Ken Norton (1943-2013), Star of MANDINGO

Upon hearing about the recent passing of Ken Norton, I now re-present my look at MANDINGO. I also highly recomemnd the book MONDO MANDINGO, which recounts the history of the original controversial novel as well as the sequels, spinoffs and film adaptations.

Here's a repost of my MANDINGO article from 2010 :

MANDINGO is one of the "forbidden films" that I've always heard about, but kinda sorta avoided because I knew it would be an unsetting experience. I recently bought a copy at Marshall's (of all the places) for $3.99 (you can't beat that price!) and decided it was time to face my fears and watch the damn thing. WARNING: This review contains full frontal nudity and junk fondling.

First some back story. MANDINGO (1975) was adapted from a 1957 novel by Kyle Onstott. It was Appalling! Terrifying! And Wonderful?

It was directed by Richard Fleischer (son of animation legend Max Fleisher), known for such mainstream hits as Disney's 20,000 LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA (1954), FANTASTIC VOYAGE (1966), DOCTOR DOOLITTLE (1967) and SOYLENT GREEN (1973). He later directed the Neil Diamond version of THE JAZZ SINGER (1980). What a diverse career!

MANDINGO was produced by the recently-deceased Dino DeLaurentiis and released - remarkably - by Paramount Pictures! It was rated R.

The film stars English actors James Mason, Paul Benedict (Mr. Bentley from THE JEFFERSONS) and Susan George, up-and-comers Perry King, Brenda Sykes and professional boxer Ken Norton in his first acting role.

Set in the Antebellum period in the deep South on a plantation named Falconhurst. The manor that has seen much better days, here we meet slave-trader Warren Maxwell (Mason), his handsome young son Hammond (King) and an assortment of their friends and slaves.

This being Black History Month, I'm not sure this was a good viewing choice, because right off the bat, I don't think I've ever heard the "N word" uttered so many times by white actors. This makes me extremely uncomfortable, but I try to keep it within it's historical perspective.

Brutal scenes of whipping, torture and abuse of slaves is juxtaposed with the with the lifestyles of the white and

privledged. James Mason's character even uses a young slave boy as a footrest to draw out the rheumatism from his sore feet. It's painful to watch. Then, when a young slave woman "goes into heat", it's up to her "master" Hammond to take her virginity.

Perry King goes full frontal in this scene. Something you usually don't expect from a leading man in a historical drama from a major studio.

Well it was the 1970s after all, and the MPAA was a lot more liberal back then when it came to nudity. Reference 14-year old Jodie Foster topless in the PG-rated THE LITTLE GIRL WHO LIVES DOWN THE LANE. Today, the Parent's Council would declare it "child pornography". Back in the 70s, it was just a movie.

Getting back to MANDINGO...we now meet Ken Norton's character, Mede - he's a "Mandingo" slave who is being auctioned off to the highest bidder.

Mede gets his junk fondled by a perspective buyer. She's from Germany after all.

But Hammond is the winner of the auction, and Mede's new owner. Have I mentioned how HOT Ken Norton is?

Hammond sees Mede's purchase an an opportunity to turn the hunky slave into a champion fighter.

Back at Falconhurt, Hammond is now married to a woman named Blanche (Susan George), but he doesn't know what to do with a white woman in bed since he's only had sex with "wenches." He's disappointed to discover that she is not a virgin.

So then Hammond the gets HIS junked fondled by a whore in a surprisingly graphic fashion.

And then he winds up in bed with a sweet and sexy slave girl named Ellen (Brenda Sykes).

Insanely jealous Blanche is none to happy about this and gives Ellen a piece of her evil mind.

Additionally, Blanche concocts a plot to get back at her loveless husband by seducing Mede and telling Hammomd that he raped her.

Mede tries to resist out of loyalty for his master, but Blanche threatens to cry rape even if he doesn't bed her. What a bitch!

So he does it.

The big fight that Mede has been training for happens, and Hammond is pleased with the outcome, he purchases some jewelry to bring back home. But in the biggest Faux Pas south of the Mason-Dixon line, he gives earrings to Ellen.

 But he gives the matching necklace to his wife Blanche. Blanche is not pleased - but she is pregnant! And so is Ellen!

I'm not gonna give it away - but one baby lives and the other one...not so much.

As for Mede, let's just say there is not a happy ending to this sordid soap opera about lust between the races. 

In conclusion, I am glad I finally watched MANDINGO, though I felt real dirty doing so. I'm not sure why it even was made. It's like Dino DeLaurentiis said (in his Italian accent)  "Let's a take the GONE WITH THE WIND and the Blaxsploitation movies and a throw in a some of that soft-corn porn over there and let's a sell it to Paramount, okay?" 

