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RELEASE NAME : Fantasm.1976.DVDRIP.Xvid-SiCK
IMDB : http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0072969/
VIDEO FORMAT : XVID, ~1010 br (25 fps)
ASPECT RATIO : WS (576x320)
AUDIO FORMAT : ~96 VBR mono
LANGUAGE(S) : English
SUB(S) : N/A
FILES : 1XCD
COMMENT LINE : Professor Jurgen Notafreud explores the 10 most common
female sexual fantasies.
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This Aussie sex comedy ran into trouble with the censorship board in July
1976. It was Refused Classification in a print running 2350.00mtr
(85min 54sec). The same month saw a 2212.40mtr (80min 52sec) Reconstructed
Version passed with an R18+.
The Video Classics VHS from the early 80's is presumably taken from this
censored print.
It was passed again in March 2004 with an R18+ (Medium Level Sex Scenes,
Some Sexual Violence) in a 79min (v) version. This was for the Umbrella
Entertainment DVD release where it is double-billed with its sequel (also
censored in the 70's) FANTASM COMES AGAIN.
This new uncut release runs 86 min 54 sec.
Now that 70s everything is the pop culture decade du jour, it's time for us
to get down and delight in this double-header of cheery Australian softcore
sex romps. No lesser talent than Richard Franklin (hiding behind the pseudonym
Richard Bruce) directed the first Fantasm on a tiny budget of less than
US$50,000 and when released by the late, great exploitation film specialists
Filmways, it returned a massive US$600,000 worldwide gross. This makes it one
of the most profitable Australian films of all time, yet hardly a frame of it
was shot locally.
The main reason reason? Australian actresses were too timid to engage in the
kind of sexual athletics in Ross Dimsey's screenplay and the whole affair was
filmed in ten days in Los Angeles. In producer Tony Ginnane's commentary
tracks, we learn that only the linking sequences featuring John Bluthal as the
outrageously bogus "sex expert" Dr Jurgen Notafreud were filmed at home - in
the house of present-day Sharmill Films honcho Natalie Miller, no less. Miller
is one of Australia's most respected and admired distributors, exhibitors and
supporters of the Australian film industry and it's wonderful to discover that
she, too, has a distinguished connection with the Aussie exploitation scene.
Ginnane's commentary tracks are packed with so many fabulous titbits like this
they're worth the purchase price alone.
His reflections on how to get ahead in filmmaking ought to be part of the
curriculum at The Australian Film Television and Radio School in Sydney. With
the goofy humour supplied by Bluthal's links and a generally cheery approach
to the explicit material (a notable exception is a rather unpleasant rape
scene starring Rene Bond that Ginnane rightly admits was perhaps a bit too
strong), Fantasm succeeded in attracting couples and the expected raincoat
brigade as it simply catalogues "the 10 most common female sexual fantasies".
As an exercise in titillation that pushed the boundaries of the R certificate
as far as they could go at the time, Fantasm is an agreeably raunchy 90
minutes and outside of a dozen or so dire Aussie porno movies made the 80s and
90s (Aussie Vice, Aussie Phone Sex Girls, Buffy Down Under et al), it's your
only chance to see American XXX stars strutting their stuff in an Australian
film. The attention-grabbing scene is undoubtedly John Holmes' underwater
tryst with Maria Welton. Ginnane's description of the commercial impact of
Holmes in all his 13" glory is priceless and the sequence itself is pretty
hot stuff. If you've only ever seen Fantasm on the old Video Classics VHS
release, there's 3 & 1/2 minutes extra here and much of the censored footage
(including a few seconds of genuine hard-core action) appears in this
sequence. Elsewhere it's fun to watch Russ Meyer alumni Uschi Digart in a
lesbian sauna scene, Mary Gavin in the bathtub and Serena in the blasphemous
"Blood Orgy" sequence as we marvel at how this was shot in just 10 days over
the Christmas/New Year period in 1975-76. Fantasm played at the Dendy Collins
St in Melbourne for a year straight and is probably responsible for more
libido inflammation than any other Australian film. For those who can
approach cinema without snobbery this cultural artefact is a must-see.
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