Undici giorni, undici notti

This movie that was strangely released at the cinemas here a long time ago was a trial to imitate the famous movie "Nine weeks and a half" starred by Kim Basinger and Mickey Rourke although obviously with a lower budget. Nevertheless the female main character(Jessica Moore) is really beautiful and the story has sometimes very sweet touches seeming almost like a romantic movie, so if you like romanticism or erotism or both you can watch this. It´s neither very modern nor very good but at least actors are not bad and you can watch it better than most erotic movies. About Jessica Moore it is a paradox that she is playing here the role of a dangerous bitch-later in love, with only the age of 19 when she played some years later the role of the daughter of a terrified family in a movie called "The broken mirror" seeming younger there, because in this movie you could never imagine that this magnific blonde is so young, she is so well-grown....,I love her.

I first watched this movie on cable back in the late 80s and 90s. They would show it regularly; I didn't know who directed it until a commentator mentioned Joe D'Amato's name who died in 1999; The film is about a guy named Michael marrying this ordinary woman named Helen; He hooks up with this woman Sarah, who he doesn't know is writing a book of men's sexual natures, and he just happens to be No 100; What turns into an full-fledged blown out affair for Michael and Sarah turns into pure agony for poor Helen who is waiting for her day at the altar; The ending can be predictable to some; But it's worth a look; It's hard to get this movie here in the US but I am sure they still show on the premium cable channels;

(1987) Eleven Days Eleven Nights/ Undici giorni, undici notti DUBBED DRAMA

This is another one of those movies where the thin and forgettable story line takes a back seat to the nude scenes much of it from Sarah (Jessica Moore). On the first 10 minutes, as she is coming toward a building, a large man wearing sunglasses is taking pictures of her. As he is snapping shots of her coming toward the building up until she goes to this empty floor where there are nothing but unclothed mannequins on different poses. And the obese guy is still taking photos of her. What is odd is that she begins to disrobe, she does not appear to notice him doing this as they are both on the same floor. And it was at this point, I was unable to watch anymore.

Sarah Asproon (Luciana Ottaviani) is a writer who is working on a book about 100 men with whom she has had sexual adventures. The latest object of her "research" is Michael (Joshua McDonald), an ugly guy she meets on a boat. Unsuspecting of Sarah's true intentions, he immediately falls for her charms and a torrid romance begins, despite the fact that Michael is about to marry Helen (Mary Sellers) in eleven days.

"Eleven Days, Eleven Nights" marked a point of no return in the career of Joe D'Amato. The film was his biggest box office hit, and after that he basically worked in the same style of "American" softcore dramas mostly shot in New Orleans, Louisiana, until returning definitely to hardcore porn in the early '90s.

Despite its cult status today, and the fact that I'm a die-hard D'Amato fan, I have to say that this film disappointed me quite a bit. Perhaps the main problem is that it captured too well the same stupid tone of its source of inspiration, Adrian Lyne's "9 1/2 Weeks," a pseudo-erotic romance falsely marketed as a controversial sadomasochistic tale. If in the original we had Mickey Rourke subjecting Kim Basinger to silly games, here the roles are reversed, with the woman manipulating the man. It could have been interesting if the script had had our heroine coming up with really dangerous situations in order to torment her prey. Instead, we have to endure Sarah forcing Michael to do ridiculous things, like showing up for a dinner at a restaurant dressed as a drag queen! The scene was so poorly executed that we don't see enough reluctance on Michael's part regarding such an embarrassing idea.

Where this film best surpasses its mainstream counterpart is in the T&A department. While the original could easily be rated PG-13, with only a brief bit of nudity from Basinger, this one is very generous in terms of erotic scenes. Ottaviani's impeccable curves found the perfect admirer in D'Amato's lens, with no detail of her body escaping his voyeuristic advances. The more than usual explicit approach, though, resulted in a tremendous continuity error during the first sex scene on the boat. While having sex with Michael in standing position, Sarah lifts one of her legs and the camera can't resist to the exposition of her genitals. The problem is that there is no male genital inserted into it, although the body moves are clearly implying they are in the middle of an intercourse. This error becomes even more blatant given the shadow of an erection that is showed just before the action starts. For the sake of continuity, D'Amato should have avoided the more explicit details.

I won't include among the problems the filler scenes featuring the actors walking through the streets, as I got used to this trademark of D'Amato cinema. However, the music that plays during a long segment featuring Sarah and Michael being stalked by Helen was not appropriate at all. Helen is deeply suffering by seeing her fiancée cheating her, but the upbeat pop song seems to ignore her presence and her feelings during this sequence.

Mary Sellers did a good job playing Helen, a woman insecure about her physical potential to attract men who sees her dreams of marriage menaced by the presence of voluptuous Sarah. Unfortunately, her character didn't receive enough attention by the fragile script. By the other hand, Joshua McDonald was one of the worst choices for a male protagonist I ever saw, as his Michael is not only ugly but also very irritating. It is impossible to believe that a goddess like Luciana Ottaviani is interested in someone like him. He has the charisma of a brick, and the movie needed urgently another male lead. Laura Gemser, as usual in the period, has the typical clothed cameo as Sarah's editor. Some sourcers say Valentine Demy has a cameo in this movie, but I couldn't spot her.

D'Amato does an excellent work as director of photography and this aspect, together with the stunning presence of Ottaviani are the only two factors that save "Eleven Days, Eleven Nights" of being a total disaster.

Eleven Days, Eleven Nights (1986)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

After the Italian Horror market dried up several of the genres directors were left without work or had to switch gears and try something else. Joe D'Amato had already done hardcore features but his career got a boost with this softcore flick, which became a big hit in Italy and other countries. A man (Joshua McDonald) is about to be married in eleven days but he starts up a steamy love affair with a young woman (Jessica Moore), which leads the man to thinking twice about getting married. The only problem is that he doesn't know the woman is just sleeping with him so she can write a book on sex partners. This film starts off okay but slowly goes downhill due to some stupid characters, which are amongst the worst written I've ever seen. The stereotypes of the characters are at times laughable. For instance, the man's girlfriend is a plain, ordinary, boring, bookworm who wants to wait to have sex. There's a dinner scene with her parents, which just has to be seen to be believed. The one good thing about the movie is Moore who is able to display a great sexual presence. D'Amato does great with the softcore sex scenes but the rest is pretty bad.