Lina Romay, the Spanish cult actress that was to the infamous cult director Jess Franco what angora was to Ed Wood Jr., died of cancer on 15 February 2012.
Here at a wasted life, we decided at the time to honor her with a career review, a decision that – as we previously mentioned in Part I – has proven to be Sisyphean in proportions. Romay took part in an innumerable amount of celluloid projects, mostly for Franco but on occasion for other filmmakers as well, many of which were completed, some of which were not; many of which were never released outside of Spain or on DVD or video, some of which were never officially released at all; many of which have been reedited or reworked or retitled, and a number of them can probably be officially categorized as "lost" – an exact listing of all titles is probably impossible to create. Indeed, we culled our list from the imdb, a list that has already changed since we began this project.
This career review is thus hardly definitive. Aside from the projects added since it was begun, some films found on the initial list that couldn't be documented are not included herein. But as flawed as this review of films might be, it nevertheless offers a slight insight to the projects of Jess Franco's muse and life partner. May she rest in peace.
The first part of this career review is the blog entry of February 24, 2012, which you can find here.
Today, we present part two of the review below – part three can be found here.
Hellhole Women
(1981, dir. Jess Franco)
Bloody Moon
Trailer:
The Story of Linda
(1981, dir. Jess Franco)
According to imdb, Lina Romay is "Rosa Almirall", who is listed in the credits as assistant director; some of the aka names of the film include Linda, Captive Women, Die nackten Superhexen vom Rio Amore, Linda, de stoeipoes Netherlands, and Orgy of the Nymphomaniacs. Supposedly footage of this film was edited into Otto Retzer's Babystrich im Sperrbezirk (1983), which features David Bowie's former favorite transvestite Romy Haag (né Edouard Frans Verba).
Plot, according to My Best Video Collection: "Betsy Norman (Ursula Buchfellner) is a happy assistant at a luxurious Spanish hotel. Sheila (Raquel Evans), the hotel owner, caters for all wishes of her clientele with another lucrative business, the brothel 'Rio Amore' where clients from all over the world come to relax with the girls and watch the sado-masochistic shows. Linda (Katja Bienert), Betsy's sister, is drugged and forced to work as a prostitute there." Here at Daily Motion is the fab nude lesbian scene in which Linda says goodbye to her boarding school roommate. As veehd.com points out, however, Katja Bienert was somewhat underage when she made this "sexploitation/sleaze/roughie" – namely, 14. The Story of Linda was co-scripted by Erich Tomek, who not only co-wrote Franco's Bloody Moon, but also helped write that classic Italo Alien rip-off, Contamination (1980 / trailer).
At imdb, good Ol' Michael Elliott of Louisville, KY, says: "Extremely bizarre Jess Franco flick about an actress (Lina Romay) who puts on sex shows with a story involving aliens who kidnap girls and knock them up. The first gag is that the women, due to the super sperm, can deliver 600 babies an hour. The second gag is that real aliens see this and decide to get in on the action. This is probably the best sex comedy I've seen from Franco. Romay, when she's not showing off her sex talent, can be very funny with a light comic touch and she gets to deliver that several times throughout the film. [...] The alien make up at the start of the film is cheap but very effective looking."
Les filles de Copacabana
(1981, dir. Jess Franco)
10K Bullets, which calls the movie "a sexual coming of age film", does not like the film, saying: "Visually the film is bland when compared to
Franco’s most inspired films. To Franco's credit he does know how to
photograph women. The shots of women on the beach and close up of their
assets are this films strongest asset. The film is also padded with
footage from the carnival in Brazil. The weak plot which is essentially
just a series of sexual encounters that offers no advancement in the
plot."
Aberraciones sexuales de una mujer casada
(1981, dir. Jess Franco)
Dare one suggest that Lina Romay was never truthful about her age? In this film, playing the mother of George (Antonio Vasco), she is theoretically on 27 years old in real life – so why does she actually look old enough to really be his Mom? Aberraciones sexuales de una mujer casada is the first – and Spanish – version of Diary of a Desperate Housewife, Franco's French film of the next year which is both cut differently and has additional scenes added by the credited director, Oliver Mathot, a highly active sleaze actor who died in 2011. Both this is and the French version features mostly the same cast, and both are available in German as Cecilia – that be the name of the films' main character, played by Muriel Montossé. Specifically about Aberraciones sexuales de una mujer casada, over at imdb, Pierre-Alexandre Buisson of Montreal, Canada, says "Wonderfully shot and wrapped in a warm score by Daniel White, this Franco flick is a must see. Shot in Portugal, in a forest similar to the one adorning the family castle in Virgin Among the Living Dead, it has a timeless feel, and the theme, centering around 'open sexuality' inside a couple, is universal. It is basically the story of Cecilia (Muriel Montossé), a housewife raped by three greasy thugs. She ends up enjoying the assault and it opens new horizons for her. She convinces her husband that seeing other people will improve their relationship, and off they are! Orgies, rituals and lots of erotic scenes captured by Franco's sensual zooms later, they start dealing with the downside of sleeping around... [...] The movie, overall, is a guilty pleasure, a pleasure that a newcomer could find questionable, but that the true Franco connoisseur will approve, and most of all share." For more info on basically the same film, go down a few films to Diary of a Desperate Housewife.
