Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! (1965)

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General		Extras
Category	Drama	Main Menu Audio Audio Commentary-Russ Meyer (Director) Audio Commentary-Tura Satana, Haji & Lori Williams (Pussycats) Featurette-Go! Pussycats, Go! Theatrical Trailer Trailer-2046, Exils, Night On Earth, Battle Of Algiers
Rating
Year Of Production	1965
Running Time	83:22
RSDL / Flipper	Dual Layered	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	Russ Meyer
Studio Distributor	Madman Entertainment	Starring	Tura Satana Haji Lori Williams Sue Bernard Stuart Lancaster Paul Trinka Dennis Busch Ray Barlow Michael Finn
Case	Amaray-Transparent-Secure Clip
RPI	$29.95	Music	Paul Sawtell Bert Shefter

    Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to violence…

    Trash film auteur John Waters referred to Russ Meyer as “the Eisenstein of sex films.” And he couldn’t be closer to the truth. Like Eisenstein, Meyer was a master craftsman of the often overlooked art of film editing. In fact, through shrewd editing and a fetishistic eye for the female form, Meyer revolutionised the sex film industry by teasing audiences with erotic montages of women in a host of compromising, yet powerful positions.

    With films like The Immoral Mr. Teas, Mudhoney, Lorna, Beyond the Valley of the Ultravixens and Mondo Topless, Meyer’s lustful camera caressed a plethora of well-endowed beauties while carefully manipulating the expectations of his soft-porn audience. Indeed, Meyer exploited women’s bodies, but he also used them to make moral and political statements about the sexual double standards of mainstream society. It was an ideal situation - men could go along to safely ogle the screen, while their girlfriends left the theatre feeling oddly empowered.

    In terms of socio-political commentary, Pussycat is Meyers' most accomplished film. However, his over-the-top comic representation of feminism taken to its left-wing extreme alienated his core audience. By having his larger-than-life female characters act like violent bad boys, most men (sado-masochistic fetishists aside) found the Pussycats intimidating rather than sexually provocative. This was certainly not a sexy date movie - these women used their sexuality to destroy men. As a result, the film bombed when it was first released in theatres.

    Starring the Amazonian Tura Satana as the go-go dancing Varla, whose screen presence is a cross between fetish queen Betti Page and a menacing Japanese Manga whore, the movie revolves around her slide into man-hating violence and merciless greed. Along with fellow exotic dancers, Rosie (Haji) and blonde good-time gal, Billie (Lori Williams), the three release their pent up frustration of living in a male-dominated society by racing fast cars in the desert and having cat fights in the sand.

    After beating a young square in a race, Varla suddenly turns on him and breaks his back with her bare hands. Now on the run, the three gals decide to kidnap his whining girlfriend, Linda (Sue Bernard) and take her to a nearby secluded ranch. Here they are confronted by a wheelchair-bound lecher and his two sons: a hunky, but mentally-retarded man-child and the other a quiet scholarly type. The sparks begin to fly when the loyalties of the three women are tested after they seduce the brothers and Varla learns of the old man’s stash of cash.

    Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! has an energy and pace that threatens to burst out of the screen like Tura Satana’s panoramic cleavage. While the editing is not as hell-for-leather as the frantic Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, the comic-book framing and quick cuts are nevertheless mockingly captivating. One moment the viewer is squirming after a moment of violence then, in a flash, voyeuristically provoked by a close-up of heaving bosoms or looking up at a pair of Robert Crumb-esque buns wrapped tightly in black jeans.

    The dialogue is an amphetamine fusion of Jack Kerouac’s beat poetry and Mae West double-entendres --“You’re all shook up, aren’t you baby?”; “You really do have the hots for the long green”; “Would you like to look under my hood?”; “My motor never breaks down”; “Break out the sauce”; “I don’t like nothin’ soft.” Every line is delivered with smutty gusto by the buxom trio, who b**** and bicker their way to femme fatale abandonment.

Video

    Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! is presented full frame in an aspect ratio of 1.29:1. It is not 16x9 enhanced. The framing here appears to be a little too tight, cutting about 2cm of information from the left and right hand sides of the screen. This is evidenced by the “F” in Faster barely making the frame in the opening titles, while the final italicized exclamation mark is slightly cropped.

    The transfer rendering itself is disappointing. Mild aliasing appears quite frequently, most notably on car grilles, while other detailed images shimmer away inappropriately in the hot sun. Noise reduction is also another film-to-video artefact frequently rearing its ugly head. In many scenes an irritating jitter threatens to turn images into a pixelated mess. Examples include the automobiles moving from side-to-side (6:35, 7:44 and again at 13:00) when they should obviously be static.

