DORIS DECEMBER: DIARY OF A NUDIST (1961) **

(Originally posted July 17th, 2007)

A newspaper editor is out hunting one day when he stumbles upon a nudist colony.  Outraged, he sends his cutest reporter to infiltrate the colony to do a smear campaign against them.  When the reporter ends up enjoying being a nudist, he fires her.  Then, he joins the colony himself and falls in love with her (and nudism).  Director Doris Wishman filmed parts of this movie in the same nudist colony she filmed Blaze Starr Goes Nudist.  She crams the screen with buns and boobs and badly dubbed dialogue.  It’s pretty harmless stuff, but endless scenes of naked shuffleboard, volleyball and swimming gets repetitive after a while.  

DIARY OF A NUDIST  (1961)  **

(New review)

If the above review looks really short, it’s because it was originally written for my Video Vacuum fanzine (remember those?) before I ported it over to the old LiveJournal website.  That capsule review gets the job done, but now that I am knee-deep in Doris Wishman movies, I decided to write a new review for Diary of a Nudist instead of just a series of quick bullet points.  If anything, it will help contextualize the picture within her filmography.

The first thing we notice about Diary of a Nudist is that it gets right to the nudism, making it vastly different than the other Doris films so far.  The head of a nudist camp gathers members around and reads “The Nudist Creed”.  Then, the opening titles kick in, accompanied by a song called “Sun Lovers’ Blues”, and like the other title songs in the Doris Wishman repertoire, it is a banger.  Seriously, after the absence of a title song in Gentlemen Prefer Nature Girls, I was a little worried, but this catchy ditty lifted my spirits immensely.  When you have mainlined five Doris Wishman movies back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back in an eight-hour span, you look for any beacon of hope.  

Like Gentlemen Prefer Nature Girls, Diary of a Nudist is pro-nudism propaganda.  (If that opening scene with “The Nudist Creed” wasn’t an obvious tip-off.)  The film hinges on our heroine, a reporter named Stacy (Davee Decker) trying to convince her editor (Norman Casserly) that nudism makes for a healthy and happy lifestyle.  The nudism scenes aren’t bad either.  We get nude flower basket making, nude suntan lotion application, nude swimming, nude sunbathing, nude coffee table discussions, nude shuffleboard, nude volleyball, and nude spraying each other with a garden hose. 

While Wishman stages the set-up in expedient fashion, things quickly get bogged down once Decker arrives at the camp.  The scenes of guests pulling up to the entrance of the camp, getting out of their cars, and futzing with the lock on the gate go on seemingly forever.  The worst form of padding comes late in the game when Casserly sits at his typewriter and writes his big story while wearing tiny shorts.  At seventy-one minutes, the movie is already overlong to begin with.  Had Wishman cut all the needless padding and brought the film to a lean hour running time, it might’ve skated by with ** ½.

Although there are some surprisingly long dialogue scenes (where the dubbing is only slightly off), there are still scenes where we hear people’s thoughts/narration on the soundtrack and telephone conversations where the user strategically places the receiver over their mouth so dialogue can be dubbed in later.  Then again, if we didn’t have these scenes, it wouldn’t be a Doris Wishman movie.  Overall, Diary of a Nudist isn’t Wishman’s best film, but it might be her most competent.  

AKA:  Diary of a Naturist.  AKA:  Diary of a Girl Reporter.  AKA:  Girl Reporter Diary.  AKA:  Nature Camp Confidential.  AKA:  Nature Camp Diary.  

DORIS DECEMBER: GENTLEMEN PREFER NATURE GIRLS (1963) **

OK, this is the first movie in the Doris Wishman boxset I haven’t seen yet, so now I actually have to sit down and craft an actual review instead of half-assing a bunch of notes and tacking them to the bottom of an older review.

Thomas (Lou Alexion) works at a real estate office for his hard-ass boss Bennett (William Mayer, also in Wishman’s Nude on the Moon and Blaze Starr Goes Nudist).  When Bennett learns Thomas is a nudist in his spare time, he fires him on the spot.  It’s then up to Thomas and his wife Ann (Joan Bamford), who also happens to be Bennett’s secretary, to show him there isn’t a stigma attached to being a nudist.  

