Supervixens

Russ Meyer, like David Lynch or Alejandro Jodorowsky, creates his own world in his movies and invites you to visit. And while I may not want to LIVE there, I sure do like to visit! You either love Meyer or you don't, it's as simple as that. Most fans seem to regard either Faster Pussycat or Beyond The Valley Of The Dolls as his best movies. I worship them both but my particular favourite is Supervixens. This movie is like no other ever made, with it's surreal mix of buxom babes, humour, violence, car chases and dynamite that has to be seen to be believed! Charles Napier fans note that this is his definitive performance playing psycho cop Harry Sledge, which may or may not be a reprise of his role in Cherry, Harry and Raquel! I dunno. Other Meyer regulars pop up including Haji, Stuart Lancaster and the criminally underseen John Lazar(Z-Man). But the real find here is Shari Eubank in a duel role. She unfortunately only made one other movie after this, Chesty Anderson,USN (with Timothy Carey!). She will always be remembered by lovers of trash cinema everywhere.

You haven't lived until you've seen Supervixens!

Russ Meyer loves breasts, and he's a filmmaker, but it's mostly the breast thing. That doesn't mean that he's not good at what he does, which is making raucous comedies where there's a dumb, well-hung klutz (Charles Pitts, in thankfully his only significant point in his career as Clint Ramsey), the dual role of the schizo-girlfriend (SuperAngel) and later her re-incarnation as a gas station attendant (SuperVixen), and the enemy of the film, the diabolical, totally evil Harry Sledge (Charles Napier, a classic part in a long character actor career). Much of this is just silly, very silly, and strange, deranged, illogical, and probably would be seen on the surface as sexist. But looking past the fact that there are a lot of naked women who continually throw themselves at Clint, there is something more to Meyer's psychology here. It would probably be something of a big point had the film been used in Zizek's The Pervert's Guide to Cinema: it's like a classic farce- yet still a somewhat truthful farce- about male desire.

Take the fact that while Clint is on his 'journey'- running from the scene of a crime he didn't commit, which was the murder and burning down of the dig that SuperAngel was living in- he continually gets into situations where the women present want to desperately ride him till Tuesday...but then there's always another man. There's a fascinating push-and-pull (no pun intended...maybe a little) to how the men treat the women in the picture. Until Clint agrees to stay with SuperVixen and take care of the gas station does he finally seem to relax, as before with the guy in the car, the farmer, the motel owner, all had women as their next of kin or significant others that were persona non grata. Behind the hilarity that ensues as Clint gets practically raped in a hayloft by a German girl, or when a mute/deaf black chick tries to get Clint to have his way with her in a desert, there is subtext- desire is defined by property. By the time Clint gets to SuperVixen, and finds out her man ran out on her weeks ago, it's like they're suddenly whisked away to the Garden of Eden (rather, in Arizona, as is one of the funniest sections of the flick), as they run around naked in ecstasy. Freud would have a field-day.

But one must not forget the Harry Sledge character who, like Hopper in Blue Velvet or Bobby Peru in Wild at Heart, is as Zizek described a larger-than-life, absurdist figure of man's libido. Maybe it was subconscious or not, but there's a lot to do in Supervixens with the idea of potency, or impotency. Harry can't get it up, the truth of it, and it becomes a sudden turn to see Harry suddenly stomp SuperAngel (albeit, in one of the most illogical scenes I've ever seen in any movie, taunts him for five minutes while locked in a bathroom following a bad sexual experience) and burn the place down as a means of compensation, an inherent lack of drive leading to the demise of anyone around him. While this seems to go overboard in the last twenty minutes of the film, when he returns in and becomes an ultimate terror upon Clint and SuperVixen, there's probably more one could read into in terms of symbolism than your average Bunuel movie: the dynamite shooting out of a chute, the one stick next to SuperVixen's most private of private spots, and all raised to the level of delirium.

The more I thought about it after the movie ended, the more it seemed to make sense, the idea of the ID blown-up in, of all things, a Russ Meyer movie. But this will be moot to most viewers who are just looking for what it there in a Meyer movie- sex and craziness, usually at the same time. As the first of his films I've seen, it's already apparent how equally proficient and tacky he can be: he's a master at editing, and casts his actors like it's a slight step above Z-grade porn. Which, of course, adds to its hysterical attitude, as we see one of the worst male actors of the 20th century play off of girls who rarely have a dirty smile off of their faces (save for when they're taunting Sledge, or getting caught by their daddies or husbands). And because Meyer, in the Mel Brooks sense, rises below vulgarity, his picture works so well even as it shouldn't. It deserves to be shown in grindhouse theaters and be found in the dirty sections of video stores. That it's an unlikely classic to be found in either of those places is hard to deny.

