Manor House Fantasis

I was always curious about the transformation done by "svengali" Sascha Alexander, taking the English rose Sarah Young and making her the video sex icon of the '90s. MANOR HOUSE FANTASIS (misspelled, as is the hawking for MANOR HOUSE FANTASIS NO. 2 on the poorly-made video) shows Sarah before her breasts-ultra-enlargement, of interest perhaps only to me.

This is a lousy artifact of the British softcore pornography industry, consisting of 43 minutes of the main program and then two solo vignettes spotlighting Sarah and Stephanie Bews, running about 7 minutes each. Other than fanatical followers of the models in question, no others need apply.

Although I was a steadfast reader of Britain's Mayfair men's magazine during the 1970s (actually selling a part of my collection at a healthy profit 20 years later to a collector of the comic strips included in the back pages of many issues), this live-action version of British lasses cavorting naked is a colossal bore. Once the four principals of MANOR HOUSE are introduced, they fondle themselves, each other, dance around in crypto-music video fashion and desport in fetishistic gear (leather, breast chains, black stockings, garter belts, etc.) for your listening and dancing pleasure. Shot MOS, it is tedious in the extreme.

The only enjoyment, other than my masochistic pleasure at watching such antiquated anti-entertainment, comes in the wonderful accents and cutesy sort-of "dirty talk" by the femme voice-over artistes, purporting to be the girls we're watching. For low-grade porn like this (as was the case with so many '60s American sexploitation films shot MOS), voice casting is of the utmost importance.

The lady pretending to be Lady Maria (married to Lord Smutteridge who she calls Lord Smutty) tells us of Buttocksdale House, its address being Cunnilingus Lane, Fuckham, Bedinhere. Not exactly top-grade British humor, but this isn't exactly Thames or BBC TV.

She has a pale-skinned maid named Fanny who is there to pleasure her, since Lord Smutty can't satisfy. Odd touch is that she reveals she was a former whore who the Lord married and elevated in station, but that she must supply him with a steady stream of girls to satisfy the old creep.

She phones an agency to send over two cooks' assistants, and most of the running time is devoted to this pair's lesbian mixed-combo action, both of them extremely well-built: Debbie (the blonde) and Chantal (the Black girl). Much of the voice-over hints at harder stuff, particularly fingering and cunnilingus, which never eventuates, this being strictly softcore with full-frontal nudity, roughly what was shown in American cinema circa 1968/69 (no split beaver shots, except in an unrelated Extras still gallery on the DVD).

At the end she calls up to send over a couple of guys (one black and one white) but poor fools like me would have to cough up another few pounds to see that on (sic) MANOR HOUSE FANTASIS NO. 2.

The extra material here is called "Nude Wives Special" featuring "The Essex Girls", referring to their fictional birthplaces. Fictional, because Stephanie Bews appears as "Sue from Romford", while Sarah Young portrays "Emma from Ilford". This quaint setup is merely to have the girls in solo masturbation loops.

Bews, with her out-sized nipples, floppy natural breasts and appealing tan is a turn-on, feeling herself up as we listen to breathy Popul Vuh-type mood music.

Video ends with seven minutes of Sarah Young, first at her makeup table primping and then masturbating (merely topless, threatening to but never removing her pink panties) on her bed. She has attractive white hose and white high heels on, but the anonymous director (there are no credits on the video whatsoever) bungles the job by lighting Sarah harshly and styling her with unattractive makeup and a hairdo that looks like an audition for a Hammer witch role.

Sarah has big breasts here (she was a Page 3 girl after all), but as evidenced by her constant fondling of them (and sucking her own nipples) they represent a pre-op (circa 1987-88) Mother Nature's gift, not silicone. Having seen & enjoyed hundreds of her latter-day performances for hubby Sascha and various Italian directors, I am fan-wedded to the new, improved Sarah, essentially a gilding of the lily.

Glancing at the wikipedia-like website "boobpedia" (I would think these clowns are ignorantly giving a mixed message, given the derivation of "ped"), it's stated that Sarah divorced Sascha and is currently in the U.S. studying to be a lawyer. If you believe that, I have this beautifully bound set of encyclopedias for sale, for only $...