If they were going for the story of how horrible human beings can be to each other, I guess they did a commendable good job. Perry King's character is supposed to be the "hero" of the story, but yet he says and does such ghastly things because, I assume, that's how white people acted towards people of color in those days. When I watch movies like this I always wonder what the actors were thinking. Not only people like James Mason, but all the actors who played the slaves. Did they just think of it as a paycheck or did they think they were participating in an accurate portrayal of American history as it really happened?

As a film, I'd give it a 6 outta 10 - mostly because of Susan George's over-the-top performance as Blanche. But as a slice of pop culture history I gotta admit it's pretty far out there. So, if you dare to sit through some pretty squeamish stuff to see Perry King get a reach-around through his knickers and James Mason as one of the most despicable characters ever captured on film, I say go for it. $3.99 at Marshalls.

SUSAN SLADE

Here's another re-post from 2009...

Almost as if it was written today, SUSAN SLADE (1961, directed by Delmer Daves) is a glossy melodrama about the dangers of premarital sex and disgrace of being an unwed mother.

The story goes like this: family man Roger Slade (wooden cue-card reading Lloyd Nolan), his upstanding wife Leah (the lovely, but soft-focused Dorothy McGuire)

and sickeningly sweet daughter Susan (kittenish Connie Stevens) take a cruise on The Love Boat, which is traveling from South America to San Francisco.

Susan meets a fellow passenger “the handsomest man on the ship” Conn White (Grant Williams), a dashing mountain climber who wants to mount Susan's slade.

Conn romances (or cons) his way into Susan's heart (and lower) as the theme from Daves' other film A SUMMER PLACE (1959) plays, reminding us that Troy Donahue is about to enter our story.

After Susan sins with Conn in his cabin, he promises to marry her–but only after he returns from Alaska, where he is going to climb Mount McKinley. Right.

Meanwhile, the Slades hobnob with the snobby super rich Corbett family (Natalie Schafer aka Mrs. Howell is the mother) including their dashingly handsome son Wells (TATTELETALES host Bert Convy). The Corbetts gift the Slades with a gorgeous new Asian/modern house in Monterey.

Painfully good-looking Hoyt Bricker (Troy Donahue) is the son of a former Corbett employee, who blames his father's death on papa Corbett. Hoyt is now a stable boy, and Susan is quick to put him in his place, even after he saves her from a horse accident.

Susan has not heard from Conn, but begins to worry about him. While visiting a doctor in San Francisco, she learns she's knocked up! Hoyt begins to look more attractive to Susan after he tells her that he aspires to be a famous writer just like Robert Lewis Stevenson or John Steinbeck.

The Slades throw a snazzy cocktail party, and Susan still hasn't heard from Conn. Was he indeed a con man? During the party Conn's father calls to tell Susan that her groom-to-be was killed in a climbing accident. Oops. There goes the wedding plans.

This news causes Susan to furiously pull her dress off and want to miscarry her bastard child—so she saddles up a horse and rides out into the ocean in an attempt to drown herself and the baby. Unfortunately Hoyt rescues her.

After she confesses her "sin" (The film is based on a novel called The Sin of Susan Slade) to her parents, rather than get an abortion they concoct a plan to move to South America for two years and then return with the baby - and say it's Leah and Roger's child! So, without appearing pregnant at all, Susan soon gives birth to her baby “brother” Rogey (Ragi?), but has a hard time letting go of him. Mrs. Howell notices that Susan is more mature and oddly attached to her infant sibling. Then grandpa Roger suddenly drops dead.

Susan and her mother return to Monterey with baby Rogey and there is much tension between them, especially when absent-minded Leah leaves her cigarette lighter lying around. Now that Conn is long forgotten, Susan finds she now has two men to choose from: filthy rich Wells Corbett, who proposes to her and pathetic stableboy Hoyt Bricker, whose ass looks great in white jeans.

Susan decides she can't walk down the aisle in a soiled wedding gown because she's no longer pure. Soon afterwards, Susan is babysitting Rogey, when Hoyt comes by to tell her that his book is going to be published. Hmmm, maybe he's not a loser after all!

While they are celebrating, Rogey somehow climbs out of his crib gets hold of Granny's cigarette lighter and sets himself on fire!!!! This scene is totally over the top and must be seen to be believed.

At the hospital, Susan reveals that Rogey is her baby and Wells rejects her. Hoyt, it turns out, is okay with burned bastard babies. Then we learn that Rogey is going to be just fine–well, eventually...

What a ridiculous movie! I laughed out loud a bunch of times, but at 2 hours in length, the laughs didn't come as quickly as they should have. I give it a 6 outta ten. Connie was no Sandra Dee, Dorothy Maguire was no Constance Ford and SUSAN SLADE is no SUMMER PLACE.

Random TV GUIDE Ad Week - Day 5

Who raised you, wolves?