El fontanero, su mujer, y otras cosas de meter
(1981, dir. Carlos Aured)
Lina Romay, plays "Julia" in her first film for director Carlos Aured, who is famous primarily for directed five films starring the legendary Paul Naschy (The Werewolf Versus the Vampire Woman [1971 / trailer], Horror Rises from the Tomb [1973 / trailer], Curse of the Devil [1974 / trailer], House of Psychotic Women [1974], and The Mummy's Revenge [1973]). This flick here, however, is an "erotic comedy" – though going by the Spanish-language (simulated sex) clips of this film that can be found all over the web – like here at xvideos.com – the humor is rather flat and the fake sex anything but erotic. Over at Movie House Reviews, however, they see things slightly differently, saying that "The film is 99% nudity and simulated sex, with a little humor to separate the sex scenes. This is the only vintage Spanish sex farce I have seen that finds the balance between erotic and funny in the same way as so many successful Italian, German and English sex farces of that era." Plot? Well, what do you think it is in a film whose title translates, more or less, into "The Plumber, His Wife… And Other Thing to Put Inside"?
On imdb, Cianeto from Portugal, who says "This one has the dubious honor of being the worst DVD that I possess" and also points out that the film "is not actual XXX porn [because] hardcore pornography was illegal in Spain at the time," details the plot as thus: "This is a comedy about a plumber (Ricardo Diaz) who, after finding is wife (Montserrat Prous) in bed with his best mate (Antonio Parrilla), engages in a series of sexual encounters with about all the oh-so-lonely housewives and other women that required his services." The film enjoys minor infamy for the scene in which, when the plumber is unable to satisfy his friend's wife (Lina Romay) with his own rod, she ends up making do with the rod of a plunger.
La chica de las bragas transparentes
(1981, dir. Jess Franco)
LIna Romay as the hooker Suzy in this film, aka as Pick-Up Girls and The Girl in the Transparent Panties and, possibly Two Female Spies with Flowered Panties – a name also claimed as an AKA for Franco's Ópalo de fuego: Mercaderes del sexo (1980).
Over at Film Affinity, they offer the following plot description: "Private eye Al Crosby (Antonio Mayans) is paid by millionaire Harry Feldman to take his place at a meeting with Emilio, a gangster. He is drugged and photographed in compromising positions by two hookers, Suzy and Bijou (Doris Regina), then he is nearly killed by Mrs. Feldman (Rosa Valenty). Al tries to blackmail Mrs. Feldman, and he is beaten up by three women and forced to tell of Harry's whereabouts, leading to Harry's murder. Al enlists the help of Harry's mistress, Coco, plus Suzy and Bijou, whom Al gets out of prison, to expose Mrs Feldman as having inherited money by devious ways and being a brothel owner."
Good ol' Michael Elliott from Louisville, KY – he's a dedicated Franco viewer if there ever was one – gives a bit more detail on imdb: "Private Eye Al Crosby (Robert Foster) is hired to do some tracking down and he gets the help of two hookers. At first Crosby thinks this is your typical murder hunt but it turns out a woman has hired him to find her missing penis. You see, she was once a man and after her operation, she returned home with her penis in a jar and someone stole it. Yep, this is a Franco movie. That big revelation doesn't come to the end, which is a shame because it would have been a lot more fun if the PI was going after that instead of the murder plot we have to sit through. The story makes no sense whatsoever so the film becomes very boring. There's a great music score by Pablo Villa and Franco and of course there are countless sex scenes with all sorts of beautiful women getting naked. There's an erotic threesome at the start of the film as well. Franco is known for leaving mistakes in his films if they come off as something that might happen and one of these is the highlight in this film. During the threesome, Romay is trying to get Foster's pants off but both of them are struggling to do so and they finally break out of character and just start laughing."
Trailer:
Aka The Treasure of the Living Dead and Oasis of the Living Dead and a dozen other titles. Jess Franco bailed from the film Zombie Lake (trailer), which was then taken over by the equally legendary Jean Rollin, to make this film instead (in two alternate language versions, actually). All films are amazingly bad and, in their own ways, perversely entertaining, but Franco's Oasis of the Zombies does get more boring more quickly, if only because it lacks the excessive amount of unshaven bush found in Zombie Lake.
