High Priestess of Sexual Witchcraft (1973)

... aka: High Priestess of Sensual Witchcraft
... aka: Sexual Witchcraft

Directed by:
Beau Buchanan

I guess if nothing else, I'm happy to provide an accurate review for this seldom-watched hardcore horror flick and clear up some misinformation about it. For starters, the current IMDb plot description; "A young runaway escapes from abusive men and finds a happy home with a cult of devil-worshiping lesbians" happens to be completely misleading, if not flat out wrong. Like most of the info over on IMDb, this same false write-up has spread onto many other websites over the years despite the fact that no runaway factors into the plot, no one tries to escape an "abusive man" and, most disappointingly of all, there's no cult of devil-worshiping lesbians, though there is a cult of devil-worshipers. Strangely, there's only a handful of brief and / or incomplete sex scenes. The longest of these by far is a female solo number. Two of the others don't even make it beyond the early oral stage before abruptly ending. And the fourth bit, the only scene with actual intercourse, lasts less than two minutes and is at the very end of this 63-minute film. Perhaps that's why Newsweek called it "classy," but for a typical porn viewer, this is going to be a disappointment. Sexual Witchcraft is the type of adult film made by someone seemingly disinterested in porn who wanted to make a movie and perhaps saw the X market as the only viable way to do so. While there's no escaping the fact this doesn't come through on the sex, it has enough of a basic plot to be watchable and the performances are pretty good. Actually, I've seen a lot worse acting in many R-rated horror films.

After having spent his teenage years away (presumably at a religious boarding school), a now-grown Wayne ("Rick Livermore" / Levi Richards) returns to his New York City home to visit his sister Debbie (who is "away" throughout the entire film) and his oddly-paired parents. Dad William (Harding Harrison) is a seemingly-repressed "fuddy duddy" minister whose idea of a pleasant dinnertime conversation involves telling his son "If either you or your sister lose sight of your Christian upbringing you won't have to worry about God's vengeance because I'll beat you within an inch of your life!" Mom Ellen (Georgina Spelvin) is about the polar opposite. She's flirty, vivacious, foul-mouthed and has held up surprisingly well over the years. So what's her secret? Well, she attributes it to dance and yoga classes, but we later find out otherwise. After Wayne goes to a party to bang Sally (Jean Palmer), he returns home only to catch mom and dad engaged in some rather non-religious behavior. It turns out the holy roller dad likes to be dominated and humiliated, and mom is all too happy to appease his desires. She calls him a "filthy mongrel" and "disgusting turd" while walking him around on a leash and putting nipple clamps on him. For an encore, she sits on his face and instructs him to "Eat it or I'll beat your cock to a bloody pulp!" Christian values, indeed.

After the S&M horror show, Wayne decides to trail Ellen around the city to see what she's really up to and discovers more than he bargained for. After following her inside a scummy apartment building and up a long flight of stairs to the top floor, he makes his way up to the rooftop and watches his "high priestess" mum overseeing a Satanic sex cult from the skylight. He's made it just in time to see the initiation of a big-breasted virgin (Stephanie) into the cult, which involves bongo drums, nude body painting and a deflowering with a sheep's horn headdress. Ellen catches Wayne spying on them and then forces him to either take part in "the supreme test" or else face becoming a human sacrifice. Wayne opts for the former, which involves him having to stay hard after getting his cock smacked with a cane and then having sex with the virgin. The end. A voice-over comes over the credits stating "You'll see what happens to Wayne and his strange new power when you see Happy Days at your neighborhood theater." A sequel? Yep. Released the following year, Happy Days was also made by Buchanan and also stars Spelvin, Richards and Harrison in the same roles. I guess Wayne's "strange new power" is his ability to maintain an erection while his own mother administers genital torture.

This is available on both DVD and VHS through Alpha Blue Archives, who have included it in their "Satanic Sickies" box set. The print quality is pretty damaged / dark / blurry, but that's pretty much to be expected with one of these obscure 70s hardcore flicks.

★★