Somebody somewhere should really write the late Ted Roter's biography someday. I bet it would make one hell of a page turner. Born in Brussels a Jewish child on the cusp of WWII, his mother dying at Auschwitz as he discovered the joys of acting in refugee camp. Character thesp in Hollywood programmers of the '50s, he founded the esteemed Santa Monica Playhouse in 1960, famed for keeping Jewish Heritage alive through regular tributes to the work of Sholom Aleichem and other Yiddish authors. He sold the theater at the dawn of the next decade to make movies of the disreputable kind, appearing on camera as well as off, starting off ginger with 1970's simulated NORMA, soon graduating to full-on hardcore with PRISON BABIES and Hollywood SHE-WOLVES. Man of many lives, who knows what secrets he took to his grave apart from the astonishing twists and turns we know of.
Nowadays rarely seen, A LITTLE MORE THAN LOVE (unfortunately albeit appropriately re-christened A VERY SMALL CASE OF RAPE somewhere down the line) marks something of a rupture with the director's previous endeavors. First off, it's a comedy, at least an intentional one. Until then, Roter preferred to focus on the darker side of sex and its capacity to destroy picture perfect marital union (PAUL, LISA AND CAROLINE) or even the human psyche altogether (THE PSYCHIATRIST a/k/a ALL THE DEVIL'S ANGELS). There's still some of that but treated with gentle subversive humor instead. Secondly, this is the movie where he finally relinquished sexual performance duties to the professionals. His track record had been spotty at best in this respect so his films only stood to gain from this changing of the guard. He did possess a certain charisma and potent screen presence and would continue to act with his clothes on, though not on this occasion.
Filling the void is talented John Hollyfield, part of a thespian troupe of Roter regulars (along with Gena Lee and Monique Fabergé) who never seemed to work for anyone else. As I was only familiar with the larger than life lechers he was to portray on RING OF DESIRE and LITTLE GIRLS LOST, I was pleasantly surprised by his sensitive turn here as nice guy Doug, badgered by wanton wife Renee (Hillary Summers, whose characteristic tendency to overact suits such a sexually frustrated character) to perform his marital duties while he's preoccupied with bringing home the bacon. It's relatively unusual for the men to impress most in adult and Hollyfield's performance is matched by the usually underwhelming R.J. Reynolds (credited as "Steve Event"), generic stud meat on most of his movies, sympathetic as studly next door neighbor David. Just married to Women's Libber Lisa (Julianne Moore lookalike Lee, poised with a pleasingly cultured voice) in a feminist ceremony that has the female Minister pronouncing them "wife and husband", he's not getting his rocks off either as his spouse prefers poetry and conversation in the bedroom and fakes a headache on their wedding night when her husband proves incapable to comply.
Sure, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see where this is heading but getting there provides half the fun. Preparing for an important meeting with her women's group, Lisa's pressured into performing by her hard-up husband. Tearfully recounting what happened to her hard-bitten posse, she's urged by the rabid Dworkin types to press charges for marital rape. The situation's mirrored by Doug suing Renee when she threatens to cut off his manhood if he doesn't step up his efforts to fulfill her needs ! Both disgruntled duos are about to discover that the grass really is greener at the other side of their white picket fence, ending in orgy bliss (watch out for Jennifer West and Tawny Pearl supplying sexual scenery) as Lisa contentedly sighs she "never thought an extended family could be such fun !" The story's cute and fast-paced, along with sex scenes too brief to wear out their welcome, revealing the director's desire to produce a proper picture that was erotically explicit rather than just plain porn, emphasized by the absence of cum shots. All four leads deliver stellar turns, with frumpy Fabergé (a/k/a "Margaret Monroe") along for the ride as David's devoted secretary offering office relief and typically into it, a claim often insensitively made of the "attractively challenged" by delusional Don Juans. Film's appealingly shot by Christopher Nils, who was to collaborate with fence-straddling fornication filmmaker Sal Grasso a/k/a "Steve Scott" on his gay GREENHORN and straight TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE, the pleasingly punched up color scheme translating well to Essex's long out of print VHS. Only downside's the schizo editing, unfortunately still something of a Roter trademark at this early "experimental" stage, which renders a straightforward narrative unnecessarily confusing, even unintelligible, entire chunks of plot exposition seemingly missing.
