User Reviews

Gerard Damiano, he who gave the world both DEEP THROAT and the original DEVIL IN MISS JONES, desperately wanted to film the scandalous French erotic novel "Story of O" but clearly didn't stand a virgin's chance in a gang bang of acquiring the legal rights to do so. Instead, he wrote an original screenplay liberally based on the book, pretty much as he had adapted Sartre's "No Exit" for MISS JONES, adding a moral (believe it or not) subtext to the whole story. This stands not only as one of Damiano's finest films however but quite simply as one of the very best adult movies ever made.

Hauntingly sad-eyed Terri Hall plays the titular Joanna, an innocent débutante singled out by wealthy womanizer Jason (the always intriguing Jamie Gillis) for degradation. As any long-suffering literary heroine worth her salt, Joanna takes it all on the chin (trust me, no pun intended...) in the name of love. There is method to Jason's madness however as we find out that he is dying of a mysterious disease and,as a final grand gesture, wants to be killed by one who loves him above all else.

In one of her earliest adult film appearances, Hall brings a touching sincerity to the role of Joanna, the occasionally awkward line reading notwithstanding. A former dancer with the Stuttgart Ballet, she also performs an exquisitely choreographed routine, wearing little more than a modest pubic shield. Her male partner in this memorable sequence is Steven Lark, who was featured in Chuck Vincent's FAREWELL SCARLET and Bill Milling's ORIENTAL BLUE, frequently partnered by Hall, begging the question whether perhaps there was a personal off-screen connection between the two. The only other female performer is Juliet Graham as maidservant Gina. She's best remembered for portraying the evil Queen of Hearts in Bud Townsend's legendary porno musical ALICE IN WONDERLAND as well as the various incarnations of hapless anti-hero Jeff Hurst's fantasy girl in Howard Winters and Roberta Findlay's engaging Walter Mitty adaptation FANTASEX.

The three cigar-chomping aristocrats Joanna takes on in a bid to prove her limitless devotion to Jason are one shots John Koven and Roy Carlton with the bulky bearded guy being regular "roughie" mainstay John (occasionally "Francis X.") Bush, who appeared in Zebedy Colt's UNWILLING LOVERS and a couple of grimy Joe Davian sleaze operas made for notorious New York based Avon Productions, APPOINTMENT WITH AGONY and DOMINATION BLUE. Speaking of Colt, here he delivers one of his most accomplished albeit restrained acting turns - diametrically opposed to his equally indelible loose cannon ranting in Tim McCoy's SEX WISH - as loyal manservant Griffin who performs well above and beyond the call of duty, as witnessed by his obedient oral servicing of his Master, a rare sight in heterosexual hardcore even in the anything goes decade that was the 1970s. A proudly out of the closet gay man with bi-curious leanings, long before the term became fashionable, Colt was never the most potent performer sexually, so it's safe to assume he was stunted for in his mesmerizing extreme close-up lovemaking scene with the heroine.

Setting the story in some vague past (there are hints that these could be either the 1920s or '30s yet nothing too specific), Damiano weaves a monumentally gloomy melodrama that just happens to contain a considerable number of explicit sex scenes, some of them quite nasty, such as Joanna receiving a severe whipping across the thighs in a mirrored room, yet many of them also unexpectedly tender, choreographed to almost resemble sacred rituals. The whole film's gorgeously photographed by Joao Fernandes (as "Harry Flecks") and memorably scored with a mix of real classical music and new tracks emulating well known classical favorites. Best of all in this respect is the repeated use of Albinoni's swooningly romantic Adagio in G Minor, at one point even transformed into a torch song with fitting doom-laden lyrics by Colt, employing two thirds of his real name ("Edward Earle", his last name being Marsh) in this capacity.

Gerard Damiano's The Story of Joanna is surely one of the most outré porn features from that strange period in the mid-70s when porn was being made on film and shown at movie theatres. Damiano - despite the crass Deep Throat - was usually one of the more artistic (some might say pretentious) of pornographers, and in this extreme oddity (loosely based on Pauline Réage's The Story of O) he offers what aspires to be the erotic equivalent of Last Year of Marienbad, a disorientating experience of pure aestheticism.

The story has wealthy socialite Jason (Jamie Gillis) recounting his seduction of a woman called Joanna (Terri Hall). He meets her in a bar and romances her, bringing her to his lush mansion and securing a place in her heart. Once he's weaselled his way in there, he forces her to have sex in the front room, humiliating her. Then follows the first example of what turns out to be the film's elliptical approach to narrative: Joanna is tied to a chair in a mirrored room, being whipped for an "infidelity" by Jason, with a fierce-looking dominatrix overseeing the event. How the relationship between Jason and Joanna developed this far, what her infidelity was, when in relationship to the previous scenes is unclear - all we know is that he's upped the ante in her humiliation considerably since the last scene. The film then proceeds as a disorientating fragmented narrative, with scenes of Joanna having sex with Jason's socialite friends and his faithful servant (Zebedy Colt).

An unkind critic might think that Damiano was simply being narratively incompetent here, or someone has hacked the film down from a longer version. But disorientation and fragmentation seem to be the codes of the road here, as the viewer is constantly trying to piece the story together, figure out the relationships, find some ground in shifting sands. Damiano's most daring scene has - out of the blue - Jason being fellated by his male servant, a sequence which must have a provocative and dizzying effect on the male heterosexual viewer. It is almost as if the film is playing an S&M game with its audience, pushing their limits and testing their stamina.

The film is beautifully designed, photographed and framed. Classical music accompanies much of the action, with particularly lush use of Albinoni's Adagio in G minor investing the images with a depth of emotion which touches profundity; there's a very odd and quite beautiful sexual ballet at one point.

The Story of Joanna is a dark film, as it turns out that Jason is dying and therefore training Joanna to be his executioner. It is a film designed to have strange and unfathomable effects on the viewer, erotic but also aesthetic and Thanatos-raising. This is a good place to start for any attempt to see Damiano not merely as a hack porn purveyor but as a genuine auteur.