We've seen countless Noir's where the Femme Fatale was a "bad girl."
She'd run with the wrong crowd, she'd be a user, duplicitous, a nasty piece of work, a selfish bitch, a cold blooded killer. It wasn't until the demise of the Motion Picture Production Code that artists, directors, and producers could exploit a new found freedom.
"FILM NOIR HAD AN INEVITABLE TRAJECTORY…
THE ECCENTRIC & OFTEN GUTSY STYLE OF FILM NOIR HAD NO WHERE ELSE TO GO… BUT TO REACH FOR EVEN MORE OFF-BEAT, DEVIANT– ENDLESSLY RISKY & TABOO ORIENTED SET OF NARRATIVES FOUND IN THE SUBVERSIVE AND EXPLOITATIVE CULT FILMS OF THE MID TO LATE 50s through the 60s and into the early 70s!" The Last Drive In (thelastdrivein.com)
But this freedom came with a price, there were no longer any guardrails, no guiding force to be a green lighting arbiter or to hold back a bit, to sustain a product for a long run that may have weeded out real artistry from the commercial bottom line. It was a free for all to the bottom. Why waste time with any good cinematography, story, sets, or acting when a certain segment of the public would pay to just watch people getting busy with it. Any idiot could film that and they did.
But through that small creative window of exploitation free for all opportunity a lot of future talent passed. This film's cinematographer was László Kovács who went on to film
Easy Rider (1969), and
Five Easy Pieces (1970),
Paper Moon (1973), and
Miss Congeniality (2000)
Lover's Lane
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| Rape! |
A Smell of Honey, a Swallow of Brine fits into the exploitation slot between Hollywood B films and Stag/XXX Flicks. It's about an unusual femme fatale and a quite common one. In this film it's an office girl Sharon Winters (Stacey Walker) who destroys men with the promise of sex. She leads the guys on, teases, temps them coyly with her naked body, gets them hot and bothered and all worked up in heavy petting sessions, only to tell them to stop when the dirty deed is about to commence in earnest. If they don't immediately cease and desist she starts screaming rape.
The guys are shocked run for their lives. Sharon is very similar to Barbara Stanwyck's character Lily in
Baby Face (1933) but instead of screwing her way to the top at the bank she worked at, Sharon works her way through men just for kicks, for just the sheer gratification of destroying them. She's even exploits her lesbian leaning roommate in a equal manner.
Of course, it is still right at the demise of the MPPC and because of various State obscenity laws on the books there was still no full frontal nudity depicted. It's mostly T&A for the women and bare chests for the men. It's all tamer than what you'll see in a typical "R" rated film nowadays. The nudity you see though, does get "exploited." It's the quintessential definition of the "male gaze." In fact the camera lingers too much for its own good, runs way too long and gets somewhat repetitive. It's of course deliberate on one hand, but conversely it's also a matter of necessity to pad the film out to a acceptable run time. It could all be cut down to ten second shots, and it wouldn't lose anything and give it a current up to date feel.
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| Santa Monica, City Hall, Los Angeles County, Ca |
Exploitation films, should follow the same general formula as other genres, they should out of whatever total of them were produced, have about 3% that should be cream of the crop. But a lot of these films though are already lost, deemed commercially worthless back in the 70s, once XXX hardcore films took over.
Quite a few films were just deliberately orphaned by their owners. These films were and possibly still are are kept in commercial film storage vaults, either held hostage to storage bills, or were eventually destroyed to open up shelf space. The general view was why pay storage on something of no value. The value of theses films should be to film preservationists, for a lot of them still depict a time, place and mores in a culture that is gone forever. Add in a lot of guerrilla on location shots of the city's they were shot in and you have historically significant artifacts.
On another level you can watch these films, ignore the amature acting and the threadbare stories and just enjoy the visuals. The crisp Black & White cinematography captured on individual frames can be strikingly artistic.
The film's tale pretty much is a chronicle of Sharon Winters path of destruction through a world of men until she gets her comeuppance.
Victim # 2
A guy from work is her next target.
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| Her next victim shows up for his date |
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| The visual tease |
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| Sharon the pathological virgin |
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| invited into the bedroom |
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| All worked up |
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| Stop! |
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| Rape! |
Victim # 3
She next leads on her own lesbian roommate. A massage breaks bad.
