ground like some of her more notable pictures (see ANYONE BUT MY HUSBAND), but quality, tongue-in-cheek feminist porn.

Concept is simple -see the creepy guy get his comeuppance, in this case forced to live on Earth as a woman after dying and given a dubious second chance by a heavenly angel. But arousing XXX sex scenes and a tight control over the material make this at least as much fun as the latest umpteenth copy of HERE COMES MR. JORDAN (I'm expecting it to be a Jackie Chan vehicle next time out).

Darby Lloyd Rains, once among the reigning goddesses of NY hardcore, is convincing and even plaintive at times portraying the reincarnation of our womanizer. Alan Marlowe as the creep is pretty one-note, and Jamie Gillis is embarrassingly dull as the villain who gives Darby the required hard time that is her inherited punishment. The original title character Angel #9 is well-played by Findlay's regular thesp Jennifer Jordan (who the clown that writes Something Weird's liner note hype insists on calling "Barbara Jordan"). Both Marc Stevens, as the guy who runs over Marlowe, and Eric Edwards, as Angel #10, go through their in & out paces.