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Released by: Impulse Pictures
Released on: November 10th, 2015.
Director: Zebedy Colt
Cast: Spalding Gray, Gayle Leonard, Susan McBain, Nancy Dare, Jon Black
Year: 1973
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The Movie:
The earliest of Zebedy Colt's directorial efforts (credited as his first feature... whether or not this is true is debatable) stars a few notable performers of the time. In addition to showing up in front of the camera himself, Colt cast Gloria Leonard (credited as Gayle Leonard), Marlene Willoughby, Nancy Dare, Spaulding Gray and Susan McBain in this grizzly pornographic take on the home invasion/Last House On The Left style of horror film.
Clocking in at a lean, mean hour in length, the film tells the story of group of escaped thugs, led by Gray, that terrorizes a farmer and his hot daughters (played by Willoughby, Dare and McBain) and forces them to do despicable things at gun point. There's rape, incest, brutality and perversions galore and the film has a rough, primal and at times almost amateurish feel to it that makes for quite uncomfortable viewing. The thugs, brandishing rifles, force the mother (Gloria Leonard) to have sex with her three daughters and at one point the father (Colt himself) finds himself on the receiving end of some oral gratification thanks to his youngest girl. Twisted stuff. And did I mention the rape? Cause there's lots of rape in here, most of it at gun point and done with a whole lot of verbal and physical abuse.
While I suppose you could make the argument that maybe the film is supposed to be a parody of some of the rough horror movies that were popular at drive-in theaters and grindhouses around the country at the time, this one is played pretty much completely straight. As such, it is devoid of any humor or really any socially redeeming content whatsoever. However, if sleaze is what you're after, this one definitely delivers the goods.
Shot at some remote farm location presumably somewhere outside of New York City, which usually served as Colt's base of operations, this one ranks up there with some of the nastier films in Colt's regimen. Considering that this is the man who made Sex Wish (where he plays a psychopathic rapist) and Unwilling Lovers (in which Colt plays a retarded man who enjoys raping corpses), that statement does count for something. Despite all the wanton and completely gratuitous sleaze in the film, it is well made when you consider its target audience. It delivers on all counts everything that Colt likely wanted it to - he set out to make a rough and nasty fuck film and that's exactly what Farmer's Daughter is.
Interestingly enough, while he doesn't come out and justify what happens to the girls at the hands of the ex-convicts, in an opening scene we do see them completely humiliating the ranch hand. So in that regard he does set them up as bitchy little things that are hardly as pure as they'd like to think they are. This gives the movie a slightly different twist in that instead of being completely innocent, they're almost as bad as the rapists themselves (they do force themselves on this guy, piss all over him and threaten to bite his cock off after having their way with him and verbally abusing him the entire time).
Video/Audio/Extras:
The Farmer's Daughters arrives on DVD from Impulse Pictures in its proper 1.33.1 fullframe aspect ratio transferred from a print that was in reasonably good shape. There's print damage to be sure - nicks and scratches and what not - but the colors look pretty solid and this is definitely a step up from the tape sourced DVD that Alpha Blue Archives put out years back. Compression artifacts are never a problem and there's no evidence of digital trickery like noise reduction or edge enhancement. Skin tones look good, black levels are decent.
The English language Dolby Digital Mono track is also fine, despite some minor hiss here and there. The dialogue is easy enough to understand, the score also sounds fine. No alternate language options or subtitles are provided.
There are no extras relating to the feature itself included here but you do get a preview of the 42nd Street Forever Peepshow line that Impulse has been releasing recently by way of three 8mm silent hardcore loops.
The Final Word:
The Farmer's Daughters is a nasty, sleazy XXX roughie that pull no punches and offers up one taboo set piece after another until it reaches its conclusion. It's not a fancy film, but it's definitely effective and it makes pretty decent use of its solid cast. This DVD release from Impulse comes up short in the extra features department and while it won't blow you away with its transfer, it does offer up the film in considerably better shape than we've seen it before (and completely uncut).
