| Sex & youth. |
Eden no Sono AKA The Garden of EdenYasuzo Masumura. The film is very similar to the world famous The Blue Lagoon, a teenage sexploitation film released the same year and starred by the then nude and under aged Brooke Shields. Another similar film is Il Sole Nella Pelle, the Italian sexploitation filmed starred by Ornella Muti circa 1975-1977 (IMDB's date is wrong, it wasn't made in 1972 and you can read all about in our review of it clicking on the blue link) So, whether today's film in review is a rip off of the rip off, I guess we'll never know. However, what we do know is that this film is the last film in which Leonora Fani had a starring role. From Eden no Sono on, her career was reduced to mere cameos in softcore & hardcore films, thus misleading viewers into thinking she actually did porn, which she actually didn't.
Anyways, The Garden of Eden is the story of two opposites who are inevitably attracted, thus breaking the barrier of social class. Alessandra (Fani) is an art student, the daughter of a very wealthy family, while Michele (Ronni Valente) comes from a poor family with a tradition for pick pocketing and stealing. Michele doesn't go to school, nor he has any job, so he spends his days visiting highly populated areas in Rome in order to pick pocket something of value to bring home to her vicious mother & brothers. One day, he goes to the art school where Alessandra is in and voila! steals her purse in the blink of an eye. She goes home totally unaware of the act. Once Michele goes home, he's given a hard time by his uncomprehending mother who tells him, he's not worth of food since he never brings anything of real value. This, pisses him off in the most adolescent way, thus promising his twisted family he will make it big sooner than later. In addition, there's a nonsensical background story about his father being a fisherman who "stole from the sea", thus making his surviving family fishermen who steal in a "sea of people".
| Meet Alessandra, the art student. |
| Meet Michele, the pick pocket. |
While the first hour of the film can be easily described as predictable, derivative and plain boring, let me tell you, the second half of the film makes this teenage romance sexploitation flick easily outdo other similar films. While Michele, offers Alessandra to find a mysterious Greek vase a friend of his has found nearby, he soon realizes he can leave his stealing past behind and live a new life next to his beloved Alessandra, if she agrees to follow of course.
All the cliched teenage love discovery items are on the film, yet we don't really get to see Leonora Fani in many nude scenes. Also the sex scenes are very brief and there really isn't much going on visually, at least. Fani fans know she's spent way more nude time in all of her previous films, but here on The Garden of Eden, she's given the opportunity of spending more time acting, thus diminishing her nude scenes up to a few shots, necessary for her character development.
| So, who's this boy you've been seeing lately. |
| Fuck the rich girl as much as you want but, do get us some money next time. |
Although The Garden of Eden can be certainly described as a sexploitation film, it's real value lies in the plot & character development. Once, Michele & Alessandra are living together on the beach, there's a very interesting plot twist happening. You see, Michele's family think he's actually kidnapped the rich girl, in order to ask a lot of money for her ransom, but since they haven't heard from him lately, his older brother decides to find him and pay him a little visit. Once this happens, Michele tells his brother he doesn't give a fuck about what they think, and that his days of crime are long over because he's found true love. Unfortunately, his elder brother and family are smarter than he thinks, so they sort of, get in the way in order to cash in and pretend they're the actual kidnappers of the poor rich girl.
Unaware of this, Alessandra spends her days fucking Michele dry, while swimming in the nude, to fuck some more on the beach. In addition, she teaches him, in the nude, all she knows about painting, while they fuck some more. A pity, the film maker didn't add more sex scenes to the film, since Fani is not a stranger to sexploitation. Anyways, they seem to live a pretty happy life: They have peace, they live in a magnificent secluded beach, they spend 24/7 naked and what's more important, they feed off of each others' sex.
| Runaway or kidnapping? |
| Not really, she's actually fucking all the time! |
Alessandra's parents, utterly worried about her, spend some money on newspaper prints with the description of the kidnapper and info on how and when she disappeared. On the other hand, Michele's family is already blackmailing the poor wealthy family asking for a lot money in case they want to see their daughter alive once more.
The Garden of Eden, like most of Leonora Fani's films is currently out of print and there aren't any plans on future releases on, so the only way to watch it is by either streaming services or bootleggers. Either way, the best available version of the film is the English dubbed edition with hard-coded Greek subtitles. While, I'm always supportive of the idea of watching films in their original language, dubbed versions are usually found easier. The version I watched was terribly dubbed in English but you know what? almost every dub movie I've seen suffers the same unfaithful faith. The problem is, dialog is way more cheesier than originally intended, and some of the idioms, figurative speech & slang sound weird or unnatural, thus giving you the impression the acting quality on this movie couldn't get any worse.
| I'm hungry, I need some of your cum. |
| And maybe you can have some of my pussy juices. |
If dialog is cheesy, wait until you pay attention to the background music composed by Stelvio Cipriani (known for his work on a Bay of Blood, Death Proof and more recently The Man from U.N.C.L.E. remake), a man who surely knows what he's doing because he delivers a soundtrack that perfectly accompanies the teenage couple throughout the film on their coming of age adventure while the unexpected grand finale is around the bend.
Once Michele's family gets the money they want, his older brother (strangely enough, the only characters with an actual name on the film are those of Alessandra and Michele only) returns to the beach to give his brother some money for having casually given them the idea for the job of their lives. Of course, this leads to a violent confrontation between brothers all the while, Alessandra is scared as fuck because she knows Michele's brother wants a piece of her ass. Fortunately, the cops followed Michele's brother and in a very confusing action sequence Alessandra is rescued while Michele & his family are arrested and sent to jail for plotting the kidnap.
| Why don't you paint me with your cum Michele? |
| This whole art is getting me really horny Alessandra. |
By the 1980's the teenage sexploitation genre had grown tired of itself, and movie producers efforts didn't truly help in the making of new master pieces of the genre. Had The Garden of Eden being released in the early 70's, it may have ended up being a cult film but, since that wasn't the case, the film tries too hard and delivers very little in the end. The concept of living a hippie life out of love and mother nature was already a worn out story by the late 70's. In addition, the coming of age concept was also entirely over used, and only the porn industry would keep on using it to sell their "virgin gone wild" stories starred by actresses that clearly looked nothing like a teenage girl. Still, being the final film in which Leonora Fani worked, it may be a good farewell movie in which she was allowed to spend more time dressed up than she used to in all of her previous films. Unfortunately, the way her character is written, doesn't really up her game as a skilled actress.
Overall, The Garden of Eden, doesn't offer much on original story telling as well as sex and nudity, so if you're looking for one or the other (or both) you may want to look for another movie instead. For Leonora Fani fans, this film is clearly a must watch, since it's her last movie. For casual movie enthusiasts I think you should watch Ornella Muti's Il Sole Nella Pelle instead (better story & better acting) For sexploitation fans, well this movie is mildly a sexploitation film so, nope, keep looking.
| After all the semen I've swallowed it was about time you gave me a ring! |
| a behind the scenes photo from the film. |
Will this film ever see the light of an official release? I doubt it, since her most popular films are either out of print or not officially released as of yet. However, we still have plenty of Leonora Fani movies left for reviewing. The next entries will cover her debut film, 1974's La Svergognata (The Shameless Woman), 1975's Bestialitá (Bestiality, maybe her most shocking film ever), 1975's Lezione Private (Private Lessons) & 1975's porno film Calde Labbra (Burning Lips) So, stay tuned as our blog is the only blog (and website for that matter) in the whole world covering her career with very detailed information, so yeah, we want to be the official unofficial guide to all things Leonora Fani.
No movie trailer this time, better luck next time I guess.
Eat your vegetables!