Apparently the answer would be "yes" if you were Mowgli, the little naked star of MOWGLI'S BROTHERS, a half-hour animated special from the legendary Chuck Jones. Based on a tale from Rudyard Kipling's THE JUNGLE BOOK, this family program was aired by CBS numerous times throughout the 1970s. Why the advertising department chose to run an ad with "baby ass" in it is beyond me. I know that Mr. Jones' adaptation was intended to be more faithful than the Disney musical, but there is just something off-putting by the depiction of the mop-haired jungle boy looking like a cross between Joan Jett, Cindy Lou Who and a wrinkly Coppertone baby. Can't imagine a network using an ad like this today, the Parents Research Council would be crying "pornography" the minute it hit the newsstands. Times have changed.

THE STRANGER WITHIN

Unable to provide you with proposed posts about either PROM NIGHT or HALLOWEEN 2, please accept this previously aired post as my Halloween treat to you.

Let's say Roman Polanski decided to cast TV's lovely Barbara Eden (I DREAM OF JEANNIE, HARPER VALLEY PTA) in ROSEMARY'S BABY instead of Mia Farrow (PEYTON PLACE). Then let's say Polanski forgot EVERYTHING he ever knew about filmmaking...the result would be a 1974 ABC Movie of the Week called THE STRANGER WITHIN.

This rediscovered camp classic comes to us via the WARNER ARCHIVE COLLECTION.

Written by Richard Matheson (THE NIGHT STALKER) and directed by Lee Phillips (THE WALTONS), THE STRANGER WITHIN is a thriller devoid of any thrills. This is the story of Ann Collins (Eden) and her grizzled husband David (the appropriately named George Grizzard), a California couple living somewhere near Lake Hollywood before Madonna moved in and ruined the neighborhood.

Ann is a stay-at-home artist who is blue because she has missed her period and had "trouble" with a pregnancy a few years back.

Perhaps something to do with an astronaut and a purple bottle with throws pillows in it? David is not amused because he went under the vasectomist's knife three years earlier - so the future rugrat cannot be his!

Here is where we see the first of many repeated closeups of a bronze phallic clock with an axe aimed right at the said phallus. Ann swears up and down that she's been faithful, but David doesn't believe her.

He takes her to an abortion doctor (recommended by Dr. Bellows?).

This doc is clearly so popular in sinful Hollywood that he has TWO telephones! Ann decides to go all "pro life" on our asses and keep the baby. David is not amused.

Their marriage begins to crumble, as Ann becomes obsessed with the baby. And starts exhibiting strange behavior. And because it's 1974 (the year after THE EXORCIST), we naturally believe that Satan is the papa.

Ann's best friend Phyllis (Joyce Van Patten) thinks something's fishy and convinces her husband Bob (played by CHARLIE'S ANGELS' creepy sidekick "Bosley", David Doyle) to hypnotize Ann.

A hypnotist isn't exactly a priest but we'll go along with it. Ann then learns that her pregnancy is even further along that she originally thought. What a total slut!

What would Major Healey say? Soon poor pregnant Ann begins experiencing wild mood swings and hot flashes.

You'll pee yourself when she declares "I'm sorry I've been acting so terribly". That's okay Babs, we're used to it.

 After that admission, Ann puts herself on a high-sodium and caffeine diet.

She starts covering all her foood with salt... and begins downing cups, then whole POTS of scalding hot black coffee like a swing shift hooker at an all-night truck stop.

Then when we think things can't get any crazier, Ann goes all Evelyn Wood and starts speed-reading just about any book she can get her hands on.

She also begins going galavanting in the Hollywood Hills at night, returning to her avocado, yellow and brown home all scratched up. Cat fights with Julie Newmar perhaps?

Without explanation her wounds begin to heal, causing Ann to believe that her unborn child is a gift from God. Ummm... right.

Or maybe it's a genie?

Before you know it, Ann begins speaking in tongues (an acting tour de force for Ms. Eden!)...

and starts preparing exotic gourmet meals like pigs feet and guts. (Pipchicks for dessert?)

 Then things turn real dark as she pulls a knife on her husband!!!

Bob/Bosley puts her under hypnosis again and just when we think we are gonna find out who the devilish baby daddy is...we learn the real truth about THE STRANGER WITHIN!!!

SUPER RIDICULOUS SPOILER ALERT: Ann is NOT pregnant with the child of Satan. She was impregnated by an extraterrestrial being...or maybe Michael Jackson. Tests soon reveal that the fetus has not one, but two healthy heartbeats!

Ann flees her home and prematurely gives birth in the woods. No room at the inn?

The next morning, she is revealed to have given birth to a healthy baby boy...but she's not alone!

She is just one of many women who have been going through the exact same thing! It's The Sisterhood of the Traveling Spaceship!

Meanwhile, David discovers the a painting that Ann has been working on. It was her blue period after all.

Creepy! Kinda, sorta. But mostly very, very funny. THE STRANGER WITHIN gets a glowing 8 outta 10 because watching Barbara Eden pour salt on food and drink gallons of coffee is a million times more entertaining than THE HURT LOCKER will ever be. And that's how I see things.