Wikipedia claims that "Franco filmed a 'Spanish version' simultaneously with the French version (under the title La tumba de los Muertos Vivientes), probably to placate Lina Romay (since the French producer had chosen other actors to be in the 'real version'). Only the director's cut (the Spanish version) includes scenes with Lina Romay and Eduardo Fajardo, but that version has never been released outside of Spain." To what extent that is true is open to conjecture, but in the public domain version of Oasis of the Dead found below, Kurt's wife is played by an unattractive "Myriam Landson" – so, theoretically, it probably shouldn't even be part of this review. (Tuff titties.) For a wasted life's less than positive review of that film, click on the title above... strangely enough, we must admit that we really don't remember disliking it as much as we obviously did. Give it a go yourself. In the US, the movie seems to be public domain.
Lina is Helen, the Housekeeper in this film AKA under a half-dozen names including the Revenge in the House of Usher, that name due to the fact that (a very few) aspects of the film were taken from the similarly named tale by Edgar Allen Poe – as Fantastic Movie Musings and Ramblings rightly points out, the "utter sloppiness" of the opening credit "Based on the novel 'The Fall of house of Usher' by Edgard Allan Poe [...] certainly shows that someone didn't give a flying fudgesicle stick about this movie." Giving the plot as "A former student visits the home of the ailing Dr. Usher, who has been trying to revive his daughter with blood transplants from unwilling female donors," FMM&R is of the opinion that Zombie 5 "is Franco at his least inspired. It takes very little out of the Poe story; the only real elements in common are the name of Usher, the fact that someone comes to visit him, and that the house collapses when the main character dies; apart from that, it's just Franco going to the Dr. Orloff well one more time, and this movie even recycles about fifteen minutes of footage from the first Orloff movie," The Awful Dr. Orloff (1962 / trailer). Neurosis, the French version originally distributed by Eurocine and now available on DVD in English-speaking countries, supposedly has different scenes added. The original US video title Zombie 5 was appropriated in 1988 by Claudio Lattanzi for the US release – as Zombie 5: Killing Birds (trailer) – for his Italo zombie flick Killing Birds – Raptors.
Diary of a Desperate Houswife, aka Cecilia, is the French version of Jesus Franco's Aberraciones sexuales de una mujer casada (1981), supposedly augmented with a few additional scenes shot by Olivier Mathot and with less Lina Romay, who now play a cabaret owner instead of George's mother. My Duck Is Dead quotes Louisville, KY's very own' Michael Elliott in full for their plot description of the movie: "After being gang raped and then having sex with her husband, a woman discovers that marital sex is a lot better when the relationship is open. This is an extremely rare film from Jess Franco but it's really a straight love story and not a sleazy effort. Franco treats the subject matter with full respect and tries his best to tell an honest story about marriage and the film remains interesting throughout, although not too much really goes on."
Apocalipsis sexual
(1982, dir. Carlos Aured & Sergio Bergonzelli)
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The second and last film Romy made with Carlos Aured, with whom she made El fontanero, su mujer, y otras cosas de meter... the year previously. This time around, it's a horror film. Co-director Sergio Bergonzelli is unknown for films such as Sick-a-Pathics (1996 / trailer), Delirio di sangue (1988 / trailer) and In the Folds of the Flesh (1970 / trailer). I'm in a Jess Franco State of Mind says: "If you haven't seen this, it's a way, way, way, way out hardcore crime roughie very loosely based on the Patty Hearst case. Only this time it's in Spain. A group of criminals led by Ricardo Diaz break into a vacant villa where they hold an heiress for ransom. [The film] is actually a pretty interesting oddity with good performances by Diaz, Romay and the late, great Wilson. One steamy interlude involves the two stars of Macumba Sexual getting involved with a candle! There's plenty of group sex and offensive sexual violence. The film has a somewhat droll sense of humor and a philosophical twist." That blogspot also asserts that Sergio Bergonzelli was not involved in the film, despite what imdb says. According to MovieCensorship.com: "There are two different versions of the movie. The Spanish DVD contains the softcore version, whereas the Italian VHS shows the hardcore version. In the latter every sex scene (and there are many) has been extended or replaced by HC material, on the other hand the story has been reduced. This is why all in all the HC version is the shorter one." Obviously enough, going by the poster above, the film features the great Ajita Wilson (né George Wilson) as one of the kidnappers. 24 NSFW minutes of sex excerpts can be seen here, but it ain't anything exciting. Co-director Sergio Bergonzelli, who started his career as an actor in the early 50s, moved onto directing westerns by 1960, and ended his career as a productive director of so-bad-they're-good horror and sex sleazefests such as In the Folds of the Flesh (1971 / full film), Our Lady of Lust (1972 / psychedelic scene), Taxi Love (1976 / trailer), Porco Mondo (1978 / opening credits), Blood Delirium (1988 / trailer) and more, more, more.
