Erotic Dairy of a Lumberjack (1974)

French erotica

English Overdub, Remastered

Le Chat Qui Fume

Classics of French Erotica

MVD

R1 DVD

Reviewed by Bob Estreich

In an earlier issue we looked at the early French erotica of Jean-Marie Pallardy’s My Body Burns. In that film the style of his future films was established – lush settings including many outdoor shots, very attractive women, lighthearted plots, and nothing that could really be called pornographic. Erotic Diary of a Lumberjack (French title Foret aux Mille Desirs) continues in this happy style. It follows Pallardy’s successful formula but includes more women, more outdoor shots, more of everything really. It is a more polished presentation than My Body Burns and Pallardy was obviously getting into his stride as a producer.

The plot is fairly basic. Professor Muller, a Nobel Prize nominee, and his business partner have turned a forested area near a small village into an open-air brothel for jaded businessmen. The place is well-staffed by attractive and compliant young ladies to the point that the Police Minister is complaining of a lack of high-class hookers for the tourist industry. He is also concerned about the effect on French prestige if it became known that one of their leading scientists (or whatever he is a Professor of) is also a leading pimp. He sends police officers undercover to investigate and to dismantle the Professor’s little enterprise. One of the investigators is an attractive woman and she starts to fall in love with the Professor’s son (played by Jean-Marie Pallardy himself). So, on with the action. Lots of tasteful fornication, a farcical fight in a quarry, more fornication, policemen being chased by attractive women, fornication, and so on.

The film is tastefully done, the women all look happy, and the film is low-key funny all the way through. It has been well remastered and cleaned up, apart from a couple of minor scenes and the sound. The voice tracks are quite good but the background music is, as in My Body Burns, inappropriate, intrusive and poorly recorded. If the original soundtrack was of the same standard then they have done the film a kindness by overdubbing it.

The extras include a long interview with Jean-Marie Pallardy, another 100 still shots of his actresses and some extended scenes that were shortened for the film.

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This review will appear in Volume 2 No.6 (2009) of the digital and print edition of Synergy Magazine.

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