Sexandroide (1987)

... aka: La dagy de les sexandroides
... aka: Les sexandroïdes
... aka: Sex Android

Directed by:
Michel Ricaud

Sexandroide is a shot-on-video exercise in plotless gore, nudity and overall bad taste - a videotaped Grand Guignol if you will - that runs just 57 minutes and is divided into three segments. I guess one could call it an anthology, though there's no linking segments to tie the stories together so this just really comes off like three shorts shown back-to-back-to-back. Though French in origin, there's no real dialogue to listen to in any of the segments so subtitles aren't even be needed for this one. Our first tale is titled "Le dagyde," which immediately had me hopping on the ole search engine to find out what in the hell that even was. "Dagyde" is derived from the Greek word dagos, meaning “doll.” The definition I found claims a dagyde is a doll similar to, but not exactly the same as, a voodoo doll, though it sounds exactly the same. The doll represents a person who's going to be the subject of a magical ritual or spell. Needles or pins are then inserted into various places on the doll to indicate where energy, for good or ill, is to be sent. Hey, I need to make watching this crap, and having you read about it, at least somewhat educational, don't I?

A man seen only in shadow opens an envelope containing a Polaroid of a woman. He places a fingernail, a snippet of hair, an earring and a bobby pin all presumably belonging to the woman on the photo and then starts messing around with a voodoo doll. The woman in the photo, who's at a bar, soon starts feeling woozy and excuses herself to the bathroom. She pukes in the sink and, as clothes are ripped off the voodoo doll, her clothes are also ripped off. First goes her dress and then her stockings and then her panties, bra and garter until she's standing their butt ass naked. The man then pokes the voodoo doll in the vagina until the woman is bleeding profusely from between her legs all over the floor and into a toilet. Next up comes the eyeballs and breasts, which also start bleeding all over the place. He then burns the doll's face, slits its throat and hangs it from a noose, all of which happen to the girl in the bathroom. Though she screams a few times, she mostly moans and sounds like she's getting off.

In our next story, "Les sexandroïdes," a scared woman (who actually conveys fear and other emotions unlike the chick in the first story) makes her way down a flight stairs to a cheap dungeon set. There, she's attacked a mutant hunchback wearing a robe and shoots him until he goes away. A skull starts smoking, she becomes possessed and then does a long strip routine that involves removing her panties, giving a mannequin torso a lap dance, constantly bending over to show off her ass, playing with fire and violently flogging herself with a cat o' nine tails. The monster returns, whips her some more and then (really!) sticks four pins through her nipples, another long pin through her tongue and more into both of her boobs. He hands her a razor and she cuts off one of her nipples, hands it over to him and he eats it. After cutting himself and having her lick his blood, what could he possibly do for an encore? Well, cut out her eyeball, stab her through the throat and then gut himself over her corpse.

Finally comes "Les dents de l'amour" ("The Teeth of Love"); which is little more than a chick showing off her hot body. A casket is cracked open for a widow to have a private viewing but the corpse rises as a vampire (in really crappy makeup). He rips the woman's clothes off, bites her and then hops back in his coffin and goes to sleep. She then leans over on the coffin and comes back to life as a pale-faced vampire with an oversized set of plastic fangs who does a nude dance around the coffin... all set to  horrible covers of the Tina Turner songs "I Might Have Been Queen" and "What's Love Got to Do With It!" After her eight minute long grave gyration complete with spread eagle shots and crotch rubbing concludes, she climbs into the coffin with the vampire, hangs a Do Not Disturb sign on the outside and closes the lid. The end.

Sometimes you'll sit through something and wonder what kind of audience they had in mind when they made it. This is one of those times. Considering the director's only other output was hardcore porn, I think it's safe to say all of the actresses on hand (none of whom is credited) were probably porno gals. I would say perhaps professional strippers except none of them can actually dance, though they all have the bodies for it. The ass on the final girl is probably worthy of a star all on its own. Not only does the constant flesh scream porn, but so do the static long shots, the fact it was shot on videotape and the ultra cheap sets, which resemble something a community theater may throw together in half an hour. Rest assured, if there happens to be a chair or another prop in the room, it's there to be used in some fashion.

Released on video in both France and Japan back in the 80s, this finally made its American debut last year courtesy of Massacre Video, who offer both a DVD and a collector's edition VHS. The Massacre release includes hardcore inserts featuring different performers that were added to at least one of the two Japanese releases. As per the usual Japanese standard, these explicit shots have been censored so why they're even there in the first place is a mystery.

★★