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Sweden Porno: Blonde Animal
[Blu-ray]
Blu-ray B - United Kingdom - 88 Films Review written by and copyright: Eric Cotenas (14th December 2024). |
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The Film
 It seems like love at first sight for a young man (Göran Svensson) and a young woman (Helen Sanderholm), but they both have guilty secrets that are closer than they realize. They have both been separately inveigled by an older swinging couple (The Second Coming of Eva's Jim Steffe and Annette Albisson), and the boy gives in far more easily than the girl; but it is with this knowledge that the older man finally breaks through the girl's defenses. The swinging couple fall back into their routines while the young couple walk away with a better appreciation of one another. That is pretty much all there really is to Sweden Porno: Blonde Animal, and even much of that is speculative. An odd example of a Nikkatsu Roman Porno shot outside Japan with a European cast and possibly a European crew since the credits only list four of the five cast members – the two women are unnamed while the men are Goran and Jim – executive producer Kazuyoshi Fukushima and writer/director Masanao Sakao for whom this and his previous Sweden-lensed Forest of Beastly Desire were his last credits. While we have not seen his previous effort or any of his other Nikkatsu credits, his direction must have consisted of telling them where to go in a shot and writing Japanese dialogue to match the lip movements of Swedish dialogue spoken on set that might have nothing to do with what is dubbed in which mostly consists of "you're so beautiful" and "you're so handsome." The sexual action is not only far less explicit than what one would see simulated in a Japanese Nikkatsu production but even more so than what viewers would expect from a Scandinavian sex film; indeed, what the film resembles most in terms of its sex scenes are some of the American softcore sex films of the late sixties and early seventies with the performers keeping their underwear on and tentatively touching each other with only a few bare bums – Goran and the swinger wife are only seen nude after sex in a shot zooming back from them on the bed that emphasizes just how androgynous the former is while – and the most explicit the sex gets is a blowjob staged in silhouette (no fogging or opticals here). In between the sex scenes, the young couple walks around Stockholm savoring the sunsets while the swinger couple engages in sexual tourism, perusing pornographic magazine displays (oddly, a few shots of the magazine covers are not censored) and making fun of a vaginal opening in a tree trunk in the garden court of the Swedish royal family's palace. They also separately and together visit a nightclub in which the same instrumental riff plays on a loop, and a lesbian strip show seems to have been thrown in and we take it on faith that it is being watched by the older couple. With the setup, there seems to be fertile ground for an interesting erotic drama but no one involved seems inclined to do anything but the bare minimum effort. That there were a series of these Sweden-set Nikkatsu erotic films suggests that they were popular with the Japanese, and they do offer a foreign view of Sweden who were known internationally in terms of cinema for Ingmar Bergman and sexy imports. That they have been nearly impossible for English-speaking viewers to see has only elevated interest in them, but viewers expecting something along the line of Toei's Christina Lindberg efforts Sex & Fury or Porn Queen: Japan Sex Trip but naughtier will be disappointed (at least, if the other "Sweden Sex" titles are like this one). 
Video
Presumably produced solely for domestic Japanese audiences, Sweden Porno: Blonde Animal does not appear to have had any theatrical release elsewhere (it probably would have been laughed off the screen in Sweden and was not explicit enough for the U.S. in 1972 or even the U.K.). While most Nikkatsu Roman Porno films were shot in Nikkatsuscope, this one – and presumably the other Swedish ones – was shot in 1.37:1, possibly due to the limited availability of anamorphic camera equipment in Sweden. 88 Films' 1080p24 MPEG-4 AVC 1.37:1 pillarboxed fullscreen Blu-ray is presumably struck from a master of more recent vintage than some of the other titles in the Nikkatsu library since the extras note that even the studio did not know of the existence of these films which they had not released on videotape or projected in any retrospectives. The transfer seems to faithfully represent the film at its best and worst. Locked-down coverage of the sex scenes in brightly-lit hotel rooms shows off the textures of bare flesh, hair, and awful vintage underwear. Night scenes pop with saturated primary neons against deep blacks. The handheld nightclub scenes and some of the guerilla daytime travelogue shots suffer from the haste of the production with some shots more crisply-focused than others. 
Audio
The sole audio option is the Japanese mono mix in LPCM 2.0 mono. It was very unlikely that a sync-sound Swedish track was recorded and the Japanese voice actor seem to insert dialogue wherever they can get away with it. Aside from the dialogue and music, there is very little else on the post-dubbed track, and it all sounds fine. Optional English subtitles are free of any errors. 
Extras
Given what little happens in the film and how few credits there are for it, the mind boggles at the inclusion of an audio commentary by Japanese cinema experts Rickard Gramfors & Jasper Sharp but the two of them are able to gather up a lot of history about this production even though they too describe it as a bit of a mystery. Sharp provides context of the pinku eiga productions versus Nikkatsu's Roman Porno films as a reaction to the independent counterpart and noting that during the early days of the cycle they released triple bills in which a purchased or commissioned pinku eiga film was usually the C-feature, and that these first four entries of the Sweden Porno line were outsourced to pinku eiga producer Fukushima and director Sakao (Nikkatsu later returned to Sweden to make two more of a planned further series with Nikkatsu crew and more money but those proved less successful). Gramfors – who hopes to release the series in Sweden on his Klubb Super 8 label – reveals that he became interested in the films through the poster art when assembling a book on the "Swedish Sin" film cycle and a chapter on the use of "Sweden" in international cinema, getting in touch with scholar Johan Nordström in Japan who had contact with Nikkatsu and inquiring about the films which he wanted to include on his cultpix streaming site. While Sharp discusses Nikkatsu's production and studio practices, Gramfors reveals information he has gleaned from some of the film's crew including actor/filmmaker Christer Holmgren who assumed many roles in the series but had no involvement in this film which was hastily put together when a scripted feature he was supposed to direct was dropped. Gramfors also points out the Stockholm locations and indicators of the shooting period. Both compare the film's depiction of sex scenes to those in actual Swedish pornography.  "Swedish Sin - Johan Nordström on Nikkatsu's 'Sweden Porno' Line" (17:31) is an interview with the aforementioned Nordström who discusses Nikkatsu's practice of filling out their billings with purchased and commissioned pink films – including the recollection by one of the Nikkatsu workers that the series was one they "bought" rather than ordered – and reveals that the studio discovered to their surprise that Japanese audiences were not interested in watching white people have sex, hence the studio giving up their experiments with producing Roman Porno in other countries. He discusses what he learned from some of the crew as well as revealing that many of the actors he could track down either did not want to talk about them or laughed off the experience. The disc also includes a stills gallery (1:14) and a theatrical trailer (2:26),
Packaging
The limited edition comes with a DVD copy, an OBI strip - which, like the Radiance Films ones, includes the limited edition content in its list of specifications so that they will not have to alter the actual sleeve for the standard edition - and ooklet with an essay by David Flint (not provided for review).  OverallImpossible to see for decades, Sweden Porno: Blonde Animal is a letdown as far as titillation and provocation, but it is an interesting look at exotic Scandinavia from the Japanese and part of a lost chapter in both Swedish and Japanese sex cinema.
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