    Shadow detail clarity is slightly compromised by the persistent veneer of lo-fi to medium grain. Black levels are reasonably deep, but at times low level noise creeps into the background.

    Cross colouration was also detected on Lori Williams’ polka-dotted top (9:07 and 11:26). Although it should be black and white, a shimmering green and red appears across her chest.

    Film artefacts like white speckling and fine scratches appear intermittently but are not a real concern.

Video Ratings Summary

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Audio

    The English-only Dolby Digital 2.0 mono mix fares much better than the video rendering.

    The frenetically paced jazz soundtrack and score by Paul Sawtell and Bert Shefter sounds a little tinny, but comes through loud and clear without any distortion.

    Dialogue is clear and discernible and there were no lip sync problems.

    Being a mono mix, the surrounds as well as the subwoofer are inactive.

Audio Ratings Summary

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Main Menu Audio

    A static screen with the main theme tune played over the background.

Russ Meyer Commentary

    This commentary is taken from the Image Laserdisc and most of it is an absolute delight to listen to. Meyer speaks with frank and fond affection about the film and ‘his’ girls. He reveals how he made concessions to his ‘no sex’ rule when filming by allowing Tura Satana to satisfy her active sex drive. He talks about his disappointment when the film initially failed at the box office, but is more than happy with the success it has subsequently achieved.

    He also discusses the Jaws of Lorna, which was going to be his next film. Evidently the script has been written by Roger Ebert. Perhaps some enterprising Meyer aficionado will make the film at some stage.

    Considering this commentary’s historical importance (Meyer died on September 18, 2004 from pneumonia complications) it’s a shame there was no moderator to ask him a few poignant questions about the production and the context of Pussycat with his other movies.

Pussycats Commentary – Tura Satana, Haji & Lori Williams

    While much of the same ground is covered in the Russ Meyer commentary and Go Pussycat Go featurette, the three girls give their personal reminiscences about the filming. Satana brings up the ‘no sex’ rule, but explains it was because Russ Meyer thought the girls, like boxers and athletes, would lose their power.

    There was also a great deal of tension between Tura Satana and the mother of Sue Bernard (Linda). Satana recalls the lengths she had to go to get Bernard to act like a frightened child, despite the interfering efforts of the mother. Even Lori Williams admitted to being very intimidated by Satana’s presence and confessed that in one particular scene she felt Satana was really “going to lose it” and hurt Sue Bernard.

Go Pussycat Go (25:26)

    This terrific featurette has recent interviews with Tura Satana, Lori Williams, Haji and Susan Bernard. They each have fond memories about the production and working with Russ Meyer.

    Lori Williams admits that the cat-fight between her and Haji got a little out of control, while Satana and Bernard talk in more detail about their on-set tension.

Original Theatrical Trailer (Full frame) (2:42)

    Wild women and wild wheels! For the first time on the screen a haymaking, belly-busting, karate-chopping, judo-flipping fight to end them all…

Russ Meyer Biography and Filmography

    Printed on the inside slick is a brief, but well-written Russ Meyer biography. There are also three black and white stills from the film plus a comprehensive filmography listing.

    There is a bare-bones Region 1 release that retails for $39.95 USD. According to an amazon.com user, “the sound quality is acceptable given the source, but picture quality is muddy and faded looking, plus a seemingly improper/misaligned aspect ratio to boot.”

    On direct comparison to the Region 2 (United Kingdom) release, incorrect framing, transfer problems and audio quality are identical to our own Region 4. The commentaries plus Go Pussycat Go featurette and the original theatrical trailer are contained on both releases.

    However, the Region 2 (United Kingdom) edition has a fantastic theatrical trailer showcase reel not available on the Region 4. Running for 21:26 it contains trailers for the following nine Russ Meyer films: Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!, Blacksnake!, Mudhoney, Vixen, Wild Gals of the Naked West, Supervixens, Beneath the Valley of the Ultravixens, Cherry, Harry & Raquel, and Common-Law Cabin.

    The addition of the trailer reel on the Region 2 release sways me in favour of it.

    A disaster at the box office when it was first released, Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! has built up a huge cult following over the years. With its exaggerated, unrestrained depiction of feminist angst wrapped tightly around a Double-D cup and skin-tight jeans, the film demonstrated that indeed the sweetest kittens can have the sharpest claws.

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