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Released by: Peekarama/Vinegar Syndrome
Released on: February 22nd, 2022.
Director: Roberta Findlay
Cast: C.J. Laing, Jennifer Jordan, Robert Kerman, Eric Edwards, John Holmes, Marlene Willoughby, Crystal Sync
Year: 1975/1976
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Anyone But My Husband/Sweet Punkin – Movie Review:
Vinegar Syndrome’s Peekarama sub-label offers up a double-feature of Roberta Findlay directed vintage hardcore features starring the lovely and talented C.J. Laing and a host of other A-list XXX talent from the golden age of New York City-based adult filmmaking.
Anyone But My Husband:
First up is 1975’s Anyone But My Husband where the delectable Ms. Laing plays a woman named Nora Pelham, the lovely and devoted wife of a schlub named Sam (a perfectly cast Robert Kerman) who seems to prefer to go out for hamburger when he’s got steak at home. Yes, Sam is a philanderer of the worst sort, a teacher only too happy to take advantage of his young, nubile, female students (Susan Sloane being one of them), a habit that has led to his disinterest in the wife at home who is only too happy to hope into bed with him whenever he wants or cook a fancy meal of chicken and carrots!
Frustrated enough to masturbate with a champagne bottle, Nora eventually visits a psychiatrist who tells her the best way to get over all of this is to have affairs of her own. With some help from her sexually freewheeling friend Sylvia (Jennifer Jordan), Nora decides to do just that. Sylvia takes her to an art gallery where the artist hosting the event, Nigel Farthington (Beerbohn Tree), takes a liking to her. He shuts down the exhibit and brings her into his private backroom where he binds her, beats her and has rough sex with her. Not exactly what Nora was after, she next winds up with a spaced out nice guy who she goes on a picnic with (Eric Edwards). From there, she has a three-way with a psychic named Madame Chaney (Deanna Darby) and her boy-toy (Tony “The Hook” Perez).
Will she ever figure out how to fix her marriage to Sam, and by that point, will she even want to?
A generally light and comedic film (the BDSM scene gets a bit dark but that’s really the only exception), Anyone But My Husband is a great mix of humor and erotic. Much of the credit for this has to go to C.J. Laing, as she’s the star of the bulk of the sex in the film, though Jennifer Jordan gets some credit for her role in the film as well. Casting Laing alongside some pretty recognizable co-stars doesn’t hurt either, and the fact that, for the most part, everyone looks like they’re having a really good time here goes a long way towards making this picture as enjoyable as it is.
Production values are strong, the movie is nicely shot with a good score and strong lighting. It moves at a good pace and never overstays its welcome. All in all, this one works very well!
Sweet Punkin’:
The second film on the disc, made a year later in 1976, once again features Laing in the lead This time she plays Punkin Peel Crean-Smith, a onetime porno star who gave up the fuck film business some time ago to work as a maid and then marry wealthy old Jason Crean-Smith (Marlow Ferguson, credited as Tootsie Robysto!) – you’ll be amazed at how many one dollar bills this guy flashes around during the movie!
While Punkin hopes to make the most of her new life, she quickly learns the hard way that her husband’s friend and associates will never see her as anything other than the maid that she was hired as. Realizing that she’ll never be treated as an equal by Crean-Smith’s old money associates, she eventually hits it off with Dixon (Jeffrey Hurst), the butler. Meanwhile, all sorts of other crazy shenanigans are going on as, early in the film, we witness two women, Deirdre (Jennifer Jordan) and Diana (Crystal Synch), use their oral skills the solve a dick measuring competition between Peter The Great (John Holmes with a goofy Russian accent) and The Great Peter (Tony Perez again)! A scene showing off Punkin’s porn star days proves she wasn’t so good at her job, leaving the male director to finish the blowjob she couldn’t finish.
Again, this one is played mostly for laughs, with Laing lighting up the screen more often than not. She’s once more surrounded by good supporting players, with Holmes, Perez, Jordan and Synch doing a pretty solid job in the opening scene and recognizable talent like Eric Edwards, Marlene Willoughby and Lorraine Alraune all getting in on the action. Hurst, who appears to be doing his best Harry Reems impersonation in this film, is pretty likeable as the male lead, going about his business with a smile on his face and clearly having a blast.
Findlay, credited as Robert W. Norman in the opening credits, paces the film well and even pays a nod to the first feature on the disc by putting some ‘Anyone But My Husband’ one-sheets in plain view of the camera during the aforementioned scene where Punkin can’t quite finish the job.
Anyone But My Husband/Sweet Punkin – Blu-ray Review:
Vinegar Syndrome presents both Anyone But My Husband and Sweet Punkin scanned & restored in 2k from their 35mm original camera negatives in AVC encoded 1080p high definition on a 50GB disc with both features framed at 1.85.1 widescreen. Picture quality is really solid, with great color reproduction and really nice detail evident throughout. The image shows natural film grain but no damage outside of some small white specks here and there. Skin tones look good and black levels are strong. There are no problems with any noise reduction or edge enhancement issues.
Both films get the 24-bit DTS-HD 2.0 Mono treatment in the films’ native English sounds good. Audio for Anyone But My Husband was sourced from video as all other elements appear to have been, sadly, lost for good. As such, there are fluctuations and bits where the audio is less than great. It’s a bit on the flat side and sometimes slightly muffled, but overall, it’s serviceable enough. The track is for Sweet Punkin is clean and properly balanced, no problems to note here and the score sounds quite strong. Optional subtitles are provided in English only, and they do come in handy during the Anyone But My Husband.
The main extra on the disc is a commentary track over Anyone But My Husband featuring Roberta Findlay moderated by Casey Scott. Like most of the tracks that these two have done together, this is very much worth your time as they clearly enjoy one another’s company and Scott seems to get Findlay into a comfortable enough spot that she dishes! They go over who used what name in the opening credits, the cross-cutting in the editing of that sequence, where the Robert Norman alias came from, where Findlay's career was at during this period and the order in which some of her adult films were made, similarities to classic Pre-Code Hollywood stories, shooting some of the stronger and raunchier scenes in the film, working with Ron Sullivan and his penchant for filming things in small bathrooms, details on some of the locations that were used for the film, differences in quality between gay and straight adult films, her work with John and Lem Amero, working with Walter E. Sear, memories of the different performers that she worked with on this and other films, Laing's deep-throat skills and lots more. There's a weird beep around the sixty-one minute mark that may indicate something needed to be cut out? It happens when they're talking about how may have given who a sexually transmitted disease! Either way, it's an interesting and fun listen.
Aside from that, the disc includes a trailer for Sweet Punkin, menus and chapter selection.
As far as the packaging for this release goes, Vinegar Syndrome offers up some reversible cover sleeve artwork and, for the first three thousand copies purchased directly from Vinegar Syndrome’s website, a limited edition embossed (and legitimately classy) slipcover designed by Earl Kessler Jr.!
Anyone But My Husband/Sweet Punkin - The Final Word:
Peekarama/Vinegar Syndrome’s Blu-ray release of Anyone But My Husband/Sweet Punkin gives fans of the inimitable C.J. Laing a whole lot to appreciate! The presentations for both films are quite solid and the commentary with Findlay herself well worth listening to.
Click on the images below, or right click and open in a new window, for full sized Anyone But My Husband/Sweet Punkin Blu-ray screen caps!
