The Stewardesses (USA, 1969) 65 min color DIR-SCR: “Al Silliman, Jr.” (aka- Allan Silliphant). PROD: Chris J. Condon, “Al Silliman, Jr.” (aka- Allan Silliphant). MUSIC: Jaime Mendoza-Nava. DOP: “Christopher Bell” (aka- Chris J. Condon). CAST: Christina Hart, Ronald South, William Condos, Anita de Moulin, Paula Erikson, Monica Gayle. (Sherpix)
In the last ten years, we’ve seen a movie made about Edward D. Wood Jr., books written on Al Adamson or -especially- Andy Milligan, and a huge injection of “retro” to pop culture, thanks to a video clerk-turned-filmmaker named Quentin Tarantino. Everything in our seemingly disposable past is re-appraised, and gazed upon with “irony”. As such, The Royal, a downtown repertory cinema, had programmed a “Saucy 70s” festival, in which viewers can giggle with post-modern irony at thirty year-old porn. For this occasion, programmer and showman Dion Conflict tracked down a beautiful new print of the world’s first (and only?) 3D softcore film, The Stewardesses. With an ambitious advertising campaign, it brought out a lot of people who had never seen, much less heard of the movie – myself included. I wasn’t able to catch the film during its run at the Royal. Instead, I saw it a week later when it played at the Fox cinema in the Beaches. To give a bit of context for those who are reading this from Peoria, the Beaches is a very affluent borough. So, when a 3D softcore flick plays in an upwardly mobile neighbourhood to a packed house of Starbucks swilling yuppies giggling at every turn of the sheets, you know there are no new frontiers from our collective past pop culture left to discover.
And just like in the old days of seeing risqué movies at the grindhouses, the ticket buyer would have a lot of fun while being had. The Stewardesses, for all its giddiness and 3D, still doesn’t entirely live up to its fanfare. Yes, just like in the 70s’ far-out ad campaigns, connoisseurs are promised something wild, yet sometimes the viewing experience is disappointingly average.
Like most softcore flicks, The Stewardesses barely has a pretence of a plot (or at least, I’m told that a lot of them don’t have a plot- ahem). What we get for the scant 65-minute running time (the version we saw, anyway; some prints run 93 minutes), is an almost impressionistic look at the fun had by a group of flight attendants on their night off. Within the conventions of the adult film, I suppose it is perfectly fine to be nothing but strung-together bedroom action. However, because of the time taken to make this different (via its 3D effects), it is too bad that was no effort to make the film entirely outrageous and off-the-wall, which would have perfectly suited the stereoscopic delirium.
The claim that this is the highest-grossing 3D movie of all time is likely more due to its subject matter than the audaciousness of the visuals. Other than seeing some legs and arms thrown to the foreground during those moments of carnal bliss, it is surprising that the film is otherwise shy in flaunting its device. Something is wrong with a 3D sex film in which the most imaginative sequence takes place in a carnival ride through a funhouse… where no sex occurs! I’m sure that due to the film’s apparently minuscule budget, not a lot of time was afforded to make every single moment work. When it does, it is because the shots are framed with strong use of foregrounds, thereby allowing the stereoscopic visuals to stand out. More often than not, however, scenes are always dully shot in middle ground, so therefore the visual effect is minimal at best.
While the film itself is disappointing, it is far from uninteresting, if because you are always anxious to see where this novelty is going next. Secondly, because we are seeing this unique cinema specimen removed from its 30 year-old environment, it inevitably appears as a time capsule of that decadent age. Given that this is a silly sex film (the tone is usually quite comic), The Stewardesses surprisingly ends on a depressing note when one of the fun-time gals jumps from a high-rise apartment deck because of her self-disgust in pursuit of guilt-free pleasure.
The Stewardesses is surprisingly tasteful, considering that the film is no more than a series of vignettes concerning sex-mad women. Yes, perhaps it shows that women can also be the pursuer, rather than the receiver, of the sexual act, but I would venture that the filmmakers chose to make this flattering of women in an effort to get both genders in to see this movie (and based on its high box-office returns, perhaps this was likely).
Still, what one gets for their money is the standard “subplots” of these girls in the quest for guilt-free sex. Even the opening sequence in the airplane shows how they mix business with pleasure. Once airborne, Brad the captain “tries out” a new stewardess, and their moans of ecstasy are audible on the intercom. Flying high in the friendly skies, indeed!
Finally, when their shift is over, the girls disperse for a quest of good times. The most audacious pursuit is executed by Samantha, who sets her gold-digging sights on an older man named Colin Winthrop, an ad executive (read: rich). Is it a requisite in stewardess pictures to have some rich older gentleman who also has a “way” on the mattress? (I’m also thinking of Al Adamson’s The Naughty Stewardesses.) The most -uh- independent pursuit is committed by one young lady who decides to drop some acid when her parents aren’t home, and then starts making out with a lamp shaped like the head of a Greek God! This fantasy may not equal Woody Allen’s Sleeper in which he goes into the Orgasmatron by himself, but it remains in the memory because it is so ridiculous.
Meanwhile, two other girls go check out some action at a nearby club, in sequences which frequently cut away to the good-bad rock n roll played by the resident hippie dippie band. And of course, because this is an adult film, there is the (I’m told) obligatory lesbian sequence, where two of the flight attendants check each other out. One knows where this scene is headed right from the start, with such double entendres in dialogue as: “I love you too”.
This impressionistic study of hedonism turns sour, as Samantha realizes what a cad Colin really is (and how parasitic she is in her pursuits of materialism and power), and the nightclub scenes get ugly as those who ogle the girls get violent. While obviously marketed as a free-wheeling sex flick, one is surprised at the blue notes in the film’s final third. It is almost as if the filmmakers purposely wanted to dupe the viewers into showing them just how out of control the age of liberation was getting.Finally, after tragedy ensues, we end on a deceptively cheery note back on the plane, with future starlet Monica Gayle as a new stewardess (presumably a replacement) who reads aloud the final credits. Once again, the pursuit of pleasure is re-instated. But is this really a happy ending? With the lingering memory of suicide from just one scene prior, these characters flagrantly disregard for any “bummers”, and ignore their own fates. Hey, it’s the 70s: everything is fun and games. Arguably, The Stewardesses is more interesting for its misanthropy than its sometimes lackluster 3D.
Originally published in Vol. #1, Issue #8.
Greg Woods
Greg Woods has been a film enthusiast since his teens, and began his writing "career" at the same time- prolific in capsule reviews of everything he had watched, first on index cards, then those hardcover dollar store black journals, then an old Mac IIsi. He founded The Eclectic Screening Room in 2001, as a portal to share his film love with the world, and find some like-minded enthusiasts along the way. In addition to having worked in the film industry for over two decades, he has been a co-programmer of films at Trash Palace, and a programmer/co-founder of the Toronto Film Noir Syndicate. He has also written for Broken Pencil, CU-Confidential, Micro-Film, and is currently working on his first novel. His secret desire is for someone to interview him for a podcast or a DVD extra.