42nd Street Forever: XXX-Treme Special Edition

Back in the day when 42nd Street New York was sleazy and easy and not Disneyfied to the sky, these kind of movies ruled 24/7/365 and 366 on leap year of course.

Back in the 1970's and early to mid 1980's New York City's most memorable road was the home to the derelicts of society. A mesh mash of flotsam and jetsam mixed together.

All the one room movie houses on 42nd Street showed cheap budget horror and shock films or "Grindhouse Cinema" to the lay man. They also showed porno films ! All the films were hardcore and had actual dialog and story lines to follow. This was called "The Golden Age of Adult Cinema" but it all came to an end in the mid to late 1980's when the home video format war between Beta and VHS was swiftly won by VHS.

Adult Film Distributors stopped sending out 35 millimeter reels to these theaters and a majority of them either went video projection or deliberately withheld what adult reels they did have in their possession and played them over and over till they were far beyond repair.

On this DVD you get 46 trailers total from the Golden Era. One is actually from the 1970's but the rest are pure 1980's. A small majority of the trailers star "The Hedgehog" himself Ron Jeremy. You also get the late great John Holmes and Lisa DeLeeuw before they died of Aids ! Also be on the lookout for the Puerto Rican Mancrusher Vanessa Del Rio. She is hotter than chili peppers and cayenne red pepper mix !

If you haven't read my review of 42nd Street Forever Volume 1, you really should. This is volume 3 of the series and continues the movie trailer montage, except it switches to covering grindhouse's next door neighbor (namely porn).

Before the videocassette, DVD and the Internet, porn was viewable only in seedy theaters (usually next to grindhouse theaters). Because they were theatrically released, meant that there needed to be an actual story to keep you in the theaters after the money shots. With the 1980's also came the assembly line, cookie cutter porn. The story was no longer important and took a backseat to cheaper (and more frequent) productions, relying mostly on physical attributes. The 80's signaled the death of the "story porn". For reference, Boogie Nights shows this same transition.

Volume 3 compiles the trailers from 46 movies, made during the late 70's and early 80's. This would include cheesy 80's hair, clothes and music. Whatever happens, don't get caught humming the music while in line at the post office. The talent level (no pun intended) is quite high here. Names such as Harry Reems, Seka, John Leslie, Hyapatia Lee, Jamie Gillis, Stacey Donovan, Mike Horner, Nina Hartley, Ron Jeremy, Annette Haven, Peter North, Ginger Lynn, Joey Silvera, Vanessa Del Rio, John C. Holmes, Taija Rae, Randy West, Amber Lynn,Eric Edwards, Chelsea Manchester and Richard Pacheco, should be quite familiar to many. What is even more amazing is that some of them had actual acting ability and gave the movies a campy, fun (and yet absurd) quality. Some were highly educated and others, still, had actual acting training. Imagine what they could have done with a good script, a good director and the possibility to keep their clothes on.

The trailers are very graphic and include full on sex and nudity, so don't show this at the local PTA meeting. It is the 80's so you can expect butcher-like closeups, tan lines, bad hair cuts and hedges in full bloom. I would give this a 2 (of anything distilled) on my "shot scale". That is just to relax you, however. It is also much better to watch this in the appropriate company of others. These trailers are a time capsule of a bygone era. Recreate the experience by sharing with others, but please try and keep the Pee Wee Herman to a minimum.

-Celluloid Rehab