The Diary of My Secret Life (1971) Online

It's rare that a hardcore porn quickie from the early days of the genre shows some care in its making, but this adaptation of the classic Victorian porn novel "My Secret Life" rises above the usual filler. I give credit to the pseudonymous director "P. Talbot Drummer".

Format is a bit odd, as several actors sign into a book, the diary titled "My Secret Life" and take turns playing the title character. Because the novel was published as "by Anonymous" I guess this makes sense to have a tag-team approach.

The dialog is kept in period fashion, as are the costumes, while the cheap sets are something of a letdown. Explicit sex is arousing and casting attractive porn starlets is a big plus. With a decent budget this could have been a quality film.

It has been reissued on a disc within Alpha Blue Archives' "Young Lust 1" boxed set, that also contains two even better Victorian porn movies: "Flossie, a Venus of Fifteen" and "Oh Fanny!". Latter two eventually have been added to IMDb, and are highly recommended, not only for the well-handled sex scenes and cute cartoon credit sequences, but Fanny, an adaptation of "Fanny Hill", recycles John Addison's soundtrack for "Tom Jones" to good effect.

Talk about authentic -these films use the word "gamahouche" in the dialog to indicate oral sex - I don't think I've ever heard that word spoken aloud before, having only seen it so many years ago in Victorian porn novels like "The Pearl".