The Joys of Jezebel (1970) is a bit of grindhouse/drive-in sexploitation
produced by the kings of that particular hill, partners David F. Friedman
and Peter Perry.
Jezebel (Christine Murray) has been killed by throwing her to the dogs. A
man and his girlfriend Ruth (Angela Graves) were responsible, and are trying
to get Jezebel's sister Rachel (Dixie Donovan) to marry a repulsive
foreigner who has a large army to loan.
Meanwhile, on "the other side," Satan wants to bag Jezebel since, after
all, everyone on earth did, but she has her mind set on revenge, and plays
to Lucifer's personal weaknesses. She promises to deliver a virgin to him if
he gives her time for revenge on earth. Having never seen a virgin in hell,
he goes for the arrangement.
Jezebel tricks Satan by swapping bodies with Rachel, and sending her to
hell. She does promise not to sully the body she borrowed. Thus she looks
just like virginal Dixie Donovan as she goes about her revenge on the toad
that is to marry Rachel, the jerk who had her condemned, and Ruth. There is,
of course, a surprise ending, but the point of the film is not the ending,
but the journey, which is filled with wall-to-wall full frontal nudity and
mild simulated sex.
Bethel Buckalew is correctly listed as the director at IMDb, but listed
among his aliases are Peter Perry and the A.P. Stootsberry. Neither of those
listings is correct. Stootsberry is actually the nom de porn of a producing
team which consisted of David Friedman and Peter Perry. So you can say that
Parry and Stootsberry are the same guy (or at least that Perry is half of
Stootsberry), but the guy in question is not Buckalew. Bethel Buckalew, who made several
films for the Stootsberry team, then tried one on his own, but was unable to
sell it.
If you are not familiar with our grading system, you need to
read the
explanation, because the grading is not linear. For example, by
our definition, a
C is solid and a C+ is a VERY good movie. There are very few Bs
and As. Based on our descriptive system, this film is a:
C
It is not a genre classic like the same team's The Erotic Adventures of Zorro,
but it's solid. It doesn't have the
sharp wit of the Zorro film, nor as much acting talent, but it does have
much more skin.
