HARDCORE

CONTAINS SPOILERS (FOR WHAT IT'S WORTH) AND UNGALLANT REMARKS

It's really difficult to review this without resorting to uncharitable and ungentlemanly comments, but I'll try. Hardcore is a softcore British smutcom from 1977, apparently detailing the life and countless loves of sex symbol Fiona Richmond (played by sex symbol Fiona Richmond) in a series of flashbacks which play out like a checklist of Dirty Raincoat fantasies: schoolgirl molested by the chemistry teacher (Richmond was over 30 when she filmed this and – ungallantry ahoy – it shows), lesbian tryst on a yacht, bonking a railway ticket inspector, action on a blue movie set, and so on. Frankly it's just a rather grubby parade of boobs and pubes aimed pretty squarely at the typical adult movie audience of the time. It couldn't be more explicit and actually live up to the promise of the title because the censors wouldn't let them so it ends up as coy and suggestive.

Much of the dubious pleasure of watching this kind of movie is spotting the familiar British sitcom stars and character actors. This one is slightly unusual in that it doesn't have a semi-regular from the Carry On films or anyone from Dad's Army. But it does include Graham Crowden, Ronald Fraser and Victor Spinetti (camping it up as a features editor at Men Only magazine, and all his scenes have a middle-aged bloke in the background groping the breasts of prospective models). Graham Stark shows up in the last reel as a French policeman complete with Clouseau accent, which is hardly surprising as he was in most of the Pink Panther films anyway.

The weirdest thing is that while watching it, I was reminded of none other than Catherine Tate! In fact, if some enterprising producers are thinking of doing The Real Fiona Richmond Story (as opposed to this sexed-up bumfest) she'd be ideal casting. She can also look scary and she doesn't do comedy very well. (I think Tate is at her best when she's working from someone else's scripts, as in Doctor Who, and the problem with her comedy shows is that she wrote them.)

So the comedy is pretty non-existent and the sex (or what bits of it they were allowed by law to show) is dull. And – ungallantry ahoy #2 – I don't get Fiona Richmond in the way I'm supposed to: as a sex goddess. I get Mary Millington but I don't get Richmond. (If it's any consolation, I don't really get Marilyn Monroe in that way either.) To be brutally honest I think Richmond is a bit scary-looking. And there's also the fact that she can't act. I know that in this kind of movie that's the last thing on anybody's mind – if you want acting, go get Meryl Streep but she's not going to do that lesbians-on-a-yacht scene. It's mainly absolutely terrible and even the occasional appearance of a sitcom star doesn't help. For me the biggest thrill (of any kind) was a three-second shot of a TV set broadcasting an old movie called Sweet Virgin in the background while Fiona and Number 72 are fumbling about on the vicarage floor. And that old clip woke me up basically because it had Lalla Ward in it: one of my favourite Doctor Who assistants during the Tom Baker years. Now, how rubbish does a movie have to be when the best bit is an unrelated clip from a completely different movie?

*

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