Aka My Rabbit is the Best One – with a little imagination, you can probably figure out what (non-Brazilian-waxed) rabbit is being talked about. The directorial debut of Ricardo Palacios, a prolific actor seen in such fun films as Coming At Ya! (1981 / trailer), The Blood of Fu Manchu (1968 / trailer), Night of the Werewolf (1981 / Spanish trailer) and many more – and who even, in 1986, worked in an "adult" Jess Franco film featuring Romay, Fury in the Tropic (aka Orgasmo perverso).
Movie House Commentary gives this softcore S&M/B&D a positive review, stating "Lina Romay was at her young prime, and demonstrated that she could act. Much of the full frontal exposure is very well lit. For the kinkier among you, there is lots of bondage and whipping, and plenty of the old favorite, the lesbian kiss. The Spanish clearly know how to make erotica." The full NSFW lesbian muff-diving credit sequence (with Romay!) that opens the film – underscored by a truly great and cheesy organ soundtrack – can be found here at xhamster.com... the beating that the jealous guard gives Romay when they are caught is what drives her to run away from the reformatory and go to Madrid, where, according to MHC, "A handsome stranger, Carlos (Emilio Linder), comes to the rescue, offering her a hot bath, dinner and a warm bed. Everything seems on the up and up, and his maid (Elena Alverez) is put in charge of getting her bathed and settled into a room. Her first clue that something may be wrong is when she wakes up in the middle of the night, and finds Emilio beating then screwing the maid. After a few days in the house, Lina wants to play, too — even if it entails bondage and discipline." See the film if you want to know more – it's available on Spanish-language DVD.
According to imdb, Lina Romay worked as assistant director on this "Emmanuelle" film aka Las orgías inconfesables de Emmanuelle; while this "erotic" film itself is very less than unexceptional, the synth soundtrack is torturous. Don't we wish all women were as easy as Emmanuelle to satisfy?
My Duck Is Dead says: "This is Emmanuelle as you've never seen her before – a unique take on the insatiable sexual adventuress courtesy of Jess Franco! French TV star Muriel Montossé (billed here as Vicky Adams) follows in the uninhibited footsteps of Sylvia Kristel and Laura Gemser as Emmanuelle, exploring carnal fulfillment in the most unlikely places. But after an impromptu live-on-stage lesbian exhibition with a sultry stripper, her friends think she may be out of control. Will she resist the allure of every extreme erotic opportunity that comes her way or can she seduce her partners to submit to [aka] The Inconfessable Orgies of Emmanuelle? Known to late-night cable connoisseurs as Emmanuelle Exposed [...], this lascivious erotic masterpiece is now fully restored from the recently discovered original negative and presented totally uncut & uncensored." Okay, they saw a different film than we did – but then, we also didn't make it to the end of this turkey.
DVD Drive-In, on the other hand, probably saw the same film we did, for they describe Emmanuelle Exposed as "bottom of the barrel junk" [...] "made up of lengthy, boring sex scenes, slightly enlivened by the presence of lovely blonde starlet Muriel Montosse [...]. Thoroughly unremarkable."
Sangre en mis zapatos
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Aka Blood on My Shoes; Lina Romay is "Paquita la Fina." Numerous sources across the web, just like imdb, claim that this film is based on one of the stories from Edgar Wallace's Sanders of the River, but none of the sources seem to have seen the film. (Considering that the Sanders of the River tales are set in Colonial Africa, one must also wonder just how much of Wallace's book is actually found in this film set in 1980s.) Even printed sources such as, for example, Michael R. Pitts's Horror Film Stars make this statement but say little more about the film. Tropic Twilight Video offers this brief description of the film: "Jess Franco’s mystery/adventure/comedy loosely based on an Edgar Wallace story. A couple of investigators try to locate some stolen money."
Sideshow Video skips the Wallace connection but offers more detail – and thus ends up sounding as if they saw a different film than Tropic Twilight Video: "[An] espionage thriller – several International spies mistakenly believe the Paquita a cabaret singer is a spy who is planning to meet a German scientist who has escaped from Russia. Overall a poor blend of thriller and horror genres. Not Jess Franco's strongest work by any means. Lacks his distinct production style from earlier work with just the slow-pace and confusing dialogue left to fast forward through."
Los blues de la calle Pop (Aventuras de Felipe Malboro, volumen 8)
(1983, dir. Jess Franco)
Lina Romay is present both as assistant director – credited as "Rosa María Almirall" – and as Candy Coster, who plays the part of "Jenara Butterfly." Few people seem to have seen this film, as it only ever had a Spanish-language release, but a translation of the plot description from filmaffinity delivers the following: "A famous private detective, Philip Marlboro (Antonio Mayans), is hired by a young woman to find her boyfriend, Macho Jim (José Llamas, who in real life later fell victim to AIDS*), student of economics, who has disappeared without a trace."