Russ Meyer's Supervixens mixes extreme violence with campy humour, which results in a film that can feel a rather awkward at times. Those looking for a gritty, hard-hitting thriller might struggle with the frequent comical sex scenes (accompanied by a breezy soundtrack), and those wanting a frivolous romp loaded with big-breasted women could well be deterred by the occasional spot of gruelling nastiness. One things for sure: it's a one-of-a-kind offering - offbeat and quirky - that fans of cult cinema simply cannot ignore.

Buxom Shari Eubank takes on a dual role in the film: first, as SuperAngel, stunning yet obnoxious girlfriend of easy-going gas station attendant Clint Ramsey; and secondly, as SuperVixen, the lovely rest-stop owner Clint falls for while on the run from the law, having been wrongfully accused of Angel's murder. In reality, the villain of the piece is corrupt psycho cop Harry Sledge (a memorably loathesome performance by Charles Napier), who killed Angel after she mocked him for his inability to perform in the sack. Much of the film follows Clint as he hitches down the highway, meeting various characters along the way, including swinging couple Cal (John Lazar) and SuperCherry (Sharon Kelly), farmer Lute (Stuart Lancaster) and his nympho mail-order bride SuperSoul (Uschi Digard), and SuperEula, the wild daughter of a protective motel owner.

Undoubtedly, the most disturbing scene in the film is the murder of Angel, Harry Sledge kicking down a bathroom door to get to her, pushing her into the bath (which is full), stamping on her, jumping on her, and then electrocuting her. Its cruelty and sadism rivals anything to be found in a video nasty. The film also ends with some brutal violence, Harry abducting Vix (as SuperVixen likes to be called) to use as bait to lure Clint to his doom. Vix ix roughed up by Harry, and Clint is shot and stabbed. In a typically kooky Meyer moment, Harry finally get what is coming to him, blown up in a loony tunes style with his own stick of dynamite. As for the more light-hearted stuff, my favourite part has got to be Clint's crazy day out with sassy black babe Eula, who is one crazy gal, riding topless in a speeding dune buggy, sunbathing naked in the desert, and seeing to the sexual needs of a wandering strongman in the middle of the highway. Phew!

My rating: 7/10 - might've been a touch higher had it been a bit shorter.

Without a doubt, the first 10 minutes of Supervixens is one of the best pieces of comic film editing I've ever seen. If there's anyone who's interested in figuring out how to quick cut images with dialogue in order to create a comic effect, watch this. Most of Meyer's movies are pretty bad, but there are three that are great and this is one of them. Meyer creates a surreal American landscape, where people are all endowed with unreal sex parts, all the woman bare the title "super", and ex-nazi's are gas station owners. The movie is filled with in-your-face phallic symbols and the scene with Super Angel and the cop is absolutely hysterical. Can't wait until this is on DVD.

Russ Meyer is a God who succeeds in creating his own utopist universe over and over again. This film is just brilliant, even though the entire prudish and easily offended world will never admit it. Yes, it's a sexfilm… So what if it is? And besides, apart from that it also is a truly ingenious comedy and a cruel satire. After his more pretentious (but equally terrific) portrait `Beyond the Valley of the Dolls', Meyer falls back on the themes and ideas that gained him his first successes. This being the adventures and misfortunes of a young protagonist on the run. Falsely accused of murdering his girlfriend, a handsome man hitchhikes across rural America. Everywhere he goes gorgeous, voluptuous nymphs sexually harass the poor, poor guy (???). Isn't life hell? Charles Napier is excellent as the psycho cop, while the `vixens' are too hot to handle! Every single girl who walks through the screen here looks like a fantasy come true. Supervixens constantly features cheerful music and the screenplay is very funny. Although I can imagine not for all tastes, I personally laughed sick when the Austrian chick starts squealing German while making love! Russ Meyer often reuses stuff that also featured in his earlier movies. Like the snakebite or even the entire climax which is a more explosive update of the `Motor Psycho' ending. Not too original but who cares? He's Russ Meyer so he can do anything he wants! A fellow fan stated in his user comment that you haven't lived until you see Supervixens, and I couldn't have said it better. A must!