Dirty old moguls of the B's
Boston Herald, by Paul Sherman
| “Mau Mau Sex Sex” David Friedman and Dan Sonney, the subjects of the documentary ``Mau Mau Sex Sex,'' are the uncles we all wish for. They're guys who tell great anecdotes and have a business that makes the rest of the family a little afraid. From the 1940s through the 1970s, these old-timers were among the most prolific American producers of exploitation movies. Sonney, who carried on the family business his dad started, and Friedman, who gladly left a mainstream job as a Paramount Pictures publicist for the world of B-movies, each filmed and marketed the stories Hollywood would not or could not make. From ``Child Bride'' and ``Mau Mau'' to ``Blood Feast'' and countless nudist-camp movies, they sold gore, skin, sex and sin to a mostly male public that was glad to have them at drive-ins and urban independent theaters. And they had a ball doing it. The two old pals recall past triumphs and failures with typical gusto in Ted Bonnitt's clip-filled documentary, cantankerously arguing over discrepancies in their memories like a couple of Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau characters. Also here as a sort of Greek chorus of admiration and disbelief to analyze many of the old Sonney and Friedman movies is perceptive Frank Henenlotter, a director whose own contributions to twisted B-movie mayhem include ``Basket Case'' and ``Frankenhooker.'' ``Mau Mau Sex Sex'' is an entertaining look at the two aging B-movie moguls who've led unusually interesting lives, and whose ``sinful'' work is tame by today's standards. It affectionately takes part of its title from a 1950 Chet Huntley-narrated documentary about Africa that Sonney bought and then blatantly inserted poorly matched ``topless native'' footage shot on a Los Angeles soundstage. Sometimes the sequences on the producers' home lives are interesting, as when you hear from one of Sonney's daughters or from Friedman's longtime wife, who speaks of being married to a man who frequently worked with shapely starlets and apparently liked to seduce them, too. September 21, 2001 |
|||
 |