Robert Monell of I'm in A Jess Franco State of Mind seems to be one of the few, the brave, outside of Spain that have seen the film, and he claims that "This witty and visually striking neo-noir parody is one of Franco's personal favorites, and it's easy to see why." Monell has a nice, in-depth and very long review of the film here on his blog, but to simply present a few aspects he mentions: "[The] 1983 proto-punk obscurity Los blues de la calle Pop [...] is both mainstream and experimental in signification/intent. In a way, Jess Franco may be one of the pioneers of Punk Cinema, if there is such a thing. [...] Felipe Marlboro [...] is a seedy private investigator who takes up a missing person case [...] in the punk infested coastal resort. It's a sinister, retro place [...] which seems to be situated in a time warp where all the men seem to hang out in a smoky bar decorated with posters of Bogart and Mae West, waiting for trouble to erupt. The residents of this corrupt town all look like they base their fashion sense on 1980's MTV punk rock videos. The men look like either Sid Vicious or a member of A Flock of Seagulls, and the women sport the slutty attire and pouty sexuality of the late Robert Palmer's back-up vocalists in the music video of Addicted to Love. [...] The visual style of the film is comic strip array of primary colors and weird camera angles."
This career review is thus hardly definitive. Aside from the projects added since it was begun, some films found on the initial list that couldn't be documented are not included herein. But as flawed as this review of films might be, it nevertheless offers a slight insight to the projects of Jess Franco's muse and life partner. May she rest in peace.
The first part of this career review is the blog entry of February 24, 2012, which you can find here.
Today, we present part two of the review below – part three can be found here.
Hellhole Women
(1981, dir. Jess Franco)
According to imdb, Lina Romay is "Rosa Almirall", who is listed in the credits as assistant director. Hellhole Women is a WIP film AKA as Sadomania, Hölle der Lust and Prisoners of the Flesh and stars everyone's favorite transsexual (after Amanda Lear), Ajita Wilson – who, minus her hair and wearing a fake moustache, in one scene even plays the young man who's having sex with Lucas (Jesus Franco). Franco once said the popular Italian Fumetti comics were the inspiration for this film – a believable statement, to say the least.
DVD Drive-In, which says "this is also an ably produced little Franco flick, with excellent location photography (the girl-on-girl battle at sundown is breathtaking) and top-notch editing," comments: "Feel like gettin' down 'n dirty? Want a movie that packs lesbians, bestiality, Count Zaroff-esque human hunts? Look no further than sleaze master Jess Franco's Sadomania, a film from his less-than-appreciated early 80s period. [T]his WIP epic isn't as nauseating as Franco's Barbed Wire Dolls and not as professional as 99 Women (1969 / trailer), but it falls snugly somewhere in-between and is definitely one hell of a rollercoaster ride!"
The plot? Newlyweds Michael (Ángel Caballero) and Tara (Ursula Buchfellner) pullover in the middle of nowhere for some roadside sex, unwittingly pulling onto the land of a sleazy women's prison. "Arrested," Tara gets locked up for being a drug abuser while Michael manages to escape and goes for help. While he's gone, his wife is sold and the various women are abused and misused...
RockShockPop says "The flimsy plot is held together by a succession of depraved scenes of sex, violence, sexual violence, bestiality, lesbianism, rape, torture, and all around nastiness. It’s almost as if the storyline exists simply to propel the more base aspects of the film and it wouldn’t surprise me at all if the film was simply constructed around these scenes." Ajita Wilson, born George Wilson, died in a car wreck in 1987.
Trailer:Bloody Moon
(1981, dir. Jess Franco)
My Duck Is Dead explains the plot: "Miguel (Alexander Waechter), a young man with a horribly disfigured face, goes on a rampage at a masquerade party and rapes a girl. He then brutally hacks up the young woman with a pair of scissors. Miguel is institutionalized at a mental asylum for five years. Afterward, he is released into the care of his sister, Manuela (Nadja Gerganoff). Along with their wheelchair-bound mother, they operate a boarding school for young woman, called Europe's International Youth-Club Boarding School of Languages, on the Spanish resort of Costa Del Sol. Miguel is intrigued by Angela (Olivia Pascal), a long-haired brunette, whom he first saw on the train ride from the sanitarium. [...] Bloody Moon is [...] definitely a highly entertaining and gruesome flick that should not be missed by fans of gory European Horror exploitation. For Franco standards, this film does not feature a lot of sleaze, but even more gruesome brutality and graphic gore in exchange."
