MUNDAE MONDAY: CHANTAL!!!

CHANTAL
Starring Misty Mundae, Julian Wells, Darian Caine
Directed by Tony Marsiglia
Seduction Cinema
Review by Douglas A. Waltz

Chantal has just gotten into Los Angeles and she is ready to make her dream of being a movie star a reality. Wide eyed and innocent, Chantal is bait for the sleaze merchants that prowl the dark underbelly of tinseltown. Her run in with Tracy, an actress turned prostitute, starts off shaky but then blossoms into something more. But, Chantal is burned by every person she meets at every turn she makes and it doesn’t take long before the pressures of Hollywood cause this fragile, young woman to snap.

CHANTAL was made at the same time as Marsiglia’s LUST FOR DRACULA. This is a five year old feature that has languished on the shelves for no other reason than the Misty Mundae train has jumped the tracks and transformed into Erin Brown. Misty is THE reason that Seduction Cinema is what it is today. Without any new product they have taken their time in releasing any features of hers that they have left. This is the latest in the Nick Phillips experiment. May moons ago, Seduction Cinema would release a Nick Phillips flick with a loosely based remake using the stable of Seduction Cinema cast members. Sometimes it was good. LUSTFUL ADDICTION is a prime example, as is ROXANNA. There are some misfires, not on Nick Phillips’ part. Every one of his films are classic exploitation features and Phillips has quite an eye with the camera. Now, this might be the last one.

CHANTAL tells a story of wide eyed innocence corrupted to the point of no return. A serious subject with no wink wink funny stuff for the camera. All of Marsiglia’s films are somber, but this one is just damned depressing. It feels a little too real.
In the commentary with Tony and Misty we discover that the part hit a little too close to home for Misty as well. Seems she had a minor nervous breakdown as they neared the end of filming. This was the second of the two films that were shot. She had one day off between films and they were shooting in August in California and most of the places they were at didn’t look like they had much in the way of air conditioning. No wonder the poor thing snapped.

Most of Marsiglia’s films tend to be a little more surreal, but with this one I think he gave it such a real, slimy feel that while it is a linear feature, probably the most linear one he has done, it still manages to float in that land of surreal that Tony likes to spend a lot of time in.

It has been forever since I have seen Darian Caine in a film and she is still as gorgeous as ever. Andrea Davis always looks steamy and this film is no exception. Why they don’t give her her own feature is beyond me. Julian Welles is beautiful as always. It made me feel nostalgic for the old days when Seduction Cinema was running full bore and a new movie hit on a regular basis. Of course it felt like that. This flick is five years old!

The Nick Phillips film of the same name is more of the same classic exploitation that we have come to expect from the master. Shot in black and white and following a much tamer Chantal than the newer remake, we get the throaty voiceover that comes with all Nick Phillips films. The lead is a buxom, short haired brunette that is lovely to look at.

Both films come with commentaries that must be mandatory for any true fan. The one for the earlier film has Nick Phillips, his wife and 42nd Street Pete running down what it was like to make films on the down in dirty back in the day. The one for the remake has Tony Marsiglia and Misty Mundae and just listening to Misty talking about how her career seems to have come to a standstill after Masters Of Horror is just heartbreaking. We don’t care what you do Misty as long as you do something. We have plenty of DVDs of you naked so you don’t even have to do that anymore if you don’t want to. You’ve paid your dues and with your recent clothed appearance in the Polonia Brothers SPLATTER BEACH you have proven yourself as the fine actress we always have known you for. Come back to Michael Raso. He’ll let you direct if you want.

The two-disc set is packed with extras. Disc one has the remake along with two commentaries and a brief making of featurette. There’s a camera test since the film was shot on 16mm that is pretty cool. On disc two we get the Nick Phillips original and an interview with Nick and the aforementioned commentary. There’s a featurette called "These Girls Are Fools" and a great full color booklet that runs down the history of both films.

My one true complaint is that they did that bizarre Photoshopping on the cover. Note to Seduction Cinema: Misty looks damned fine the way she is, stop mucking about with her already. Good for you learning Photoshop, but we are sick of it!