Hot Nights on the Campus/Review

This 1966 MOS film was written, produced, and directed by Tony Orlando (not the singer -- I think) and stars Gigi Darlene (Bad Girls Go to Hell) as Sally, a naive Midwestern girl fresh in NY to study at, presumably, NYU. Her roommates -- one of whom is played by Alpha Centuri in case you were wondering if this film had any star power -- quickly introduce Sally to life in the big city: co-ed parties that turn into sex parties, lesbianism, and, nude modeling for extra money.

You can tell this was made in the 60s because these things happen for the first time at university and not high school.

Sally is at first shocked by this behavior but quickly takes to the lifestyle and before long is in a sexual relationship with two guys: one is a professor she had known previously as a friend of the family, and the other is a fellow student.

From that auspicious set-up, the film delivers a few non-explicit sex scenes, a lingerie modeling session, some awkward dancing, one girl-on-girl topless make-out scene, and a fair bit drama.

So, the film does deliver a few hot nights. One thing it does not deliver is a campus, but that wasn't the part of the title I was interested in anyway.

Since this is an MOS film (a film without synchronized audio, i.e., no dialogue or sound effects, but only a score and a narrator) the film has to rely on the music, the narration, and what we see on the screen to be interesting.

Hot Nights on the Campus more-or-less delivers on all counts.

The music is a fairly decent jazz score. It even includes a track which sounds far too professional to be in a low budget film like this. So, it probably *was* too professional, and was most certainly not licensed for the film.

I won't tell if you won't.

The diary-like narration is frequent, keeps the story moving at a brisk pace, and tells an interesting-enough story. As a complete package, then, it's more developed than many other MOS films of the era like The Immoral Mr. Teas or Eve and the Handyman. The cinematography is nowhere near Russ Meyer standards, however.

That being said, what is on the screen is sexy. Gigi Darlene is gorgeous. It's too bad she never appeared in a Russ Meyer film. She would have fit right in.

She fits in well here, too. She is charming enough to keep us interested, and the movie itself ends up being rather charming as well. It does a good job of reminding the viewer of what it was like to become sexually active and feel like an adult for the first time. It's a coming of age story with nudity. Which, I suppose, makes it a *coming* of age story.

The film does suffer from some poor camera work, though, particularly during the external scenes, which are jittery, washed out, and overall rather ugly. It is interesting to see New York in the 60s, but that historical interest hardly makes up for the quality of the shots.

My biggest problem with the film, however, is the ending. Without spoiling too much, I'll just say that I'm not a fan of sexploitation film endings that tie up too neatly with moralizing in line with Midwestern values.

Just be sleazy.

Reviewed by Rob McGee