THE GIRL FROM RIO

(A.k.a. RIO ’70; DIE SIEBEN MANNER DER SUMURU)

Jeff (Richard Wyler) is a private detective who arrives in Rio with a suitcase. Its contents are said to be 10 million dollars. He’s watched getting off his aeroplane by shady Carl (Herbert Fleischmann), who follows Jeff to a plush hotel and then reports back to his boss, crime baron Sir Masius (George Sanders).

It seems they have a plan to relieve Jeff of his booty. Meanwhile, he’s busy establishing himself as the prototype Austin Powers by trying to get it on with every female he speaks to.

Not so far away, tucked behind the mountains, a large dome building acts as the hideout for an army of scantily clad women led by their man-hating dictator Sumuru (Shirley Eaton). Their agenda, as she reminds them over a megaphone, is to take over the world in the name of feminism.

After allowing Jeff the opportunity to service a couple of comely local lasses overnight, Carl accosts our hero the following morning outside his hotel. His intention is to take him to Masius, who wants Jeff’s stash to help him rid Rio of the pesky Sumuru.

But Jeff has other ideas. He is, indeed, headed in Sumuru’s direction with the money – on a rescue mission, of sorts. But will the subject of his plight actually want rescuing from Sumuru’s pro-female regime?

Eaton had already portrayed Sumuru two years prior, alongside Frankie Avalon and Klaus Kinski, in Sax Rohmer’s THE MILLION EYES OF SUMURU. That film is rarely seen these days and is, by almost all accounts, an absolute stinker.

Two years on, in 1969, the Middlesex girl who became a hit in Hollywood when she played ‘that’ girl encased in bullion in GOLDFINGER, returned to the role for THE GIRL FROM RIO (its opening titles even include the credit ‘based on characters created by Sax Rohmer’). Prolific Euroschlock director Jesus Franco took the helm.

The film starts off nicely enough, with an attractive brunette writhing around on the smoky floor, naked but for a fishnet catsuit. She and a similarly clad friend set their sights on a semi-nude man, seducing him then scratching him to pieces. Then a cooing lounge title tune kicks in, its female vocalist purring "she played with men just like a cat plays with mice".

Unfortunately, aside from some colourful pop-art set design and alluring Spanish locations, the film is pretty much downhill from there. Franco doesn’t pace it well, often allowing the action to flag and the running time to consequently sag.

Worse still, Allan Morrison’s editing is mostly incompetent. This makes the screenplay – co-written by producer Harry Alan Towers with Bruno Leder and Franz Eichhorn – nigh-on incomprehensible. The first fifteen minutes are relatively cohesive, but then it all goes barmy. Really, scenes are loosely thrown together with little regard for logic or continuity. The result is a film which is a disjointed mess.

Manuel Merino’s cinematography is at times controlled and pleasing to the eye. At other times, it zooms and wavers like you expect it to in a Franco film. It’s frustrating, as between this haphazard style and the inconsistent script which threatens the occasional good idea when the clumsy editing allows, you can see a half-decent film striving to come through. Sanders, for example, is excellent.

But instead, things remain sloppy and unsatisfying. The film’s a heavy-going affair, with viewers being rewarded for their patience sporadically with camp villainy, minor female nudity and costume aesthetics that have clearly been influenced by Mario Bava’s infinitely superior DANGER: DIABOLIK.

A lot tamer in terms of sleaze than your usual Franco proposition, RIO instead trades on a fairly identifiable cast and gently wacky humour. It has its moments, but overall it’s not enough to stop this from not being half as much fun as you know it could’ve been in someone else’s hands.

Medium Rare Entertainment present THE GIRL FROM RIO on UK DVD in its original 1.66:1 aspect ratio. The transfer is 16x9 enhanced, and is taken from a largely clean print. Colours and flesh-tones seem natural, while blacks are strong. There is minor grain and a softness to some scenes, but all in all I thought this was a more-than acceptable presentation. It may well be that this disc utilises the same transfer as the previous US DVD release from Blue Underground, but I haven’t seen that to compare.

Audio comes in English mono and is sufficiently clean throughout.

The disc opens to a static main menu page. This contains access to a similarly static scene-selection menu which proffers 9 chapters.

Extras begin with "Rolling in Rio", a 14–minute featurette containing interviews with Franco, Eaton and producer Towers. This aged trio speak individually about how the project came about, shooting on location and their memories of one another. Eaton, bizarrely, reflects on the film now as being "almost porn". Franco speaks in Spanish with the benefit of nice yellow English subtitles; Eaton and Towers both regale us in well-spoken English.

We’re also treated to a slideshow which plays out to snippets of the film’s score over the course of 76 seconds.

THE GIRL FROM RIO is a mildly diverting slice of retro daftness, one which has a different look and feel to the vast majority of Jesus Franco’s output. It’s not great by any stretch of the imagination but, as a curiosity piece, it’s worth a look.

It’s been given a solid DVD release here.

Review by Stuart Willis