Tweet
Released by: Vinegar Syndrome
Released on: January 31st, 2017.
Director: Kirdy Stevens
Cast: Ginger Lynn, Karen Summer, Jamie Gillis, John Leslie, Joey Silvera, Honey Wilder, Cindee Summers
Year: 1980
Purchase From Amazon
The Movie:
In this fourth film in the insanely long running series started by director Kirdy Stevens and writer/producer Helene Terrie way back in 1980 (a full five years before this puppy was shot) Kay Parker is for the first time pushed aside in favor of new blood. Rather than focus on the exploits of Barbara Scott and her incestuous longings for her sons as portrayed in Taboo, Taboo II and Taboo III, this time around the story zooms in on Dr. Jeremy Lodge (Jamie Gillis - yeah!). As it happens, Lodge is a psychiatrist who specializes in treating those affected by incest.
When the movie begins, Lodge's two lovely young daughters, Robin (Ginger Lynn) and Naomi (Karen Summer), are off at college where they share a room and occasionally a man. As they do their thing, Lodge holds group therapy sessions with a few people including Joyce McBride (Honey Wilder reprising her role from the earlier films in the series) who has shown up to talk about her incestuous relationship with her son, Junior (Kevin James). While he's taking care of his therapy sessions, Robin and Naomi come home for a visit only to find out that mom and dad are having problems - it seems that the good doctor busted the missus (Cyndee Summers) fucking his brother, Billy (John Leslie)!
So with that said, Dr. Lodge decides to call it quits. He takes custody of lovely Robin while Naomi goes off to live with Billy and her mom. What Dr. Lodge doesn't know is that Naomi has always had a crush on her uncle and as she becomes increasingly aware of what Billy and her mother do in the bedroom her desires begin to burn more intensely. If that weren't enough, Robin is starting to show an interest in her father's studies and in fact she's intent on convincing Junior McBride to fuck his mother one last time so that she can watch and observe. He obliges, and soon Robin has discovered feelings for a family member of her own and turns her sights on dear old dad...
Ginger Lynn is top billed in this film, and rightly so as despite her goofy poodle-perm hairdo she looks very, very good in this picture. Karen Summer shares the spotlight and gets pretty much just as much screen time. Technically Kay Parker does show up in this one in a scene with Mike Ranger but it's in flashback form, it's not new material. Kays absence ensures that Ginger very much owns the film. Honey Wilder is great in her fourth stab at the series but really, stack her against a young Ginger Lynn and there is simply no competition. The male performers hold their own this time around with both John Leslie and Jamie Goddamn Gillis delivering some really solid acting both in and out of the bedroom. Joey Silvera lives in their shadow a bit here, he's got a supporting role as the girls' drama teacher, but that doesn't mean he does a bad job, simply that he can't compete with two legends of seventies smutmanship.
As Stevens proved with the first three entries in the series, the guy knows how to pace and shoot a good adult film. The sex is graphic enough to be hot but not super nasty in terms of what it shows despite its taboo (pun intended) subject matter. There's a bit of class happening behind the camera and it shows not only in the cinematography but also in the score and the overall production values on display throughout the movie. Couple this with the really solid cast and a genuinely involving melodramatic storyline and Taboo IV is definitely worth checking out.
Video/Audio/Extras:
Taboo IV debuts on Blu-ray in an AVC encoded 1080p high definition transfer taken from a 2k scan of the original 35mm negative and it looks excellent. There's some very mild print damage here and there - mostly just a few small white specks - but nothing more than that. Colors are really nicely reproduced, never too hot or oversaturated, while skin tones look lifelike and natural. Detail is quite nice and texture as well. There are no problems with any compression artifacts and the transfer is free of any obvious noise reduction or edge enhancement. All in all, the picture quality on this disc is great.
The only audio option provided for the feature is an English DTS-HD Mono track, there are no alternate language options or subtitles provided. The audio is fine, there's decent depth here and good clarity. The score sounds nice, it's well balanced like the rest of the track, and there are no problems with any hiss or distortion. The music during the opening scene has some nice bounce to it, the bass is pretty strong here and for an older single channel mix, things shape up quite nicely actually.
The two main supplements on this disc are the two commentary tracks carried over from the old DVD release. The first commentary features director Kirdy Stevens and writer Helene Terrie. This track is far less observational than Lynn's and it is a lot more informative as well. They talk about everything from the blinds that were used on the set to block the light and shooting locations to various cast members and the score. Terrie dominates the track far more than Kirdy does, and she talks about Gillis' role a fair bit and discusses working with him and a few of the other performers. Stevens literally just spends most of his time sitting there and agreeing with Terrie but he does chime in when they discuss dubbing certain scenes and why they had to not record live sound for a specific moment. Stevens backs that up by saying he's quite because he hasn't seen it in years and he's just enjoying seeing the movie for the first time in years.
The second track features Ms. Lynn going at it solo. Ginger sounds a little spaced out at first but soon enough she starts to get into things a little bit. She spends a lot of time just talking about what happens on screen and giggling at the movie. The unnamed male moderator keeps her moving along at a decent pace. That said, if Ginger doesn't have the best memory or very many stories to tell, at least she has enthusiasm and a sense of humor. She does have a few recollections, such as 'letting her sister lick her coochie' and the effect of red fingernails. She does make some interesting points about the score and her reasons for staying away from Jamie Gills are rather amusing.
New to this release are two interviews, the first of which is a twenty-seven minute on camera talk with Ginger Lynn who talks about being under contract to Vivid at the time but being able to do this movie because it was shot on video, not film. She also talks about her thoughts on the script and the storyline, working with Karen Summer who she got along with very well and sharing a bed with Jamie Gillis in the film's big finish. Ginger's interview is a lot of fun, she looks back on all of this with a smile on her face and a gleam in her eye. She clearly had a good time on the picture and she tells some fun stories here. The second interview gets Karen Summer in front of the camera for seventeen minutes. She chats about growing up in 'the Valley' in Los Angeles, how her family worked in film and how she worked on Dukes Of Hazzard before getting into the adult film industry. She then talks about how she got into doing porn, her experiences doing 'nude modelling' before going onto film work, her experiences with Jim South and then going on to work on this film. She talks about working with Kirdy Stevens and Helene Terrie, what they were like to deal with, getting along with Ginger, her thoughts on the Taboo movies and what made them so successful, working with the 'absolutely brilliant' John Leslie, Joey Silvera and more. Summers is a character and plenty fun to listen to here as she's very animated and obviously having a great time reminiscing about this film and her career.
Rounding out the extras on the disc is a still gallery made up of script pages, animated menus and chapter selection. As this is a combo pack release a DVD version of the movie is also included containing a standard definition version of the restored transfer and supplements identical to those found on the Blu-ray disc.
The Final Word:
With a great cast of late seventies and early eighties adult film superstars and a surprisingly decent plot, Taboo IV: The Younger Generation may have its feet firmly cemented in the early eighties but never the less proves to be a reasonably intelligent and fairly erotic film. Vinegar Syndrome's Blu-ray looks and sounds great and contains not only the decent commentary tracks from the old DVD but two interesting new interviews with the film's leading ladies as well.
Click on the images below for full sized Blu-ray screen caps!
