All Ladies Do It Blu-ray Review

• 23rd May 2013

Arrow Films, continuing their releases of classic exploitation cinema have also re-released a couple of films from that fine purveyor of Italian arthouse porn, Tinto Brass. Most of Brass’s films have been readily available for many years under the release of the Arrow titles, but have been given something of a makeover in that some have now been released by Arrow in Blu-ray, even if the format adds little to the film that DVD doesn’t already offer. As with most of the Brass films the cover is a little, um cheeky. Brass of course is best known for that classic respectable arthouse porn classic, Caligula (1981) with a cast that included such notables as Malcolm MacDowell, Helen Mirren, John Gielgud and Peter O’Toole. Here there are no big names, but never the less is typical naughty Tinto Brass.

The story, for all that it matters is about the sexual liberation and freedom of a housewife. Claudia Koll plays a 30-year-old woman who finds herself in the slimy hands of a ‘French poet’ at a party who gropes her buttocks, follows her to the bathroom and attempts to have sex with her in the toilets. They are interrupted by her cuckolded husband who is turned on during the journey home by her tales of seduction. It’s not until later in the film that we realize that he thinks that they are just stories but in the meantime is turned on by them and proceeds to have sex with her morning, noon and night. But she fantasies about going that one further step further and having some backdoor action. He is unwilling so she eventually returns to the sleazy poet and gets all her heart desires (need I say any more). The rest of the film deals with her husband unable to reconcile that she is actually going behind his back.

Fortunately for this film and most, for want of a better word, mainstream porn, soft or otherwise the comedy saves it. Tinto Brass’s films do a better job than many films of this ilk in simulated sex and yes there are lots of prosthetic members sticking out of unzipped trousers that would make Dirk Diggler proud. As for the women they are not shy and there are plenty of scenes with legs akimbo – but the amount of, shall we say personal grooming is enough mop to make one choke. Enough about this – it needs to be seen to be believed, but is never the less typical Tinto Brass. As the cover attests, the derriere is definitely what the film focuses on with Brass’s peccadilloes being highlighted in each of his films.

The extras on the disc include a curious trailer in which Brass himself introduces the delights this film has to offer. The film is also shown in both the Italian and English language versions; avoid the latter like the clap as it is truly awful in English and is just bad in the original Italian. Also included with the film is a booklet written by film historian David Flint but which was not available for review. The original Italian title for the film was Cosi Fan Tutti which, like Mozart’s opera gives it more arthouse appeal than the English title, All Ladies Do It, which is probably merely a wish fulfillment title from the auteur director.

Chris Hick