Customer Reviews

Chantal

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Here's a DVD that's been `coming soon' for about three years. Thankfully, it's been well worth the wait because Seduction Cinema have put together a superb package. The main event is a remake of Nick Phillips' late 1960s "Chantal" and this 2-disc set has that original feature on its second DVD along with an interview with the director and an audio commentary with Phillips and 42nd Street Pete. There's also a short film called `These Girls Are Fools'.

The main course, though, is Tony Marsiglia's stunning remake which features an utterly superb central performance from Misty Mundae as the innocent, wide-eyed titular character who dreams of becoming a movie star. However, she soon finds that far from being laced with tinsel, Hollywood is loaded with manipulative predators all too eager to lend a helping hand.

In some ways, this is Marsiglia's most straightforward film in terms of storytelling. There's none of the confusing narrative that characterized his previous release, Sinful, or the more dreamlike sequences in the excellent Lust for Dracula (Director's Cut). However, there are one or two moments of weirdness. For example, having been turned away from her first port of call, Chantal decides to lower her sights and enters the bowels of a decrepit hotel presided over by the creepy Pablo (Tony Marsiglia). On finding that she doesn't have enough money for a room even in this hell-hole, Pablo offers her a deal: he'll keep her suitcase and belongings with him, but he'll allow her to take two items with her. "Not the pink ones," he rasps excitedly like an obscene phone caller in imminent danger of a heart attack.

There are fine performances from the supporting cast. Darian Caine as an aggressive lesbian photographer gives perhaps her best performance to date with Marsiglia favorite, Andrea Davis, as her co-defiler. They subject the witless Chantal to their forceful attentions in a powerful scene that is harrowing to watch. Julian Wells also turns in a fine performance. Here, she plays an actress wannabe who's already been put through the wringer and is now reduced to turning tricks on the street.

Also present on the DVD are a behind the scenes featurette and an interesting audio commentary from Marsiglia and producer, Michael Raso. However, the icing on the cake is a fascinating, separate audio commentary from Tony Marsiglia and Misty Mundae. Aside from the business of `Chantal', Misty speaks about her decision to stop making softcore films. She admits with refreshing honesty that since making Masters of Horror: Lucky McKee - Sick Girl, offers of acting work that she's been willing to undertake have not been numerous.

At one point, Marsiglia asks Misty about how she and her fellow actresses prepare for sex scenes and in a delightfully catty aside she mentions an actress whose name has been partially removed from the soundtrack:

Misty: Working with [this actress], she'd be like `oh no, I don't wanna do it that way. I have to be atop, I can't be abottom, and let's do the scissor thing because then we look really good. And make sure that you hold under my boob to cover my scar.'
Marsiglia: What did the director say?
Misty: Oh, pssh! The director of that movie? Not much!
Marsiglia: I don't think I've seen this one.
Misty: Good!

I think Misty is talking about The Erotic Mirror which, in my opinion, is not a bad piece of softcore entertainment. And the "scissor thing" does look good.

`Chantal', for me is a four star film, but the extra features give this package a five star rating. Misty Mundae fans should consider it a must-have.

This is one of Misty Mundae's last exploitation skin flicks. Unlike most of her work, which is a lot of fun, her work with Tony Marsiglia is always more thoughtful. This film was made immediately after "Lust for Dracula". That movie was very confusing. This one makes much more sense, and I felt that I was watching an actual movie, only one with a lots of beautiful, naked women in it. That's very good. What kept this from being a five star film is that it is just such a downer, it kills the eroticism. There is a rape scene, where Andrea Davis rapes Misty while Darrian Caine gets the whole thing on film. In a standard Misty movie, all the above would happen without the rape, and it would be very hot. Instead, it's just painful to watch. Probably the best acting I've seen from Misty, she carries the movie on her slim shoulders. If you always wondered if Misty can act convincingly, this movie answers the question with a definite yes. If you enjoy seeing Misty kiss a bunch of hot naked women, trust me, that's not what this movie is about. Most of all, it made me sad that she has left this genre. She was the best there ever was.

Chantal (Tony Marsiglia, 2007)

While it is certainly the case that Erin Brown, who goes by the name Misty Mundae when doing either softcore of low-budget horror (viz. Kurtzmann's The Rage), is hands down one of the most beautiful actresses in the softcore industry, it is often overlooked that, when she's given material she can really sink her teeth into, she's also a pretty decent actress (viz. Lucky McKee's Sick Girl). Because she's been typecast as a softcore actress, she rarely gets material of this caliber, but in her defense, she's willing to take roles that most softcore actresses wouldn't touch with ten-foot poles as long as they contain the possibility of pushing that particular envelope. Tony Marsiglia's Chantal, an anti-Horatio Alger tale about a fresh-faced young thing who tries (and fails) to make it in Hollywood is exactly that kind of role. It doesn't live up to its potential in any way, but it's certainly an interesting enough attempt to give it a watch.