This is one of those good news/bad news situations.  Unlike the previous Doris Wishman nudie movies I just watched, Gentlemen Prefer Nature Girls doesn’t make us wait a half-hour or so before our characters arrive at the nudist camp.  This time out, we only have to sit through ten minutes of boring plot stuff before we get to the naked sunbathing, naked picnicking, naked hair combing, naked swimming, naked accordion playing, naked archery (naturally), naked gardening, naked seesawing, naked stretching, naked photography, naked volleyball, naked yard watering, naked walks in the rain, naked swinging, naked skipping rocks, naked basketball, naked popsicle eating, naked shuffleboard, and everyone’s favorite… naked sulking around because you lost your job.

However, Doris’ other films at least had the benefit of a marginally interesting hook.  Nude on the Moon was about space exploration.  Blaze Starr Goes Nudist offered an intimate look into the life of the “real” Blaze Starr.  Hideout in the Sun had a bank robbery/kidnapping plot.  This one can’t even muster up an interesting scenario.  

Yes, Gentlemen Prefer Nature Girls belongs in the subset of nudist movies where the characters/filmmakers are out to prove that nudism is a natural and healthy lifestyle choice; not something to be frowned upon.  Because of that, there’s a little bit more thrust to the story than in the other Wishman movies I’ve seen (but not much).  However, without the novelty of a hook, it just never quite takes off.  

Overall, Gentlemen Prefer Nature Girls feels more like a generic nudist picture and less like a Doris Wishman film.  Because of that, it’s lacking that certain quirkiness that makes Doris Wishman movies Doris Wishman movies.  Don’t worry, there are still plenty of those little Wishman touches like underwater shots of skinny-dippers, poorly synched sound, telephone conversations where the listener’s mouth is obscured (which goes hand in hand with the poorly synched sound), and long driving scenes.  One big notable absence is a lack of random shots of people's feet.  Another glaring omission is the lack of a killer title song over the opening credits.  

I guess if you just want to see some boobies, this is an OK way to go.  The ladies vary in attractiveness, but that helps makes it more realistic.  If everyone looked like Blaze Starr, it wouldn’t feel authentic.  

AKA:  Gentlemen Prefer Girls.

DORIS DECEMBER: HIDEOUT IN THE SUN (1960) **

(Originally reviewed January 2, 2022)

Hideout in the Sun was Doris Wishman’s first film.  Even though she was only credited with writing the story and producing, she also co-directed.  It has a few touches that would soon become her hallmarks, namely lots of nudity and tons of shots of feet, but other than being notable for her first feature, it’s not very good.  

Two thieves make a daring getaway after staging a bank heist.  When they learn the cops are watching their getaway boat, they decide to take a hostage and head to a nudist camp to lay low while the heat cools off.  While the one guy barks orders and worries about the cops, his partner and the hostage enjoy all the amenities the nudist camp has to offer.  

The first half hour or so is really slow going.  The cops and robbers stuff is a chore to get through.  The obvious Wishman touches aside, it’s dull and tedious.  Things improve once the action switches over to the nudist camp.  It’s here where things lighten up a little and the movie starts to have some fun with the silly premise.  

Among the nudist activities featured:  Swimming, volleyball, sunbathing, nature walks, picnicking, birdwatching, badminton, drinking from a water spigot, sitting in a fountain, sniffing flowers, and my favorite… NUDE ARCHERY!  Hawkeye, eat your heart out.

It’s easy to see why many nudist movies had as little plot as possible.  This one is so plot heavy in the early going that you might doze off even before you get to see one naked lady.  Credited director Larry Wolk was probably responsible for the dull stuff.  I can’t say that for sure, but I want to say it just because I’m a big Wishman fan.  So, if you can make it past the boring crime plot, the nudity in the second half is pretty much nonstop, so that’s something at least.

The title tune (sung by Ralph Young of Sandler and Young fame) is a straight-up banger too, which is good since they play it often.

AKA:  Beauties in the Sun.

DORIS DECEMBER NOTES:  

1) With “Hideout in the Sun”, Doris is three-for-three with awesome nudie movie theme songs.

