Colorization by Manos Athanasiadis
Tura Satana & Porsche 356 in Russ Meyer’s movie: “Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!”, 1965
Russell Albion “Russ” Meyer (1922 – 2004) was an American film director, producer, screenwriter, cinematographer, film editor, actor and photographer. Meyer is known primarily for writing and directing a series of successful low-budget sexploitation films that featured campy humor, sly satire and large-breasted women, such as Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!. Russ Meyer’s lifelong unabashed fixation on large breasts featured prominently in all his films and is his best-known character trait both as an artist and as a person. His discoveries include Kitten Natividad, Erica Gavin, Lorna Maitland, Tura Satana, and Uschi Digard among many others. The majority of them were naturally large breasted and he occasionally cast women in their first trimesters of pregnancy as it enhanced their breast size even further.
Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! is a 1965 American exploitation film directed by Russ Meyer. It follows three go-go dancers who embark on a spree of kidnapping and murder in the California desert.
The movie is known for its violence, provocative gender roles, and its eminently quotable “dialogue to shame Raymond Chandler.” Faster, Pussycat! was a commercial and critical failure upon its initial release, but it has since become widely regarded as an important and influential film.
Tura Satana (1938 – 2011) was an American actress and former exotic dancer. From 13 film and television credits, some of her work includes the exploitation film Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!, and the science fiction horror film The Astro-Zombies (1968).
Satana’s starred as “Varla” in the 1965 film Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!—a very aggressive and sexual female character for which she did all of her own stunts and fight scenes. Renowned film critic Richard Corliss called her performance “…the most honest, maybe the one honest portrayal in the Meyer canon and certainly the scariest”. Originally titled The Leather Girls, the film is an ode to female violence, based on a concept created by Russ Meyer and screenwriter Jack Moran. Both felt at her first audition that Satana was “definitely Varla.” The film was shot on location in the desert outside Los Angeles during days when the weather was more than 100 degrees Fahrenheit and freezing nights, with Satana clashing regularly with teenage co-star Susan Bernard due to Bernard’s mother’s reportedly disruptive behavior on the set. Meyer said Satana was “extremely capable. She knew how to handle herself. Don’t fuck with her! And if you have to fuck her, do it well! She might turn on you!” Satana was responsible for adding key elements to the visual style and energy of the production, including her costume, makeup, usage of martial arts, dialogue and the use of spinning tires in the death scene of the main male character. She came up with many of the film’s best lines. At one point the gas station attendant was ogling her extraordinary cleavage while confessing to a desire to see America. Varla replied “You won’t find it down there, Columbus!” Meyer cited Satana as the primary reason for the film’s lasting fame. “She and I made the movie”, said Meyer. Tura Satana’s performance as Varla in Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! was Meyer’s only true portrayal of the large, strong and aggressive Amazonian archetype in the classic visual sense.
The Porsche 356 is a luxury sports car which was first produced in 1948 and continued until April 1965. It was Porsche’s first production automobile. Like its cousin, the Volkswagen Beetle, the 356 was a four-cylinder, air-cooled, rear-engine, rear-wheel-drive car utilizing unitized pan and body construction. The chassis was a completely new design as was the 356’s body which was designed by Porsche employee Erwin Komenda, while certain mechanical components including the engine case and some suspension components were based on and initially sourced from Volkswagen.
The last revision of the 356 was the 356C introduced for the 1964 model year. It featured disc brakes all round, as well as an option for the most powerful pushrod engine Porsche had ever produced, the 95 hp (71 kW) “SC”. 356 production peaked at 14,151 cars in 1964, the year that its successor, the new 911, was introduced to the US market.
In 2004, Sports Car International ranked the 356C tenth on their list of Top Sports Cars of the 1960s. Today, the Porsche 356 is a highly regarded collector car.
Sources:
Wikipedia: Russ Meyer
Wikipedia: Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!
IMDb: Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!
Wikipedia: Tura Satana
Wikipedia: Porsche 356
Στα ελληνικά:
Reel.gr: Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!
Gocar.gr: Porsche 356, Από δω άρχισαν όλα
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