Retro Raunch Revisit

Today marks the 55th anniversary of THE PINK PUSSY (1964) being released. I picked up this gem years ago from Something Weird Video. And how can you not love the attention-grabbing title (and no doubt, many a purchase has been made on that alone). But this ain't no gynecology porn. Instead, THE PINK PUSSY (not to be confused with THE PINK PUSSYCAT Hollywood burlesque club) is the name of a Venezuelan nightclub in Caracas where attractive blonde singer Mara Doran is hired to perform. Leaving her Buenos Aires home, she arrives however, under trickery to a fraudulent contract. With her money & passport stolen, she is prevented from work by the local vice lord Senior Alex who even has her abducted right off the street and raped. Alex is a violent drug baron who conveniently “rescues” Mara from the no-goodniks and, playing the good samaritan to the max, gets her a job stripping at the Pink Pussy (which naturally of course, he secretly owns). And why is Alex inflicting all this nastiness to our poor desperate damsel in distress? Because he loves her. Duh. None of this sits well with Elvira (no, not the lovely boobalicious wisecracking horror hostess), Alex’s revenge-crazed/coke-addict ex-girlfriend (quick to call Mara a slut). Nor does it sit well with club singer Ernesto who’s also in love with Mara. Trouble deepens and the love-plot-foursome leads to fighting atop a cable car high above the city... This 1964 Argentinean production (known in Spanish as ACOSADA) was shot in Venezuela, and was primarily a quickie vehicle for the lovely Libertad Leblanc (Mara).

Delicate almost to the point of fragility, fleshpot Leblanc was then considered the screen “rival” of Argentina’s other official bombshell babe, the far more swanky siren, Isabel Sarli who was often dubbed as Argentina's answer to Italian goddess Sophia Loren. Interestingly & oddly enough, while Leblanc gets good & plenty naked to bang Ernesto on a beach, her other nude scenes were supplied by an anonymous New York model. And like many an adult import, THE PINK PUSSY became an international movie mutant when shot-in-New-York skin scenes were added for its 1966 US release (further dubbed in English), resulting in sexploitation starlets of 2 different continents colliding for leering pleasure. Along with the Manhattan body double displaying her naked contours as a stand in for Leblanc's 2 shower scenes, similarly, there’s a wonderful backstage moment where a naked Mara keeps her face hidden from the camera as she chats with none other than NY nudie-cutie fave JUNE ROBERTS who looks adorable putting pasties on her perky nipples. And the hotel room sex scene between Mara & Ernesto is also done with doubles who do their best to conceal their faces (even though Ernie sports a tattoo on his arm for this scene only). Even with its naughty title that can still raise eyebrows today, THE PINK PUSSY was simultaneously released with its accompanying tagline, "Where Sin Lives" (for those theaters that didn’t dare advertise the blatant vagina moniker, and in some areas re-titled THE GREEN PUSSYCAT, and THE PINK KITTEN CLUB). Also known as HARASSED or THE EXPLOITERS, the trailer is just as lurid as a delightful honeytrap of a woman purrs repeatedly for us to explore the sensuous kitty palace.