2) Like Nude on the Moon, and Blaze Starr Goes Nudist, the early fully clothed scenes are rough going.

3) More feet.

4) Watching this back-to-back-to-back with Nude on the Moon and Blaze Starr Goes Nudist, it’s apparent that this is by far the most drab looking of the three.  It’s sorely lacking the eye-popping color that at least made those two stand out.

5) The dialogue is poorly dubbed throughout, which makes it understandable that Wishman would shy away from matching actors’ lips with sound for much of her career.  

6) The climax takes place at “Miami Serpentarium” where a bunch of lizards, snakes, and alligators lounge in the sun, which kind of makes it a nudist colony for reptiles, I guess?

DORIS DECEMBER: BLAZE STARR GOES NUDIST (1963) * ½

(Originally posted July 17th, 2007)

Renowned stripper Blaze Starr stars as herself.  She’s tired of being famous and wants to get away from it all.  She goes to a theater playing a nudie movie and decides to visit the nudist colony featured.  There she encounters naked picnicking, checkers, archery, canoeing, volleyball, chess, and swimming.  She loves being a nudist so much that she neglects her celebrity duties such as attending parties, photo shoots and press functions which causes problems for her boyfriend/agent.  She drops that loser and walks off into the sunset with the camp director, Andy (Ralph Young of Sandler and Young fame).  

Blaze looks good naked, but it doesn’t help that the first half of the movie is filled with scenes of her talking on the phone fully clothed.  This is a nudist flick, and there are a lot of naked bodies on display, but I just couldn’t stop asking myself these burning questions:  A) If Blaze was going to a nudist colony, why would she have to pack her bags?  B) If Andy is a nudist, how come he is never seen without his goofy rainbow-colored shorts?  C) Why would a nudist colony need a clothesline?  D) If these people are truly nudists, how come they have tan lines?  

Director Doris Wishman also directed Deadly Weapons.  Starr (from Maryland) was also the subject of the biopic, Blaze starring Paul Newman and Lolita Davidovich.  This flick has been re-released several times under different names.  

AKA:  Blaze Starr:  The Original.  AKA:  Back to Nature.  AKA:  Nature Girl.  AKA:  Blaze Starr Goes Wild.

DORIS DECEMBER NOTES:  

1) “Going Back to Nature”, like Nude on the Moon’s “Moon Doll” is a bop and a half.  Doris Wishman might not have been the most technically adept filmmaker, but she sure knew how to secure bangers for her opening credits sequences.  (The closing theme, “The Moon is the Lamp of Love” is also very good.)

2) Also, like Nude on the Moon, there is a LOT of padding in the early going.  

3) One of Wishman’s signatures is the lack of synch sound.  In Nude on the Moon, there was at least an attempt to mask some of the dubbing to make it less obvious.  Here, the bulk of Starr’s dialogue is in the form of thoughts/narration or spoken offscreen (so they didn’t have to loop her lines).

4) Another one of Wishman’s signature touches begins to crop up here as well:  Gratuitous close-ups of feet.  Quentin Tarantino, eat your heart out!

5) The print is a little beat up here and there, but the folks at AGFA still did a great job preserving the flick.

6) Blaze looks great topless, but an actress she is not.

7) Despite the novelty of nude accordion playing and nude “Siamese” dancing, many of the nudist camp scenes are mostly lifeless and dull.  The fully clothed scenes are even worse.  

8) Seriously, Blaze’s bust is the only thing that separates this from a * movie and a * ½.

DORIS DECEMBER: NUDE ON THE MOON (1961) **

(Originally reviewed Jan. 11th, 2008)

Doris Wishman, “The Queen of the Nudies” proved that she was truly the innovator of the genre when she directed this sci-fi tinged Nudie-Cutie.  See, up to this time, most Nudie-Cutie movies had a documentary feel to them.  They almost never strayed away from their principal location (namely some nudist colony) and were comprised almost solely of nudists playing volleyball, swimming and walking around totally naked.  Instead of setting her movie in some random nudist colony, Wishman got the idea for the movie to take place on the moon where nudists would play volleyball (or at least an alien variation on volleyball), swim and walk around totally naked.  That’s just the kind of trendsetter Doris was.  

