LORD OF THE G-STRINGS
& SPIDERBABE
Late Nite TV Sexy Spoof Collection
U.S.A. | 2003
Directors: Terry West, Johnny Crash
Starring
Misty Mundae, Darian Caine
Michael R. Thomas, Kelli Summers
Ruby LaRocca, Julian Wells
Color | 88 Min. (each) | Not Rated
Format: DVD (R1 - NTSC | 2-disc set)
E.I./Seduction Cinema
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Review by
Brian Lindsey

G-Strings:2
Spiderbabe:4
: DVD:6
NOTE: DVD Rating is for entire 4-film set
DVD's golden age — brought to a sputtering end by the advent of illegal downloading, net streaming and the Great Recession — is now only a pleasant memory. It's interesting to look back at just how much crazy, off-the-wall stuff made its way to home video in the period immediately after the transition from VHS to those shiny little discs. You could stroll into Best Buy and literally find a plethora of wacky exploitation titles gracing the shelves. I distinctly recall perusing the store aisles in the early 2000s, having my attention caught by provocative DVD covers featuring a certain "Misty Mundae" and thinking, Just who is this chick? Never heard of her...
    An incongruous It Girl if ever there was one, Misty Mundae (AKA Erin Brown) was arguably the first — perhaps only — direct-to-video softcore sex star of the DVD era. While most of the films she appeared in were zero-budget trash (some things haven't changed in the past half-century of indie exploitation!), the young lady herself certainly made an impression with a sizable contingent of horndogs. Some of this was undoubtedly the result of the marketing effort by production company E.I., yet much of it had to do with what she was not... Not tan, not big-busted, not an athletic hardbody or tattooed-and-pierced stripper/biker mama. Cute as a button, with big blue eyes, "natural" and "real" were terms often used to describe Misty, who looked younger than her age (sometimes uncomfortably so) and possessed an appealing girl-next-door quality. She just didn't seem like the type who'd get naked 'n' nasty on camera — sorta like if Ellen Page did sexploitation films. Sure, the haters would rag on her B-cup boobs, "rabbit teeth" and "pasty white" skin, but when your humble correspondent slips on his Lecherous Old Man Hat he can only retort, "So you prefer rock-hard silicone, visible implant scars and tanning booth orange? To each his own, pal!"
    Oh, by the way... When she felt like making the effort, Misty could be a pretty good actress, too.
    Under its Seduction Cinema banner, E.I. has reissued some of the most well-known Misty Mundae titles in a 2-disc/4-film set, The Late Nite TV Sexy Spoof Collection, so named because the included movies — despite being the most impoverished productions imaginable — enjoyed regular rotation for a time on premium cable networks Showtime and Cinemax. These flicks may have been made for next to nothing but they proved popular as a form of 'it's 2 AM, I'm drunk and can't get off the couch' entertainment.
    Lord of the G-Strings is, as you'd expect, a sophomoric sex comedy riff on Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy. Shot in the New Jersey woods on a budget "in the low five-figures", it comes off looking exactly like... a $10,000 movie shot in the New Jersey woods. I suppose it doesn't matter much that the costumes appear to have been purchased at a Halloween party shop since the ladies don't spend much time in them anyway. Incredibly cheesy computer graphics — looking like cut-scenes from a PC game circa 1990 — pop up from time to time as awkward transitions between locations.
    Misty stars as Dildo Saggins, a nubile, lusty young Throbbit who enthusiastically swings both ways. At Throbbiton's annual Free Love Fest she encounters the perpetually drunken wizard, Smirnof (Michael R. Thomas), who entrusts her with the custody of a magical G-string — a powerful "erotic weapon" that must not fall into the wrong hands, especially those of the evil sorcerer Sourass. Accompanied by her shapely companions Spam (A.J. Khan) and Horny (Darian Caine), Dildo travels to the volcano Mt. Party Pooper to destroy the G-string, encountering (and shagging) numerous sexy ladies on the way. At the final destination they are reunited with Smirnof to confront Sourass (John P. Fedele), who threatens to snuff out our heroes with his poisonous magical farts. (Yes, that's right. Farts.)
    Basically there's about 15 minutes of story to this thing, the rest consisting of sex scenes. Every few minutes it just stops on a dime and the next thing you know the girls are getting naked on a blanket somewhere out in the forest, nuzzling and fondling each other with gusto. This is actually a good thing (such as it is), since there wasn't nearly enough money in the budget to do any of the costumes, locations and special effects in an even semi-acceptable fashion. Maybe two or three of the jokes are genuinely funny, and unfortunately the prolonged lesbian sex scenes can get tedious at times. The hottest of these softcore trysts is when Misty dons the magic G-string and seduces serving wench Ruby LaRocca (An Erotic Werewolf in London), with whom she always seemed to have good chemistry in the numerous films they appeared in together.