According to imdb,
Lina Romay is "Rosa Almirall", who is listed in the credits as
assistant director on this gory slasher film aka, as among other titles,
Die Säge Des Todes (the literal translation of the German title is "The Saw of Death"); in its uncut form, it is still banned in Germany. Cult Reviews
says "Franco throws quite a bit of gratuitous nudity and a decent
amount of gore and blood in a film that turns into a 'whodunnit' towards
the end of the film’s satisfying climax."
Murder scene:
Trailer:
The Story of Linda
(1981, dir. Jess Franco)
Sex Is Crazy
(1981, dir. Jess Franco)
Lina Romay, credited as "Candy Coster," plays "Mrs. Foncesca." Original title: El Sexo Esta Loco. My Duck is Dead says: "Life starts to imitate art when an actress who stage show involves aliens impregnating her encounters aliens in search of fertile women to help repopulate their planet. If any Jess Franco film truly lives up to its title, it would be Sex in Crazy. This film is definitely crazy and not just because the mixing of sex with aliens. The film opens and ends with Lina Romay's character being screwed by aliens while an audience is watching. The plot as it progresses then reveals that is was all a stage show. The bulk of the film focuses around two swinger couples and their sexual adventures. Then Franco shifts back to the weird alien vibe he started with only to briefly abandon it until the film's ending, which involves those pesky aliens. So were there aliens, or were they just a figment of Lina Romay’s character's imagination? The film never makes clear what is real and what is not."(1981, dir. Jess Franco)
Les filles de Copacabana
(1981, dir. Jess Franco)
Lina Romay as "Lia." There's not a lot of info about this film out there, which recently enjoyed a fifth-rate DVD release in the USA as The Girls of Copacabana. You may never have seen the movie, but we all know Barry Manilow's theme song to it. (Ha-ha: just kidding.) The ubiquitous synopsis found online is generally credited to Jason Buchanan: "Cult legend Lina Romay stars in director Jess Franco's sexy erotic drama following a trio of French students who leave Paris behind to experience love and lust in Brazil."
Aberraciones sexuales de una mujer casada
(1981, dir. Jess Franco)
El fontanero, su mujer, y otras cosas de meter
(1981, dir. Carlos Aured)
A scene from the movie:
La chica de las bragas transparentes
(1981, dir. Jess Franco)
Intro to (a)
Two Female Spies with Flowered Panties:
Trailer:
Full film:
Zombie 5
Zombie 5
(1982, dir. Jess Franco)
Diary of a Desperate Housewife
(1982, dir. Olivier Mathot & Jess Franco)
(1982, dir. Olivier Mathot & Jess Franco)
Apocalipsis sexual
(1982, dir. Carlos Aured & Sergio Bergonzelli)
Mi conejo es el mejor
(1982, dir. Ricardo Palacios)
(1982, dir. Ricardo Palacios)
Scene:
Emmanuelle Exposed
(1982, dir. Jess Franco)
(1982, dir. Jess Franco)
Sangre en mis zapatos
(1983, dir. Jess Franco)
Los blues de la calle Pop (Aventuras de Felipe Malboro, volumen 8)
(1983, dir. Jess Franco)
*It should be said, this is an undocumented "fact" once stated by Franco but never confirmed by anyone.
Another Franco PI film, once again with Antonio Mayans (billed as Robert Foster) playing the private eye, this time named Al Pereira; "Candy Coster" is there as well, of course. The plot, according to some Spanish site: "Pereira, a man of dubious morality, is hired to retrieve some compromising photos of a married woman ('Coster')."
At imdb, for a change Michael Elliott of Louisville, KY, totally dishes a Franco film, saying that "The film is incredibly slow, drawn out and there's really nothing too interesting going on. Foster has never been a favorite of mine and even Romay seems bored, although she comes to life during a rather sexy lesbian scene towards the end of the movie. There's an out-of-place hardcore scene thrown in, which does nothing and the S&M bondage stuff doesn't fly either."
Also on imdb, Brian D. Horrorwitz of Maryland disagrees with Michael in every way, saying: "I have to disagree [...]. To me, Lina Romay is still looking good and the blonde hair suits her! [...] She plays a hot stripper who uses her 'goods' to manipulate Al Pereira into doing some dangerous detective work for her. There are NOT any hardcore scenes but it does come close at one point. This would rate a soft X probably but still it is pretty raunchy and not at all boring!"
