Mona the Virgin Nymph

[StevePulaski]

Mona the Virgin Nymph (1970)
Directed by: Michael Benveniste and Howard Ziehm

Rating: ★½

Mona the Virgin Nymph was the first pornographic film to receive a full theatrical in America in 1970. While it may not have earned the recognition and merited the cult impact of Debbie Does Dallas and Deep Throat, Mona paved the way for a great deal of contemporaries, many of which, admittedly, of better quality, and was a landmark film in defeating America's tight grip on pornographic and "obscene" content.

Had it not been for this tidbit of information, I'd say Mona the Virgin Nymph wouldn't be remembered for much else other than an earlier, shoddy American pornographic film. The film is a sloppy, third-rate production all around, with a bare bones plot and scuzzy sex scenes that can barely pass for entertainment, let alone being watchable. The pale plot revolves around Mona (Fifi Watson), a young woman who is about to marry her finacee Jim (Orrin North), but makes the promise to her mother (Judy Angel) that she will not engage in sexual intercourse until they are married. Mona's mother didn't have sex until she married Mona's now late father, so she expects the same good will of her daughter. This makes Jim antsy, desperately wanting to make love with his beautiful fiancee. However, Mona isn't totally inexperienced sexually, for she has a fascination and a passion for fellatios. She winds up frequenting alleys, movie theaters, and a wide variety of places to perform blowjobs on random men, keeping this a secret from her fiancee and mother.

Mona the Virgin Nymph's basic plot doesn't allow for the guilty arousal and deep-rooted ideas of Taboo to play out, the wit of Deep Throat that wound up being just as memorable as the sex scenes, nor does it have the same kind of arousing sex scenes as Debbie Does Dallas. For being a pioneer, Mona's simplicity doesn't allow for much of a cultural impact, or even an impact on its field, because of how generic everything about it is. It's low-grade videography give the film a dreary sepia toned hue, and the sex scenes are more often than not shot with extreme close-ups, with little concern for space or atmosphere.

Then there's the fact that the sex scenes occur with five minutes, give or take, between each one. During this downtime, we get little sense of the characters and aren't given much of anything other than cheap dialog to sneer at. Films of The Golden Age of Porn proved that sex can have plots, both fairly simple and subversive, yet still succeed in being arousing motion pictures. Mona, however, gets so simple that it winds up being forgettable almost instantaneously after it concludes. It has to be the least impacting pioneer in any field that I have yet to come across.

Starring: Fifi Watson, Judy Angel, and Orrin North. Directed by: Michael Benveniste and Howard Ziehm.