Marsiglia, save his first (a no-budget 1995 horror flick called Phoenix that seems impossible to come by these days) and as-of-this-writing-most-recent (2009's Suzie Heartless, because Misty's off making CSI these days don't you know) features, has cast Misty Mundae in everything he's done, be it straight softcore (Lust for Dracula) or attempts to break out of the mold (this). Interestingly, said attempt to break out of the mold is actually a remake of an earlier softcore outing by porn/horror king Nick Millard (the original is included in this DVD release). Chantal was one of the eleven(!) flicks Millard directed in 1968, and is eminently forgettable--to everyone, it seems, save Marsiglia. It stuck in his craw enough that he had to remake it. And Misty Mundae is just about the perfect lead for this. There's so much discussion of how the perfect woman can look both the princess and the slut, and all of it's wrong. This works because Mundae is only capable of looking the princess. No matter how degraded/degrading the material, she is always the fresh-faced innocent girl next door. And that is why she has such a huge following among softcore aficionados. In a movie like this, which is barely even a softcore production (this is far more about the breaking of Chantal's will than it is about the various sexual entanglements in which she finds herself), the draw is the destruction of that innocence. Some might say that the fact Misty Mundae still looks like an angel, albeit a dirty, homeless one, by the time we get halfway through the movie undercuts what's going on. Not so, Brutus. (Though I will admit it does kind of stab longtime Mundae co-conspirator Julian Wells' immortal line "I'm 21. This is what a year on these streets will do to you." in the foot.) Given where this movie ends up (and while I'm sure you can guess, I won't spoil it for you), innocence is necessary. Even the beginning of the cynical gleam in the eye would have compromised that ending.

I'm going on and on about a movie to which I'm giving a mediocre rating because while it's technically crap (it's Seduction Cinema, what do you expect?) and Marsiglia's writing, as usual, could've used a great editor, there's actually a lot to think about here. Marsiglia dances around with Hollywood clichés that are as old as, well, Horatio Alger stories, but he manages to make something halfway interesting out of them. I liked this more than the two stars I'm giving it would seem to imply, and I am recommending you watch it, as long as you're willing to put up with occasionally-awful dialogue and cinematography that could have been done by a ten-year-old. **

Misty Mundae has never looked better than in this movie and it may be her best effort so far as an actress.However the director chose to make this a much more cynical version than the original.I do not like seeing our girl beaten up, raped, and humiliated as the girl in the original version never had to go through this .(Chantal is a redo of a movie from the 60's).

The result was a complete collapse of Mistys resolve and she went into a crying fit that lasted over 4 hours.She brought back all the bad menories of her career, or should I say the the director brought back all the bad memories .The ending is disgusting for such a talented performer to have to under go.What was Marsiglia thinking?

As a result Misty never made another movie under the name of Misty Mundae and only one or two under the name of Erin Brown.

You should go into this movie realizeing what this movie is, an over the top exageration of an "innocent girl in the big cruel city" movie. Here is an example of the exageration. Early in the movie Mysti Mundae goes to what is supposed to be a swank hotel and tells the desk attendant that she wants a room for a week. The desk attendant tells her "that'll be 4k please", to which Mundae puts $4 down on the counter and closes her eyes and puts her hands out expecting the to get her room key, instead that attendant put a condemn on her hands.

After leaving the swank hotel, she goes to a sleazy hotel and meets up with a desk attendant who, I'm not sure how to describe this, acts like someone is standing on his oxygen tube. The cost of the room is $200. Mundae only has $122. So the attendant takes her $100 and also takes her bag of clothes (he does allow her to keep two articles of clothing), and tells her she has the room for 5 days. Latter in the movie after her 5 days are up, and someone else has moved into her room and she is outside the room crying while huddled on the floor, the new occupant of the room (a man) urinates on her.

Every scene in this movie is like what I just described. Everywhere Mudae turns, there are some new people there to use and abuse her and treat her like she dirt. It's no wonder that the poor innocennt girl does what she does at the end of the movie. Not to spoil the ending for you, but the ending involves an airplane.

I bought this movie because of the good review on this web site, and because of the bondage picture on the back of the dvd case. However, I spent $20+ on this and I think the price isn't correct for what you get. Granted, the second disc in this set has the original b&w Chantal movie (which I haven't watched yet), but this movie should sell from $10-$15. For $19.99 I was expecting something extraordinary. Of all this things this movie is, extraordinary is one of them.

The only conceit is her otherworldly naivete. There aren't male characters played by hot women or animals played by balls of hair and at no time should you suddenly realize that you have no idea what is happening, two gripes I have with Lust For Dracula and Sinful(Mine). Chantal makes sense. You can see how the scene you are watching follows from the scenes before. And they lead someplace; you don't just end up there. The whole female portion of the cast is yummy, which really is what sells these frisbees, but in the case of Chantal, the story is good too. With these Seduction Cinema titles, you can't always say that.

never got the item i bought im mad i should get it free dan its not fair i wanted to see this movie bad

Just what I expected. Pretty women, weak acting and story. Better than most soft core.

Erin Brown(aka:Misty Mundae) stars as Chantal. A sweet nieve girl, who wants to be a star. But along the way Chantal encounters her worst fears along the way. Tony Marsiglia isn't my favorite Seduction Cinema/Shock-O-Rama director, but Chantal is by far his best film ever! A must see for Misty Mundae fans.