THE PINK LADIES (1980) Blu-ray/DVD Combo
Director: Roger Watkins (as Richard Mahler)
Vinegar Syndrome

The director of LAST HOUSE ON DEAD END STREET goes for a lighter tone with THE PINK LADIES, on Blu-ray/DVD combo from Vinegar Syndrome.

Friends only because their husbands take the train together to the city, a quartet of housewives – domineering Lori (Samantha Fox, HERE COMES THE BRIDE!), snobbish Jane (Robin Byrd, ROBIN'S NEST), competitive Kay (Kandi Barbour, NEON NIGHTS), and bubble-headed Leslie (Christine De Shaffer, OCTOBER SILK) – organize their every move with one another throughout the week. They are a fractious bunch, sharing squash games, theater nights, and cocktails but keeping their sexual fantasies to themselves: Jane fantasizes being a sword-swallower who takes on INSIDE SEKA's Dave Ruby and MASCARA's Ron Jeremy (while an unidentified extra does swallows his own sword), Kay dreams a visit to a lesbian brothel with SUNNY's Marlene Willoughby and HOT NURSES' Barbara Daniels, and Lori gets hot and bothered in the gym. Even from their husbands are ignorant of their dissatisfaction, distracted by their own fantasies. Lori's husband Bert (Robert Kerman, CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST) fantasizes about his niece (Micki Manos, THE NIGHT BIRDS) after spying on her with her boyfriend (Rick Iverson, THE BUDDING OF BRIE), Leslie's husband (Alan Adrian, THAT'S OUTRAGEOUS) imagines himself in some intense bondage but cannot imagine his wife doing anything too "dirty." All four of the husbands – including INTRUSION's Michael Gaunt and ORIENTAL HAWAII's Jessie Adams – daydream about fellow commuter Vanessa del Rio (HOUSE OF DE SADE). In the end, however, poor, put-upon Leslie may be the only one who gets to realize her fantasies "in the flesh."

Directed by LAST HOUSE ON DEAD END STREET's Roger Watkins, THE PINK LADIES is a very different, almost unrecognizable work from the guy behind HER NAME WAS LISA and CORRUPTION. A comedy with pacing and focus as flighty as the characters, the best that can be said is that the dependable cast organically inhabits roles that could easily be caricatures, the photography is generally slick in spite of some technical issues, and the editing energetic thanks to Watkins' use of pre-existing music including Emerson Lake and Palmer's arrangement of Aaron Copland's "Fanfare for the Common Man" for the extended opening sequence broken up between the credits and a short dialogue sequence that economically introduces and distinguishes the female quartet before giving way to a fantasy involving all four of them by voyeur/locker room attendant (Ron Hudd, DRACULA EXOTICA), and Iggy Pop's "Sister Midnight" for Adrian's bondage fantasy. As grim as the film gets is the notion that these characters are caught up in their own fantasies at the expense of their happiness with one another, and the only ones who try to realize their fantasies risk damaging multiple relationships (although this is a punchline here and a just desserts for three of the central four characters). The end result feels overlong at only seventy-five minutes, but it does have its moments.

Released on VHS by VCX and DVD by TVX, THE PINK LADIES comes to 1080p24 MPEG-4 AVC 1.85:1 widescreen Blu-ray from a 2K scan of the original camera negative. While other Watkins films have a basic level of technical competence, THE PINK LADIES' atypical feel extends to the photography which is fashionably diffused in some exteriors but it looks like the camera used in the interiors was prone to light leakage. Underneath the surface flaws, the focus is crisp and the colors are even striking when Watkins is at his most faux-surreal (including the brothel décor and the gym orgy with characters in body paint for no reason). The DTS-HD Master Audio 1.0 mono track is excellent in terms of the music, post-production audio, and interior dialogue while a dialogue during a few exteriors is subject to the limitations of the recording. Optional English SDH subtitles are included that misidentify "Ride of the Valkyries" to "Wilhelm Wagner" (shocking since Vinegar Syndrome was presumably aware that Watkins' Richard Mahler pseudonym came from Richard Wagner and Gustav Mahler).

Extras start off with what may be Vinegar Syndrome's first ever nude video interview, here with actor Adrian aka John Mozzer (13:53) who recalls reading for a part in HER NAME WAS LISA and not getting it – but gladly so since he did not like doing violent scenes where he was doing the aggressing – but doing a sex scene that was not used in the film. In recalling THE PINK LADIES, he does not remember seeing much of Watkins (which may suggest that Watkins only partially directed this film and Dave Darby may have done the rest as suggested in the remarks below). Also interviewed is Watkin's historian & friend Art Ettinger (18:31) who met Watkins in 2001 after it became known that he was the filmmaker behind LAST HOUSE ON DEAD END STREET for which they recorded a commentary (which Ettinger says was made for the Tartan DVD in the UK but only appeared in Germany although the track appears to be on the US Barrel edition), and reads here from remarks Watkins made about THE PINK LADIES which along with COSMOPOLITAN GIRLS were light-hearted films made at the insistence of his investors and which he disliked (referring to the former film as "an exercise in stupidity"). Ettinger provides further remarks on the film and its cast, noting Fox's acting talent, that Kerman might be a good actor but was making this film amidst strife going on between his sister and brother-in-law (in whose house they filmed his scenes apparently at his insistence), and asking Ettinger to see CITY OF THE LIVING DEAD/THE GATES OF HELL after learning that Gaunt appeared in the film and makes the claim that actor Parry Perkinan – who appeared in CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST with Kerman – is actually porn star Jessie Adams. The disc also includes a production stills gallery (3:33), a script & shooting schedule gallery (1:45) – worth zooming and pausing because it shows just how much detail goes into not only the description of camerawork and cutting but also characterization – and the theatrical trailer (4:22). The disc comes with a reversible cover and the first 2,000 units ordered directly from Vinegar Syndrome come with a special limited edition embossed slipcover designed by Earl Kessler Jr. (Eric Cotenas)

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