    A send-up of Sam Raimi's Spider-Man, the aptly named Spiderbabe was made with more care and money than E.I.'s previous spoofs. Misty plays the frumpy, emo heroine, Patricia Porker, a severely shy college freshman who, upon being bitten by a radioactive spider after a science lecture, undergoes a major transformation. Not only is her libido tremendously increased but she's gifted with amazing spider-like physical traits... among them the ability to shoot super-strong webbing out of her cooter! (She discovers this accidentally, while masturbating.) Patricia's self-esteem significantly improves as, exploring her new powers, she embarks on a career of crimefighting as a costumed superhero. (It's the only natural thing to do.) This new confidence enables her to get closer with M.J. (Adam Cox) — the guy she's been secretly mooning over ever since she was a kid — when not having lesbian sex with her best friend (Darian Caine), Amazonian wrestler Queen Bee (Shelby Taylor), and the editor of The Daily Bunghole (Juliette Charles). Media reports of Spiderbabe's crimebusting exploits draw the attention of another superhuman accident-of-science, the slinkily evil Femtilian (Julian Wells), who decides that the city isn't big enough for the both of 'em. Cue inevitable — and ridiculous — showdown.
    In the technical sense Spiderbabe is a major step up from its spoofy predecessors. Being shot on a hi-def 24p digital video camera gives it the look of genuine film, something the other titles in the set can't claim. Production values are higher (including location shooting on the streets of New York); the direction actually makes a stab at presenting story elements visually, with camera movement, as opposed to just statically aiming it at something and then relying completely on the editing. The comedic acting is a little better, too, even if still operating at the same high school locker room-level of sophomoric humor. Julian Wells (Dr. Jekyll & Mistress Hyde) is obviously having a blast playing the over-the-top villainess, really sinking her teeth into the part. And Misty Mundae is simply flat-out adorable in this movie, at her apogee of sexy cuteness.
    A palpable "Let's put on a show, kids!" enthusiasm is evident in both films, which nonetheless suffer from that common bane of low-budget exploitation — more ambition than funds. These are really, really cheap-looking movies, y'all. The filmmakers are aware of this, however, and in compensation bombard the screen with a nonstop cavalcade of naked women, lesbian sex and lowbrow humor. They got the job done on a pittance, ultimately proving a lucrative enterprise in terms of home video sales and cable TV licensing. Gotta give 'em props for that.
Lord of the G-Strings and Spiderbabe are found on Disc 2 of The Late Nite TV Sexy Spoof Collection; Disc 1's features are the abysmally awful Gladiator Eroticvs (2001) and Play-mate of the Apes (2002). These are the unrated versions of the films, which average five to ten minutes' more sex and nudity trimmed for cable TV broadcasts and R-rated 'retail store-friendly' DVD editions. (The original 2003 DVD release of Spiderbabe — now OOP — contained both the R-rated and unrated versions of the movie; only the unrated cut is included in this new collection.) All four are presented 1.33 fullframe, which is the way they're intended. Audio/visual quality is about what you'd expect for ultra-low budget DTV features, i.e., no great shakes but quite watchable. Seduction Cinema productions of the period were generally well-shot with the equipment at hand; these are no exception. The higher-budgeted Spiderbabe looks and sounds best, although on the DVD it suffers from an annoying video hiccup at the 24:20 mark — about 40 seconds of the movie suddenly repeats itself before proceeding per normal. (On the copy I have, at least.)
    The set is relatively light on extras. Disc 1 contains the 2002 featurette Inside Misty Mundae (68 min.), which was included on previous Seduction Cinema DVDs. (In between film clips from Gladiator Eroticvs, Misty is interviewed while taking a bubblebath, gets a rubdown from Ruby LaRocca, and is filmed driving around town in her '77 Oldsmobile and strolling the grounds of an old mansion and cemetery.) On Disc 2 are 20 skin-filled trailers for various Seduction Cinema releases of the previous decade. An illustrated booklet of liner notes by Ed Grant looks back at the making of the movies in the collection (with emphasis on the super-cheap 'guerilla' aspect of their production), but also pays tribute to frequent E.I. collaborator Michael R. Thomas (the talented actor/makeup artist passed away in 2009) and offers a January 2010 interview of Misty Mundae, who wistfully reflects on her days as a DTV sex star. 6/21/10
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