The Endangered List (Case File #9)

THE FEMALE RESPONSE (1973)

CAST
Raina Barrett (Leona)
Jacque Lynn Colton (Rosalie)
Michaela Hope (Sandy)
Jennifer Welles (Andrea)
Gena Wheeler (Victoria)
Marjorie Hirsch (Marjorie)
Roz Kelly (Gilda)
Lawrie Driscoll (Karl)
Edmund Donnelly (Mark)
Todd Everett (Gary)
Richard Wilkins (Tom)
Phyllis MacBride (Rachel)
Suzy Mann (Ramona)
Curtis Carlson (Alex)
Herb Streicher a.k.a. Harry Reems (Max)
Anthony Scott Craig (Caller)

Richard Lipton (Leland)

CREDITS
Produced by Richard Lipton
Directed by Tim Kincaid
Director of Photography: Arthur D. Marks
Music Composed by Bill Reynolds
Music Arranged and Conducted by Manny Duran
Screenplay by Tim Kincaid and David Newburge
Film Editing by Graham Place and Arthur Marks, Atlantis Films, Inc.
Sound by Graham Place
Art and Sculpture by Richard Corben, Aaronel De Roy Gruber, and Jamie De Roy
Hairstyles Created by Albert Brown

A Filmpeople Presentation
A Richard Lipton Production
A Trans-American Release
Running Time: 89 minutes
Aspect Ration: 1.85:1
Rating: R

Color by Movielab

SYNOPSIS

A newspaper columnist with firm ideas about feminine freedoms, Marjorie (MARJORIE HIRSCH) is fired by her editor for expressing her libertarian views in her column. Convinced that her employer was no longer in touch with today's morals and acceptance of the sexual revolution, she begins a probe of public attitudes and instigates a seminar in sex among a representative group of young women.

Sandy (MICHAELA HOPE), a free-living young hippie, denounces the restrictions of married life to the girls at the seminar and describes as an example an afternoon spent with Gary (TODD EVERETT), a young man who picked her up as she was hitchhiking to a country bungalow she maintained. She explains how she introduced him to some drug-boosted love-making as the pair spent an interval in the surrounding forest.

Social restrictions have no bonds on Victoria (GENA WHEELER) who forthrightly describes herself as a high-priced call girl. She declares that she sees nothing wrong with an occupation in which she is handsomely paid for making love to the most sophisticated men in New York. However, she does admit that it becomes boring at times and does not eliminate the possibility that she might one day settle down.

Such an existence fascinates Rosalie (JACQUE LYNN COLTON) who admits that she doesn't have the body to be a successful prostitute. In fact, with her weight problem, any affair with a man would be a relief from her virginal state.

The problems of a suburban housewife are expressed by Leona (RAINA BARRETT) who relates the boredom of life with a husband who has allowed his professional ambitions and drive for material gain to interfere with their emotional life, relegating love making to a routine duty.

Gilda (ROZ KELLY) reveals her interest in the offbeat propositions described in the ads of the underground press. She expresses shock at their audacity but it doesn't discourage her from determining to investigate their erotic possibilities. Responding to one of the ads, she finds herself imprisoned in a bed and bound at the wrists by her co-respondent. Another attempt finds her with a young man (RICHARD LIPTON) who insists that she must dress up like his mother and treat him like an infant in order to relate to her sexually.

Resentment of the masculine image forces Andrea (JENNIFER WELLES), a pretty blonde socialite, to tease the men she meets, luring them on then coldly cutting them off at the peak of their interest. Her technique backfires, however, when, spurning the advances of a young garage mechanic, she is raped by him in her shower. But, rather than an ordeal, she finds she enjoys the experience.

Rosalie, too, finally gets into activities more satisfying sexually when she joins a group of swingers who believe in love making as a group activity.

For Leona, the routines of suburbia take a painful turn when, responding to an obscene phone call, she finds that her frustration forces her to listen to the caller…and sense erotic enjoyment from it.

Victoria's life as a call girl appears to end when she receives a marriage proposal from one of her clients. They agree to a rendezvous and, although she is sure that he wasn't sincere, he appears and they go off together.

The girls end their seminar in agreement that the social revolution is a welcome change and that each had learned much from her sisters to guide her in improving her own love life.