After the great opening theme song “Moon Doll”, the plot begins.  An astronaut (who says, “Science is my life and nothing else!”) uses a three-million-dollar inheritance to build his own personal rocket ship and he and his mentor blast off to the moon.  (“If all goes well, we’ll be back in Miami in four days!”)  Of course, the moon looks just like your average nudist colony, except there’s gold rocks everywhere.  About a half an hour into the movie, the astronauts (FINALLY) find the moon nudists who all look like the nudists of Earth except they have antennae and wear shorts.  The nudists quickly capture the two astronauts and report to the Moon Goddess who uses telepathy to communicate.  When the normally reserved scientist sees all the naked women he yells, “I feel like a schoolboy!”  And for the next hour, the two scientists watch intently as women, men and even children parade around topless.  

The women in the cast run the gauntlet from cute, to passable, to horsefaces, but with this many titties on display, you can’t really complain.  Which leads me to my biggest gripe about the movie:  The title is NUDE on the Moon, but everybody walks around in bikini bottoms.  On the downside, we don’t get to see any of the girl’s bushes, but thankfully we’re spared the sight of seeing all the men’s frontages.  

The goofy premise and novel setting distinguish Nude on the Moon from the rest of the pack, but honestly after about an hour of watching topless chicks cavort around with antennae on their head while men in spacesuits take notes, it gets a bit old.  Seeing the astronauts fight the “gravitational force” of the rocket during liftoff is hilarious, as is the astronaut’s costumes and the aliens lack thereof.  Honestly, if you’ve seen one nudist camp movie, you’ve seen ‘em all, but if you ever wanted to see lots of women parade around topless on the moon, then this will be your best bet.  

Keep your eyes peeled for the theater marquee that advertises Hideout in the Sun, Wishman’s first movie.  

AKA:  Girls on the Moon.  AKA:  Moon Dolls.  AKA:  Nature Girls on the Moon.  AKA:  Nature on the Moon.

DORIS DECEMBER NOTES:

1) “Moon Doll”, is, as the kids say nowadays, a straight-up banger.

2) Since our hero is funding his own space program with an inheritance, does that make him the Elon Musk of the ‘60s?

3) MAN.  I forgot how much padding the first act has.

4) Since there isn’t a lot going on in the early portion of the film, it at least gives you time to appreciate the excellent job AGFA did on the print.  The movie has never looked better.  

5) The scenes of the Moon Queen’s breathless telepathic whispering combined with the repetitive score would make a great ASMR video.

6) I think the reason Nude on the Moon is one of those “Close, but no cigar” movies is because there’s no real conflict.  The astronauts just land, gawk at the nude moon women, and take notes and pictures.  If it was one of those Queen of Outer Space/Cat-Women of the Moon deals where the heroes were in some actual kind of peril, it would’ve worked better.  

DORIS DECEMBER

Now that Halloween is behind us and we’re all fat from Thanksgiving, I thought it was high time to turn my attention to some of the all-time great directors of the silver screen.  Each month for the next few months, I will be spotlighting a different director and trying to run through as much of their filmography as I can.  Fortunately for me, this will be kind of easy as home video specialists like AGFA and Severin have been knocking it out of the park lately with their director box sets.

Each director featured will in some way encompass the motto of The Video Vacuum, which has always been:  Quantity Over Quality.  These are directors who were grinding out picture after picture, year after year, and while not all of them were gems, they were all unmistakably the product of a unique, talented (or sometimes refreshingly untalented) mind.  It’s that kind of stuff that gets you inducted into The Video Vacuum Hall of Fame.

This December, we will be focusing our attention on all things Doris Wishman.  AGFA has recently released an incredible three volume series covering most of her impressive (and sometimes not-so impressive) body of work.  I will try to watch and review as many of these films as possible before the New Year and I hope you all come along for the ride.  

As when I went through the Al Adamson box set awhile back, if I have already reviewed a movie featured in the collection, I will either A) Just re-post my old review (especially if I have already reviewed it in the last year or two) or B) Post my old review alongside a brand new write-up (especially if I reviewed it way back when I had my old LiveJournal site).  

What do, you say?  Let’s dive into Doris December!