Die Sklavinnen - (Swedish Nympho Slaves).

There are two DVDs in this set, the first is Die Sklavinnen, a rather sleazy thriller directed by Jess Franco and starring Franco's favourite, Lina Romay. Told partly in flashback, Lina Romay plays Princess Arminda, a brothel keeper who, through friends in high places has escaped justice and continues to procure girls for her establishment by any means, fair or foul; this being a Franco-fest, it is mainly foul. This is just the excuse needed for showing lots of female flesh of varying colours and lots of erotic action from the very attractive female leads. To my mind though, Lina Romay looks too young to play the part of a brothel Madame and someone older would have been more appropriate. Never mind though, a naked Miss Romay is one of life's treats. This is actually quite a nifty little thriller at 73 minutes. There are enough twists and double crosses that more accomplished thriller writers would be proud of and the ending could be seen as quite a shock. The widescreen picture looks good. The language is German with optional English subtitles. There are no extras.The other DVD is The Amorous Sisters, written and directed by Erwin C. Dietrich. Rather like the Schoolgirl Report films of the same era, This is a more innocent and charming film set in a girls school in Switzerland but still featuring lots of nudity from the very beautitiful female students which includes porn star Brigitte Lahaie, and their equally attractive female teacher. One can only assume that this is supposed to be a finishing school for young ladies as all the students look older than teenagers, and the only subject on the timetable is sex education, which the girls study enthusiastically. Needless to say, this leads to much nudity, girl on girl action and boy/girl (man/woman?) action. There are some funny moments in this film and also a rather surreal scene in which the teacher and students run naked through the forest, shown in slow motion, to a haunting and romantic music track. Shot on location, some of the scenery is quite stunning. This widescreen film looks good and runs for 76 minutes. The audio is German and English with optional English subtitles. Trailers for similar films are the only extras.For me, an added bonus is that both films were shot on location. Die Sklavinnen was shot in and around Lisbon, Portugal. The Amorous Sisters was shot in various locations around Switzerland. Castle Widen, Ossingen, Canton Zurich looks to be the school; some scenes were shot in Zurich and the nature trek sequence was filmed in Val Verzasca, Canton Ticino (Lavertezzo was the Roman footbridge part).

The film is good,the packageing was good a good film for jess franco fans,with a bonus free dvd,very good overall

Franco appears as a slightly unconvincing heavy in this 1977 mid-career movie. He appears in many of his fims in roles which are much more than cameos.The listing gives little information, but the disc plays in German, with or without English subtitles at the viewer's choice, but that is the limit of the possibilities on this disc and the extras include an interview with the director and some pointless stills. The dialogue is reasonably effective and the print itself is of good quality.The movie's title is certainly Die Sklavinnen - there is nothing Swedish about it, and the German word merely means slave-girls, although there is only one girl in subjection in the movie; the immensely beautiful actress who plays her, Martine Stedil, makes a great success as a naked, captive madwoman; it is a portrayal which has a great deal of force about it. The plot is actually quite fast-paced and the sets and locations come out as the usual Franco hot-country thing with a vague feel of palm trees and bleached-white villas. Occasionally the location includes exotic and decaying architecture, adding atmosphere to what is already a fairly effective kidnapping-suspense story. Some film of rough seas breaking onto rocky cliffs adds variety although it is not clear how far away from the main action this location might be - that would be too much to ask.Viewers familiar with Franco's prolific directing career will already be expecting the cast to be discarding their clothing for much of the running time of the film. The fabulously puffy-portly Vitor Mendes, a Portuguese actor who perhaps unsurprisingly died in middle age, plays an ultimately heartless father of a daughter who, by her looks, can hardly share any of his genes. Franco's muse and of course his spouse, Lina Romay, in real life a homely and comfortable character, acts her socks off (pun by all means intended) demonically and effectively in this film and was something of a natural acting talent.The direction is quite tight and the musical score appropriate and effective.There are some truly awful 1970s' male hairdos, which are far more shocking than anything that actually happens in the plot.