Nowadays rarely seen, A LITTLE MORE THAN LOVE (unfortunately albeit appropriately re-christened A VERY SMALL CASE OF RAPE somewhere down the line) marks something of a rupture with the director's previous endeavors. First off, it's a comedy, at least an intentional one. Until then, Roter preferred to focus on the darker side of sex and its capacity to destroy picture perfect marital union (PAUL, LISA AND CAROLINE) or even the human psyche altogether (THE PSYCHIATRIST a/k/a ALL THE DEVIL'S ANGELS). There's still some of that but treated with gentle subversive humor instead. Secondly, this is the movie where he finally relinquished sexual performance duties to the professionals. His track record had been spotty at best in this respect so his films only stood to gain from this changing of the guard. He did possess a certain charisma and potent screen presence and would continue to act with his clothes on, though not on this occasion.
Filling the void is talented John Hollyfield, part of a thespian troupe of Roter regulars (along with Gena Lee and Monique Fabergé) who never seemed to work for anyone else. As I was only familiar with the larger than life lechers he was to portray on RING OF DESIRE and LITTLE GIRLS LOST, I was pleasantly surprised by his sensitive turn here as nice guy Doug, badgered by wanton wife Renee (Hillary Summers, whose characteristic tendency to overact suits such a sexually frustrated character) to perform his marital duties while he's preoccupied with bringing home the bacon. It's relatively unusual for the men to impress most in adult and Hollyfield's performance is matched by the usually underwhelming R.J. Reynolds (credited as "Steve Event"), generic stud meat on most of his movies, sympathetic as studly next door neighbor David. Just married to Women's Libber Lisa (Julianne Moore lookalike Lee, poised with a pleasingly cultured voice) in a feminist ceremony that has the female Minister pronouncing them "wife and husband", he's not getting his rocks off either as his spouse prefers poetry and conversation in the bedroom and fakes a headache on their wedding night when her husband proves incapable to comply.
Sure, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see where this is heading but getting there provides half the fun. Preparing for an important meeting with her women's group, Lisa's pressured into performing by her hard-up husband. Tearfully recounting what happened to her hard-bitten posse, she's urged by the rabid Dworkin types to press charges for marital rape. The situation's mirrored by Doug suing Renee when she threatens to cut off his manhood if he doesn't step up his efforts to fulfill her needs ! Both disgruntled duos are about to discover that the grass really is greener at the other side of their white picket fence, ending in orgy bliss (watch out for Jennifer West and Tawny Pearl supplying sexual scenery) as Lisa contentedly sighs she "never thought an extended family could be such fun !" The story's cute and fast-paced, along with sex scenes too brief to wear out their welcome, revealing the director's desire to produce a proper picture that was erotically explicit rather than just plain porn, emphasized by the absence of cum shots. All four leads deliver stellar turns, with frumpy Fabergé (a/k/a "Margaret Monroe") along for the ride as David's devoted secretary offering office relief and typically into it, a claim often insensitively made of the "attractively challenged" by delusional Don Juans. Film's appealingly shot by Christopher Nils, who was to collaborate with fence-straddling fornication filmmaker Sal Grasso a/k/a "Steve Scott" on his gay GREENHORN and straight TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE, the pleasingly punched up color scheme translating well to Essex's long out of print VHS. Only downside's the schizo editing, unfortunately still something of a Roter trademark at this early "experimental" stage, which renders a straightforward narrative unnecessarily confusing, even unintelligible, entire chunks of plot exposition seemingly missing.