Emmanuelle 5

While I don't want to rave too much about the 1970's Emmanuelle films, either the "official" French series with Sylvia Kristel or the more notorious unofficial "Black Emanuelle" series of Laura Gemser and Joe D'Amato, there was always SOMETHING interesting about them. This movie marked the point though where the series became totally worthless. First off, they cast American B-movie bimbo Monique Gabrielle in the title role. It's not just that she is a worse actress than Kristel or Gemser (which she certainly is), but she is also totally wrong for the European flavor of the role. It's like casting Queen Latifah in the lead role of "Memoirs of Gisha".

They did hire interesting if erratic director Walerian Borowzyc, but when he and Gabrielle clashed they fired him. Roger Corman than did an incredible hatchet job on the film Borowzyc had made. Most of what he cut out, I've heard, were the sex scenes involving the black characters. The European fascination for these kind of interracial sex scenes was not exactly a blow for civil rights (anymore than Joe D'Amato's fascination for equine masturbation was a blow for animal rights), but whether these cuts made the film less racist or more racist, they certainly ruined the rhythm of the movie, left Gabrielle and her equally untalented male co-star with too much screen time, and it's even hard to tell in the final cut that this film was shot on location on the beautiful island of Reunion--thus the movie loses all the travelogue appeal of the early series (other than an idiotic prologue set at Cannes where Gabrielle's character is chased and stripped naked by a mob of fans).

After this fiasco the producers tried to recapture the European-flavor and old magic with "Emmanuelle 6" and by dusting off Syvia Kristel and teaming her with washed-up former James Bond George Lazenby in a French television series. But finally, the "Emmanuelle" movies fell victim to silicone, both in the increasingly overstuffed breasts of increasingly untalented actresses, and in the "futuristic", computer- themed plots, which were apparently aimed at sexually frustrated "Star Trek" fans. But even if socially-maladjusted computer geeks weren't getting all their porn off the internet, they would probably be laughing their asses off at the pathetic "hi-tech" nonsense of "Emannuelle in Space" and "Emmanuelle 2000". A sad end for a series that was never good, but certainly deserved better than this.

I haven't watched the movie in full yet, I am just coasting along merrily taking in the view, and the golden- tressed curves of the road makes for a pleasure-filled ride. In the meantime, just dropping all you two-bit critics a line to stress that you cannot fault Monique Gabrielle for this. She has a charm (besides the obvious ones) and she does as best she can for a movie with clear limitations. I don't think anybody else could have filled her shoes, even if she seems to be carrying them the whole time.

Serious movie, clearly NO, but pretty heroine SURE ENOUGH. Should have been done different, but it has to play to a very demanding audience WHO DOES WANT EXACTLY THIS KIND OF SCENERY, THIS KIND OF PLOT so do bear that in mind. Things happen way too soon and heavy-handed for us with the (ahem) refined tastes, but our salivating grease-monkey brethren want it no other way, and they'd be bored if the movie came in at a slower, more subdued pace, hence the unbelievably ridiculous Cannes scene. Nice view, though. Very, very nice, thank you.

For the fifth Emmanuelle film, eccentric filmmaker Walerian Borowczyk took the helm, and American actress Monique Gabrielle, of "Bachelor Party" fame, played the sexually liberated woman of the movie's title. As is often the case with exploitation flicks, multiple versions of the movie exist. I was unfortunate enough to watch the French home video version, which features disgusting hardcore inserts of actual penetration that are thrown into the movie at random, and completely undercut whatever narrative the movie attempts. It also contributes to the movie's overall feeling of being an unwatchable mess.

Anyway in this one the typically free-spirited and sexually "free" Emmanuelle plays a soft-core filmmaker who also runs a dance studio.

Emmanuelle's masses of fans strip her naked at a premiere and she tumbles into some nerdy guy's boat. She is so famous he recognizes her immediately, and tells her why he doesn't approve of the garbage she directs. Of course they have sex anyway.

Borowczyk is not untalented as a softporn filmmaker. His sex scenes are pretty tasteful.

Apparently the nerdy guy is some kind of billionaire, but our Manny is also fighting off the advances of an oil sheik from some made up Arab country - Bengladistan or some such. Before we get to see how that turns out, we have to sit through a hardcore excerpt, this time with a black man with a big moustache. How does anyone get turned on watching this crap?

Manny throws a little hissy fit when she thinks her billionaire nerd is trying to "own her", like every other guy, so she goes to Bengladistan. I'm sure the sheik will have more modern ideas about feminism. Totally smart decision there, Manny!

Bengladistan requires women to cover up like Saudi Arabia or Iran. Just another reason why this trip was kind of a dumb move on the part of our free spirited lass.

In Bengladistan Manny meets some American guy who looks like Paul Reiser and warns her about the sheik owning women. They have sex.

Indeed, Manny meets a young woman who has apparently been kidnapped by the sheik. Either Manny or the young woman then masturbates with a rolled up serviette in a scene that comes out of nowhere, but isn't graphic enough to be a hardcore insert, so Borowczyk apparently intended its inclusion in the movie, confusing as it is.

Of course Manny ends up in the harem, where we get scenes reminiscent of the director's earlier "Behind Convent Walls", ie. nude gallivanting and lesbianism from women wearing pseudo-religious garb. The sheik introduces Manny to some of his 50 wives, including a young virgin whom he never plans on consummating, a crazy woman and a blind person. One of them is a beautiful dark skinned woman who is "smoking a herb that will make her child strong and handsome".

Manny has barely finished the tour when she gets rescued by Eddie, who takes her down a river. They're not so busy trying to evade the sheik's machine gun wielding henchmen that they don't pause to have sex.

Then Manny apparently ends up back in the arms of the billionaire. What happened to the guy who saved her? Who knows? Who cares?

Gabrielle was a beautiful woman, but she's not even looking that good here. The movie should have been about the beautiful herb smoking one, how she came to be in the harem, and her life there. That could have been interesting. What we end up with is pretty tiring to sit through.

If your thing is frequent viewing of all varieties of colossal mammillae and the constant fornication the heroine engages in with every Tom, Dick and Harry (and I emphasize Dick.) don't miss this movie!!! If you have an IQ anything above moron, avoid it like the plague. The acting is beyond atrocious . The story line? You mean there was one? This film is such an accumulation of excrement that no professional would review it .All the participants must have used phoney names. If anyone was paid , it was an abomination! To be fair though, Dominique Gabrielle does have one hell of a figure. It is the crime of the century that they made her act.

Poor Walerian Borowczyk. Such a promising career early on as an important player in avant-garde European cinema, his talents wasted by the time this movie was made. I can understand sometimes you have to pay the bills (ask Jean Rollin) by making porn, but this could have been made better. What, you ask? Porn? Indeed. This movie seems to have several edits for the domestic and international markets. American releases have had a 77 minute "R" rated cut I believe as well as the 85 minute "unrated" edition. The French version is roughly 85 minutes but will be virtually unrecognizable to most audiences. The first 20 minutes are an extension of Emmanuelle's "Love Train" movie which we see being screened by Cannes audiences. This 20 minute sequence contains 3 pornographic sequences, which look like they were intended for another film but found their way into Emmanuelle V. (The sex toys on display are those of Borowczyk, I guess to make these scenes "arty"). After these sequences, the film continues in the same way as the American versions except for a porno sequence in the ballet school and a porno lesbian encounter at the sheik's harem (with more of Borowczyk's "personal collection"). Monique Gabrielle does not appear in any of the porno sequences, just the softcore ones. The French version has little dialogue, but really, do you care what they're saying?