IL PAVONE NERO
Italian sleazy horror directed by Osvaldo Civirani in 1974
Cast: Karin Schubert, Chris Avram, Don Powell, Franco Ressel, Rita Orlando

Dear friends, this film means a lot to me...In fact, it was a big mystery for about 20 years!

That's it, over twenty years ago I saw a film in a cheap theater downtown Athens that used to play exploitation films all day long. I didn't know pretty much about directors & actors back then, in fact I had just started to order some fanzines from abroad, my only knowledge came from a couple of Greek fanzines for the genre. Of course I had seen a lot of films in the theaters and I was a fan of exploitation, but I didn't now names etc...

So I saw a film that shocked me a lot. An Italian flick shot in an exotic place with strange voodoo ceremonies and a lot of forbidden passions and sleaze!

Later, when I started to learn more about sinema, and I started my collection, I tried hard to find this film...but without success. I was sure it was an Italian flick. When I heard about Joe D'Amato's similar films - ORGASMO NERO, SESSO NERO, PAPAYA...- I was 100% sure it was one of them...but NO!

The -a bit faded- memory of ther film had haunted me like hell. In fact it was the only film of those I've seen in theater that was still an unsolved mystery. I searched in mags, I asked a lot of collectors, nothing...I even posted a thread in this forum a few months ago asking about it...

Recently I bought some Greek 35mm prints (full packages with trailer, posters, lobby cards and photos!) from a professional in Greece, in fact the guy has a huge catalogue of films. One of them was called MAVRI SARKA LEFKI AMARTIA (="Black Flesh White Sin") and the original title was IL PAVONE NERO. I looked in IMDb and I found out that this was probably THAT film!

Yes, yes, yes, it was that one! Shot in Caribbean location, it's a film of black magic that born nightmares and sinful desires. A bored married couple travel to Carribean islands for buiseness. There a black magician who doesn't want bloody hotels in the area practice voodoo with ugly dolls, wooden crosses and chicken guts to both of them, especially on the sexy lady (Karin Schubert, always sexy but with awful hair :)). The lady will be lead into terrible voodoo rituals with nude natives dancing like horny devils and then she'll be a sex slave of the black magician. By the way her husband will make love with the -rather fat- black servant in their house. That servant will make sex with the lady etc etc...There is also a too hot Karin Schuber masturbation scene (almost h/c). As you guess it's more sexploitation than horror, but the horror elements are there mainly with the lady's awful nightmares while the black magician practice voodoo against her!

A very interesting flick if you like horror mixed with sleaze. Very nice locations, local music mixed with electroning eerie sounds, rather bad acting, mediocre direction, gorgeous Karin Schubert shows all her talent (full nudity as always), cheesy scary moments and tons of sleaze! I have the feeling that this one may had a hardcore version, anyone who knows about that?

I could say it's just a weird little flick, but by my prologue you understand is something much more for me. A journey back in the dark theaters, those innocent years that movies (and rock music) had that "magical touch"...And finally the big mystery into my life has been solved, now I can die in peace B)

As you know already I avoid to rate the films I review. I don't like ratings at all. How the hell I could rate this film? I was after it a whole life, damn !!

Later I'll post some photos & lobby cards of it, the funny thing is that on the Greek lobby cards the breast and...ermmm...of Karin Schubert have been covered by a hand-painted bikini :D

In Italy was just recently discovered, by a friend of mine, the hard/core version of this film. The director of IL PAVONE NERO, Osvaldo Civirani, had for a long time denied the existence of this XXX version, but now it has finally resurfaced on an U-Matic professional tape, titled WOO-DOO [sic] SEXY-EROTICO. This version was fully reviewed a year ago on an Italian magazine, and in april 2007 was programmed for the first time at the Joe D'Amato Horror Film Festival held in Pietrasanta, Italy.

I know the feeling of solving a 'mystery' like this, which has boggled your mind for so many years. I also had some unidentified films swimming in my head, which I had seen parts of in the late 80s (mostly on TV, late at night, broadcast by Indian channel 'Doordarshan'). But at last, all of the mysterious film titles were revealed to me in the space of a few months, last year (what a co-incidence, that ALL of the films titles should come to me at about the same time, after nearly 20 years worth of searching! :) ) . Those films were LOS SOBREVIVIENTES (THE SURVIVORS), CECILIA (1983), IN WHICH ANNIE GIVES IT THOSE ONES, and THE RAMRODDER.

So, Miltos...now that you have a 35mm print, plus artworks, are you planning to release the film on dvd or something? You have certainly raised my interested very highly, especially coz I'm keen on Karin Schubert (ever since I saw 'Une Femme Spéciale').

I'm sure cult/exploitation/euro-sleaze fans would be eager to get this one. :rolleyes:

Great news :)

Can I hope for a DVD release of both versions? Or a complete one with all the h/c scenes?
I know the soft version had at least one Italian VHS release...

No, my friend...First of all my 35mm prints have Greek subtitles. But also I don't want to make a DVD label. To be honest this was never in my mind. It came into my head for a while when my friend Bill created Onar Films but left very quickly when I saw the problems he face. I know a label was his dream so he was ready to suffer for his dream, but I've never dreamed about it.

What I always wanted to do is to publish a fanzine in English. Well, my poor English was the main problem, you know. But now with my Cinehound site & forum I do something similar online :)

Another dream of mine is to buy a few nice films on 35mm. It was difficult to find them in good shape and they were too expensive for me. As I wrote in another thread I was ready to buy a couple of films from an old guy who had a theater...but he died! By the way I found his wife and I may buy some films from her next year (I'll talk about it in another thread - I was with Bill trying to find if that guy, Mr Elias, was...really dead :o ...because we weren't sure)

So this dream became reality and now I have some original films in my hands. Of course I have no right to project them, I can keep them as a collector for private use. Well, a good idea could be a festival or something with them...Bill and I had plans to open a theater for exploitation movies sometime!

the film sounds interesting, I suppose the hardcore stuff was unknowns in inserts and not the "stars" of the film ?

TRAILER MY COPY (TV DIGITAL) :lol: :lol:

http://www.xvideos.com/video1619952/emmanu...pavone_nero_il_