Beyond the valley of the dolls movie#
Beyond the valley of the dolls skin#

That disc was always surprisingly stacked for a trash epic, so merely repackaging the material would be enough to make this an impressive release. So you’ll get over an hour of amusing documentaries featuring a handful of actors and fans sharing hysterical Russ Meyer stories as well as some screen tests and a pair of commentaries (the best of which comes from Roger Ebert who has no problem filling his two hours with wall-to-wall anecdotes and just the right amount of self-depreciating humour). Everything from the old two disc special edition DVD is included. The special feature section is unbelievably packed as well. So don’t expect it to fill your home theater speakers in any way, shape, or form. The lossless audio track is crisp and clear, but presented in mono as intended. I sure even Russ Meyer never thought it would look this good. This trash epic is a beautifully shot film and it’s amazing to see Beyond the Valley of the Dolls given the royal Criterion treatment. Every over-packed frame is filled with pinpoint clear details and every color is cranked high beyond naturalism. Criterion have treated the transfer with care and the thing bursts off the screen.

Beyond the valley of the dolls skin#

The aesthetic was deliberately tacky back then, with all of the excessively bright colors, big hair, and bare skin so popular in the early 70s.

Beyond the valley of the dolls movie#

The movie looks absolutely glorious on Blu-ray. You may even need a few viewings for all the trashy delights to really sink in. If you have a sweet tooth for utter trash, buckle up for this one.

This movie was made by some naughty boys too smart for the smutty room in 1970 and it remains an in-joke for those who adore gloriously stupid excess all these years later. It’s an exorcise in deliberate bad taste that could well piss off folks who don’t appreciate such things these days. Colors are luridly bright and the editing unfurls at a pace that would make Michael Bay jealous. Meyer shoots it all with his usual giddy style. However, the wit is hilariously clear all these years later and the relentless melodrama and pulp never ceases to deliver big belly laughs, right up until the deliberately convoluted collection of morals at the ending. It would be easy to see how viewers at the time would think the movie was pure crap like Valley of the Dolls. Ebert and Meyer play it all tongue-in-cheek, yet the actors play it all entirely seriously. What follows is some of the most insane dialogue hippy ever written (some directly quoted in Austin Powers) and an orgy of sex, violence, and rock n’ roll. The whole thing is wilfully absurd and ridiculous, a parody of 60s LA excess made by a pair of outsiders who weren’t part of that community, but knew exactly why they hated it. Of course descriptions of plot hardly do Beyond the Valley of the Dolls any justice. The story was essentially the same: a rock band group of vixens arrive in Los Angeles with dreams of stardom that soon turn into nightmares after they meet a perverse producer named Z-Man who introduces them to the evils of drugs, casual sex, lies, manipulation and eventually murder. The goal of Ebert and Meyers was to deliver a deliberately camp parody. However, it was so silly and soapy in it’s salacious aims that the flick made money off of viewers who lined up to giggle relentlessly at the absurdity on screen. The Valley of the Dolls was a hit about a group of young women being chewed up by the evils of Los Angeles that frankly was never very good. Meyer was wooed to work for 20 th Century Fox with only a title that captured his imagination. It’s a movie so insane, hilarious, stylish, and subversive that somehow it ended up in the Criterion Collection. Along with a young film critic whom he hired to write the script named Roger Ebert, Meyer created Beyond the Valley of the Dolls. Meyer was both a pornographer and a genuine artist, a magic combination that in 1970 led to him helming a Hollywood production. He also had a sly sense of humour as well as an eye for striking cinematography and a unique quick cut editing style that was genuinely groundbreaking. While Meyer loved to ogle women’s naughty bits, he also genuinely loved women and created nudie pictures in which the women were empowered. He always made money translating his private fantasies into campy drive in fodder, but over time he even began to be taken seriously. The man loved boobs and essentially founded the sexsploitation movie industry to capture all of his favourite cup sizes on the big screen. Bless Russ Meyer, one of the most beloved and talented perverts in film history.