The Movie:

William Lustig (director of Maniac and Vigilante and currently the head honcho over at Blue Underground) directed this loose 1977 XXX remake of Luis Bunuel's Belle De Jour starring a fantastic cast of seventies smut film superstars under the pseudonym of Billy Bagg.

Made back when adult films needed a plot and semi-competent cinematography and acting, The Violation Of Claudia tells the story of the lonely titular housewife (Sharon Mitchell) who is stuck in a relationship with a husband, Jason (Don Peterson), who just can't seem to find the time to take care of her womanly needs. Rather than go without and become miserable, she instead decides to seduce Kip (Jamie Gillis), her tennis instructor. Kip decides he can make something of her and so he starts setting her up as a woman of the evening, arranging 'dates' for her. The rest of the film follows her sexual reawakening through the various randy adventures and conquests that she has over the next little while. When she arrives home after taking care of business, she finds that Kip has been in on this all along and that Jason had more to do with things that Claudia first realized.

Scene One – Sharon Mitchell, Long Jeanne Silver, Justine Fletcher and an unrecognizable girl: Starting a whole thirty four seconds into the film, this lesbian orgy kicks the movie off nicely. Sharon Mitchell lays naked on the couch while the other three ladies ravish her orally and with their fingers. The acid trip music swells up in the background as she comes closer to a climax, her yelps getting louder as the music becomes more absurd. At under five minutes it's a little short, but the film wastes no time heading on into scene number two…

Scene Two – Sharon Mitchell: After awakening from her erotic dream only to be dismissed by her husband, Sharon lets her fingers do the walking in this lovely solo scene. She starts with her nipples and after massaging them for a bit heads down south where she finishes and the scene ends (again, it's short scene).

Scene Three – Sharon Mitchell and Jamie Gillis: After a spell on the tennis court, Sharon heads on inside for a massage. The masseuse, Gillis, starts to knead her ass like bread dough and much to her initial protest, fingers her fun box. Soon enough though, Gillis has convinced her to get it on and, as a man watches through the window, unbuttons his tennis shorts for a little fun. He gets her on her stomach and does her doggy style for a little while, then pulls out to spunk all over the small of her back When he's done he has the good sense to write his phone number on the bottom of her shoe.

Scene Four – Sharon Mitchell and Victor Hines After a relaxing dinner with her husband, Sharon moves on over to Victor's place for a little after dinner dirty fun. She gives him a blowjob and then mounts him for a little cowgirl action. He plays with her perky little tits while she rides him, getting sweatier and sweatier, then he rolls her over for some missionary sex. As they fuck each other in front of the fireplace, he has all he can take and pulls out to shoot on her pelvis.

Scene Five – Sharon Mitchell, Jamie Gillis/Roger Caine, Crystal Synch: Sharon cruises on over to Jamie's pad where they watch Roger and Crystal fuck each other on the bed. As they watch, Gillis fondles Sharon's pussy until she comes. Meanwhile, on the bed, Crystal has finished sucking Roger's dick and has mounted him cowgirl style. She rides him until they're both good and done, so he pulls out and shoots on her.

Scene Six – Sharon Mitchell and a cute blonde: Sharon heads over to her meet with one of her dates who happens to be a nice looking blonde with a taste for expensive champagne. They drink on the couch of her NYC apartment and then start kissing. The blonde goes down on Sharon for a good few minutes, the camera capturing all the fun from a few unorthodox though very welcome angles. Sharon then returns the favor to the blonde, who finishes the scene off by getting Sharon done on all fours for a serious tongue-lashing. This is the longest and hottest scene in the film as the two girls do seem really into each other here and also treat each other with that kind of tender kindness missing in a lot of pornography. As sappy as it sounds, it's nice to see them having fun and enjoying each other without the need to race to a climax or fake an orgasm for the camera.

Scene Seven – Sharon Mitchell and Waldo Short: Waldo is a short, fat, bald man who has Sharon over to help him work out his kink. He has her lay on her back atop his dining room table, naked, so that he can cover her tits and pussy with whipped crème. Once he's done this, he eats her out quite voraciously as she giggles like a schoolgirl. Then he puts hot fudge all over his dick using a paintbrush and has her suck it off of him, still lying on her back. Once she's got him going he jerks off all over her neck, whipped crème and chocolate still all over her.

MILD SPOILERS:

Scene Eight – Claudia head on home after a failed rendezvous with a 'fairy' man in drag only to find her husband and her tennis instructor in bed together. Surprise! Only in the seventies….

END SPOILERS:

This film moves along at a nice pace, almost an ideal pace for an adult film. The sex is plentiful and pretty hot though it's shot with a slightly more careful eye than your average dirty movie. The performances are about as good as they get in this type of movie, with Mitchell and Gillis leading the pack and delivering some stand out work. Through 'Long' Jeanne Silver into the mix and a few other notables from the era and you've got yourself a winner.

The DVD

Video:

Now for the bad news - The Violation Of Claudia is presented in a fullframe transfer sourced from a VHS tape. While the tape was at least in decent shape and the movie is watchable, the image is pretty flat and the colors are faded. There's not a lot of print damage and thankfully there are only a couple of tape rolls here and there, but those expecting the clarity of a film sourced transfer aren't going to be too stoked about the film's appearance on the DVD as the picture is quite fuzzy at times. If you're familiar with some of the more obscure adult film releases that have come out from Something Weird Video or Alpha Blue Archives, then you'll likely be okay with how the movie looks here. The unfortunate decision to add a 'Video X Pix' bug in the bottom right hand corner of the image during a few key scenes is also a strike against the disc. While the transfer is watchable and it could have been worse, it would have been nice to see this one get a proper release – however, I honestly have no idea if proper elements are even still available as a lot of the negatives and prints for this type of material for some reason seems to just disappear. If you grade this one on a curve and stack it against other, harder to find adult features of the same era, it's about on par with that level of quality.

Sound:

The Dolby Digital Mono soundtrack is a little muffled and not of the best quality, but again, it's taken from a tape source so the limitations of the older technology are going to be there when that's the case. Dialogue is pretty easy to understand, however, and the background music comes through reasonably clear. There aren't a lot of sound effects used in the film, mostly just some random moaning and groaning during the action scenes and these are handled just fine, as are the talkier bits of the movie.

Extras:

The disc doesn't come with a whole lot in the way of extra features but there are two trailers tucked away neatly underneath the menu screens. First up is a trailer for Blue Jeans starring Ron Jeremy, which is followed by a trailer for Female Athletes starring John Holmes and his squishy monster-dong. The second trailer is in pretty rough shape and there's a horrid green tint across the entire image, but it's a pretty keen promo spot. Aside from that, there's a scene selection option that warns you before you get access to it that this movie was meant to be watched as a feature film, not just as a compilation of scenes (good advice).

Final Thoughts:

The Violation Of Claudia is an interesting film. The compositions and camera work is much more careful than your average low budget smut film of the era and the cast of classic performers in this one is pretty tough to beat. Video X Pix's DVD doesn't look so hot but it's passable if you keep in mind how obscure some of this older dirty material really is, and despite the lack of any substantial extra features it still comes recommended on the strength of the movie alone.