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| Get out! |
Victim # 4
Another company employee. This one she strings along and the frustration and teasing goes on much, much longer.
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| The poor schmuck (far right) doesn't know what is about to hit him. |
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| Pig 'n Whistle, 6714 Hollywood Blvd. Los Angeles |
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| Mulholland Drive |
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| office small talk around the water cooler |
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| first base |
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| second base |
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| rounding third |
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| blocked again..... |
This poor guy gets so worked up from all Sharon's stop and go tactics on all there dates that he begins to have vivid sexual fantasy dreams. Dreams depicted of both him tying up and whipping Sharon and in turn of himself being tied up and having a castration scenario with Sharon wielding a pair of scissors. He finally cracks and goes full Noirsville when, after another date and getting shot out of the saddle he runs off, following and attacking a strange woman. He attempts to rape her. He ends up shot dead by her boyfriend.
Noirsville
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| whipping fantasy |
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| castration fantasy |
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| strip tease fantasy |
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| a rape victim |
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| Dead |
Sharon finally gets her comeuppance. She loses her virginity when she picks up a rock musician in a bar who turns out to have a violently aggressive kink. When she begins her M.O. shenanigans after getting him all worked up, he just hauls off and belts her a few times and has his way with her,
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| Sharon is getting pretty graphic |
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| the band's singer Tony gets the message |
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| come and get me |
Tony: Are you putting me on Doll? None of my chicks put me on!
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| Stop! |
Our last shots of Sharon show now her working as a streetwalker.
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| hooker Sharon |
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| Sharon and her John |
Director was Byron Mabe (as B. Ron Elliott), it was written and produced by David F. Friedman, cinematography by László Kovács, and the cheap garage band rock music was by Et-Cetra Mark Wayne.
The film stars Stacey Walker as Sharon Winters, Sam Melville as Lowell Carter (as Neville Coward), Bob Todd as Tony, Sharon Carr as Paula Mann, Michael Wright
as Mr. Gordon, Michael O'Kelly as Roy Bradley.
It's about 5/10. Available from Something Weird Video.
More reviews from IMDb
Well, it's different (for Dave Friedman)!
22 May 2001 | by Charles Garbage
Barbara Jean Moore (Stacey Walker) was a dropout from Texas who, while vacating in Santa Monica, was discovered on a beach one afternoon by cigar-chomping sexploitation producer, Dave Friedman who decided to cast her in the title role for his latest picture THE NOTORIOUS DAUGHTER OF FANNY HILL (1965). Pleased by her acting skills (and looks I suppose), he casted her in this as well as a nudist camp short. A Paramount executive saw some of the films and was eager to run an interview with Walker but while Friedman went looking for her she had already gone back to Texas. So for all we know Miss Walker could have become a big Hollywood name!
In A SMELL OF HONEY, she plays Sharon, a sexy, sadistic office worker who teases men to their limits and screams "rape" once she's done. "Roughies" had become big in the adults-only film industry so Sharon gets what she deserves from some horny b*stards towards the end.
The cinematography was by the great Lazlo Kovacs so you can always keep yourself occupied during the 71 minutes just admiring the b/w visuals. It's slow in spots and ends abruptly (may be the print) but for a post-BLOOD FEAST Dave Friedman film, it's not bad. Walker's twangy accent and an equelly twangy, reaccuring tune by Et-Cetra (which you're sure to be humming in your head after viewing) strangely creates some kind of rural, southern feeling to the film (don't expect Russ Meyer, though). For a more slappy, enjoyable Dave Friedman experience try THE ACID EATERS (1968).
Decent mid-60's Roughie!
shepardjessica24 August 2004
Fairly interesting exploitation flick in black and white written by David F. Friedman. The lead actress Stacey Walker is well-cast and strangely attractive. She resembles a deranged Renee Zellweger with a bad hair-do. This chick only made two of these films and then moved back to Texas. The music is terrible. One of her boyfriends is played by Sam Melville (from the TV show THE ROOKIES) using a different name.
Best line in the film from Tony - "Are you putting me on, doll? None of my chicks put me on". Good B/W cinematography from Laslo Kovacs (EASY RIDER & TARGETS & many others). Good locales (cool swimming pool, also used in THE DEFILERS). Strange ending but fitting. A 4 out of 10. Best performance Stacey Walker.