Botas negras, látigo de cuero
(1983, dir. Jess Franco)
(1983, dir. Jess Franco)
Credits:
La noche de los sexos abiertos
(1983, dir. Jess Franco)
(1983, dir. Jess Franco)
Music:
Diamonds of Kilimandjaro
(1983, dir. Jess Franco)
(1983, dir. Jess Franco)
En busca del dragón dorado
(1983, dir. Jess Franco)
(1983, dir. Jess Franco)
Confesiones íntimas de una exhibicionista
(1983, dir. Lina Romay [Candy Coster])
La casa de las mujeres perdidas
(1983, dir. Jess Franco)
Gemidos de placer
(1983, dir. Jess Franco)
Lina is there not only as second unit director, but she plays the part of Julia in this semi-remake of Franco's 1980's Sinfonía erotica. The plot of this erotic thriller, which is likewise based on a tale by de Sade, deals with (to quote Film Affinity's description of the film's AKA title Cries of Pleasure)
"A Man (Antonio Mayans) invites a Woman (Romay) to his house to live
with him, just before the arrival of his wife (Elisa Vela) who is coming
back from the insane asylum."
Someone gets arty with Gemidos de placer:
My Duck is Dead elaborates by simply reprinting almost everything babycarrot67 of Columbus, Ohio, says on imdb: "Franco makes the most of the obviously low budget. The scenery is beautifully filmed, and by scenery I speak of the beautiful surroundings of the villa where the film was shot (i.e., the ocean, mountains, etc.), the decor of the villa (the hanging beads, room dividers, and window shots), and of course the usually nude actors engaged in (usually) a threesome of passion and lust that is evil yet somehow life-affirming. Franco's long camera takes, some lasting ten minutes or more, are perfectly executed and demonstrate that he is not the clunky, zoom-lens-using maniac as is his reputation. The very attractive cast perform their roles well and the dialog sequences, what few there are, are so sincerely portrayed that the biting, inhuman dialog is alternately erotic and frightening. The torture death of the servant is violently erotically charged, and the lust-filled, three-way orgy that follows is akin to a literary masterpiece written in moans and writhing bodies. The Marquis de Sade would be very proud, and anyone should be proud to view this adults-only drama."
The Hotel of Love Affairs
(1983, dir. Jess Franco)
(1983, dir. Jess Franco)
Macumba sexual
(1983, dir. Jess Franco)
Bahía blanca
(1984, dir. Jess Franco)
4.5 minutes of
The Bride Wore White:
The Bride Wore White:
Camino solitario
(1984, dir. Jess Franco)
(1984, dir. Jess Franco)
Night of 1,000 Sexes
(1984, dir. Jess Franco)
¿Cuánto cobra un espía?
(1984, dir. Jess Franco)
Lilian (la virgen pervertida)
(1984, dir. Jess Franco)
Scene:
Una rajita para dos
(1984, dir. Jess Franco & Romay)
Aka A Crack for Two. Imdb says this flick is about "Secret agents against spies who hide microfilm up their behinds," and that is about the most detailed description of the film that we could find on the web. Romay, credited as Lulu Laverne, co-directed; she also supplied the screenplay and played the part of "Agent 69." We searched long and hard for some interesting images relating to the film, but aside from the low-grade reproductions of what seems to be the VHS cover (one of which is seen above), about the only other images to be found are out-of-focus photos of hairy sex organs and an odd photo or two that lays evidence to Lina's aging. (Pornographic clips of Lina blowing ugly guys and so forth, on the other hand, are easy to find if you take off the "safe" setting of your search engine.)Over at video nasty – where the color version of the VHS cover was found – an unknown commenter says: "This is about the worst I have seen from Franco so far. I love it." At imdb, Lars Jacobson of Sweden says "If you're in the last stages of the disease called Francophilia, this film is for you. [...] The first minutes of extreme closeups of anuses through a magnifying glass really sets the tone for this disgusting hardcore effort [...]. Roughly 80% of the movie consists of failed, slightly awkward hardcore scenes between the three female agents and two male spies (one of them having serious problems holding an erection). There's also some slapstick humor of the lowest kind to spice up the dull hardcore action, like Antonio Mayans silly gay agent or the communist spy who chants political slogans while 'making love'... real classy stuff, recommended to idiots [and] lovers of unerotic porno [...]."
La sombra del judoka contra el doctor Wong
(1985, dir. Jess Franco)
La esclava blanca
(1985, dir. Jess Franco)
El hombre que mató a Mengele
(1985, dir. Jess Franco)
(1985, dir. Jess Franco)
Viaje a Bangkok, ataúd incluido
(1985, dir. Franco & "Rosa M. Almirall")
&
(1985, dir. Franco & "Rosa M. Almirall")
&
Bangkok, cita con la muerte
(1985, dir. Jess Franco)
(1985, dir. Jess Franco)
Juego sucio en Casablanca
(1985, dir. Jess Franco)
(1985, dir. Jess Franco)
La mansión de los muertos vivientes
(1985, dir. Jess Franco)
(1985, dir. Jess Franco)
Para las nenas, leche calentita
(1986, dir. Candy Coster)
Las últimas de Filipinas
(1986, dir. Jess Franco)
La chica de los labios rojos
(1986, dir. Jess Franco)
*Not to mention both Janine Reynaud and Rosanna Yanni as the Red Lips.
