Before the advent of modern-day pornography, a vast and rapidly-paced world of smut peddling was the norm, complete with its own secret history. This documentary reveals the untold story of American cinema's gloriously sordid cinematic past. Starting in the 1920s, expert exploiteer David F. Friedman and Henenlotter navigate us through more than five salacious decades of skin flicks. It's the true story of dirty movies, traced in elegant detail from the bizarre locations where these nudie shorts were screened to the ongoing legal battles fought by their promoters. And of course there are the stories of the innovators themselves, people who often risked their own security and livelihood to make these films, believing in some way that what they were doing wasn't a 'bad' thing - and that it could rake in some dough.
Director:
Writer:
Frank Henenlotter
Himself
David F. Friedman
Himself
Gal Friday
Herself
Albert Cadabra
Himself
Eleanor Ames
Self (archive footage)
Virginia Bell
Self - Burlesque Performer (archive footage)
Mary Blair
Self - Burlesque Performer (archive footage)
Manny Brown
Self (archive footage)
Doreen Cannon
Self - Burlesque Performer (archive footage)
Peter A. DeCenzie
Self (archive footage)
Kalantan
Self - Burlesque Performer (archive footage)
Herschell Gordon Lewis
Self (archive footage)
Russ Meyer
Self (archive footage)
Bettie Page
Self - Burlesque Performer (archive footage)
Russell Patterson
Self - Pinup Artist (archive footage)
Iva Pratt
Self - Burlesque Performer (archive footage)
Sally Rand
Self - Burlesque Fan Dancer (archive footage)
Vera Richkova
Self - Burlesque Performer (archive footage)
Rosita Royce
Self - Burlesque Performer (archive footage)
Louis K. Sher
Self (archive footage)
Dan Sonney
Self (archive footage)
Georgia Sothern
Self - Burlesque Performer (archive footage)
Lili St. Cyr
Self - Burlesque Performer (archive footage)
Blaze Starr
Self/Belle Fleming (archive footage)
Tempest Storm
Self - Burlesque Performer (archive footage)
Doris Wishman
Self (archive footage)
William H. Hays
Self (archive footage)
Bebe Hughs
Nudist Fencer (archive footage)
Cherrie Knight
Self - Burlesque Performer (archive footage)
Mike Vraney
Self (archive footage)
That's Sexploitation! (2013) Trailer
