Author Archive: Retro

Female prisoners in a Phillippine jail are being subjected to sadistic torture. Five of the women–along with the help of two men–plot an escape. (Josiah Howard, “Blaxploitation Cinema: The Essential Reference Guide.”)

A teenage girl has trouble warming up to her new step-mother. Hanging out with Soho beatniks, the girl discovers her new mom may have lead a life of ill repute.

Crime, premarital sex and hard drugs are all part of a young girl’s downward spiral into moral corruption. She never should’ve had that first joint! Dir. Dwain Esper

Exploitation auteur Dwain Esper directed this hare-brained expos? on the perils of drug addiction. William Davis (Harry Cording) is a young doctor eager to establish his practice when he makes the mistake of striking up a friendship with wily Asian Gee Wu (J. Stuart Blackton Jr.). Gee Wu introduces William to one of his favorite pastimes, opium, and it isn’t long before William is a hopeless addict. As his habit grows, William’s wife (Joan Dix) becomes increasingly alarmed and persuades him to get medical help. However, quacks foolishly swap William’s opium habit for a prescribed dependence on heroin, leading the hapless medico back where he started. Like most of Esper’s films, The Narcotic was scripted by Hildegarde Stadie, who happened to be Esper’s wife; she supposedly based the story on her uncle’s own unfortunate experience with opiates.

A reporter is assigned to write a article on a nudist camp.

When a high school girl gets pregnant and the boyfriend dies, the sex-ed teacher shows her a film about childbirth and the dangers of venereal disease.

The head of an illegal drug ring uses a women’s health spa as a front for his sleeping-pill racket.

Eva comes to Hong Kong. Seeing Eva perform with a snake, Judas gets interested in her. He showers her with gifts. She moves in with him and his snakes. Things get grim.

Wayward and uninhibited young runaway Kim has fallen in with a bad crowd. Kim decides to flee said crowd and goes to the west coast to reunite herself with her uptight and neurotic estranged older sister Hilary so she can collect some of the inheritance left behind by their deceased parents. However, evil drug dealer Maury and his flock follow Kim to Hilary’s house.