Super cheap-looking video to a Cumbia that has nothing to do with the film but shares the title (included here only 'cause we like Cumbia):
Fury in the Tropics
(1986, dir. Jess Franco)
(1986, dir. Jess Franco)
Aka, supposedly in a hardcore sex version, as Orgasmo perverso, but under whatever name or version it is, in the end, yet another hard to get Franco/Romay film that few people seem to have seen. In fact, the review on imdb written by babycarrot67 of Columbus, Ohio, seems to be the definitive description of Fury in the Tropics, for it is found all over the web with and without accreditation. Babycarrot67 says: "Lina Romay stars as the proverbial prostitute with a heart of gold who lives and works in a bamboo-built brothel [...]. She falls in love with one of her customers, and she and one of her sister call girls are sent to a women's prison, where they are promptly stripped and whipped in the prison yard in front of the other prisoners [...]! Shortly thereafter the women are stripped and hung by their wrists and then have their breasts and private areas poked by a sword. The women plot their escape, but cannot be saved from an incredibly brutal gang rape, even vicious by Franco's standards and even more protracted than the similar scene in Franco's WIP film Ilsa, the Wicked Warden (1977). [...] This film was shot in the early 1980s during a very low budget period in Franco's career, and as a result we really do not see one convincing prison set in this entire film [...]. The cheap, sadistic WIP thrills are here in abundance, and unlike Sadomania (1981) or even the four-way female sex scene in Women in Cell Block 9 (1978), there is absolutely no humor in Fury in the Tropics, just torture, rape, a fat dictator general, a vicious lesbian wardress, and heavy drama. The acting is also quite good. Fans of Franco's other WIP films should not miss [this one]!"
El ojete de Lulú
(1986, dir. Jess Franco & Romay)
&
El chupete de Lulú
(1985, dir. Jess Franco)
(1986, dir. Jess Franco & Romay)
&
El chupete de Lulú
(1985, dir. Jess Franco)
Anyone reading this blog ever see either film? At imdb, slake09 of Silver Lake, Ohio, was rather taken by the film, and says: "We're talking Lina Romay in her prime here, mid-thirties and squirmingly, explicitly, deliciously buck naked. Can she act? Of course she can, I'd give her an Oscar any day. Maybe a box full of them, if I got to watch her use them like she does here."
The DVD cover shown above reveals little about the film, but what we here at a wasted life do know, however, is that the curvaceous nekkid babe in focus on the DVD cover shown above has nothing to do with talking butts or Lina Romay: the babe's a popular internet model named Veronica Zemanova who, at the time this film was made, was all of eleven years old and didn't have any implants yet.
Veronica Zemanova, by the way, was the plot device of this film below which has nothing to do with Franco or Romay or talking buttholes.
Zemanovaload (2005) trailer:
El mirón y la exhibicionista
(1986, dir. Franco & Romay)
(1986, dir. Franco & Romay)
El mirón y la exhibicionista features a plump Romay (as Lulu Laverne) plays the title "Exhibicionista" in a bad wig and with a face powdered corpse-white. At imdb, Michael Elliott of Louisville, KY, is there to tell us the plot: "A woman (Romay) notices a man spying on her from a hotel room across from hers so she gives him something to look at."
Entre pitos anda el juego
(1986, dir. "Lulu Laverne")
"Candy Coster" stars in an X-rated film directed by "Lulu Laverne." NSFW clips from can be found all over the web – like here at Mr Stiff – and they all once again prove not only that Romay had a miserable taste in wigs but the average Jane and Joe look buttfuck ugly when naked on film – in other words, this is yet another Franco/Romay film guaranteed to keep you limper than an overcooked noodle. Good ol' Michael Elliott from Louisville, KY, seems to be the only person to have seen this film, for his review at imdb is found in one form or another on every site featuring a clip of the movie – so we'll do our own edit here, too: "Lina Romay plays a bored housewife who goes out and gets sexual pleasure from anyone she comes into contact with. [...] Hardcore films from Franco [...] can be erotic, disgusting or done as comedy and this one here goes for the laughs. [...] The film's really nothing but one hardcore scene after another but they all go for comedy over any type of sexual pleasure. The first scene, running twenty minutes, has Romay with two penises in her mouth, and removing them to simply talk to the camera and to wink at it. This scene continues as another woman joins the group and she and Romay have a long and vivid conversation while doing their thing to the men. If you're simply wanting to see Romay in action then this film will offer you that chance as she starts with a threesome with two men, pleasures her husband orally, then moves to a threesome with two women before the film ends on a massive orgy with all the characters involved. The film runs only 65-minutes and flies by very quickly [...]."
Go here for Part III.
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