The mondo film, which began in Italy in 1962 with Mondo Cane, was very much an artifact of the 1960s. A mondo film is a pseudo-documentary focusing on brief looks at weird and sensational things, with some genuine footage and some faked footage. It’s a genre that hasn’t aged well. The mondo sex film is a curious sub-genre of a curious genre and Australia After Dark is such a film.
Being a mondo film means that there’s no plot at all. And since each segment only runs a couple of minutes there’s absolutely zero narrative anywhere. The connections between the segments are tenuous at best but mostly non-existent. There are no thematic connections. But that’s how mondo films are. Insofar as they have an appeal it lies in the fact that you have absolutely no idea what to expect next.
It was the nudity that was going to sell the movie (and in fact did sell it) and there’s an immense amount of frontal nudity. On the other hand a mondo film is supposed to cover a huge range of sensational or weird subjects so the sexy segments are interspersed with odd sensational stuff.
Director John D. Lamond always had an eye on international markets so there’s lots of Australiana (especially stuff dealing with the Outback) which would have bored Australian viewers to tears but would have seemed exotic to overseas audiences.
And you know that the boring segments will be over in a minute or two and we’ll be back to nude women. Lamond really did understand what sells.
The challenge of course is to find dozens of different ways to get attractive young women out of their clothes. Lamond is up to the challenge. Girls trying on bikinis. Nude bathing on the Barrier Reef. Clothing fetishism. Food fetishism. Nude scuba diving. A gentleman’s club that offer lovely handmaidens for stressed businessmen. Painters using nude women as their canvases.
No movie such as this would be complete without a witchcraft in the modern world segment. Here we get two - white magic and black magic. Fortunately both kinds of magic require beautiful young ladies to get naked. If you can’t attract an audience with nude witches you’re just not cut out to be a filmmaker.
There are also UFO cultists and they’re always fun. These ones are so crazy it takes one’s breath away. There are hippies. And there’s an insane entertainer who is insane in ways you never imagined were possible. You might be wondering if the Chariots of the Gods craze gets a mention. It does. Yes, ancient astronauts.
People today believe just as many crazy things as people in the 70s (people in every generation believe different crazy things) but the crazy things people believed in then were totally different, and more fun.
This movie’s appeal at the time was obviously the copious quantities of nudity. Today it’s a fascinating time capsule. It’s so very very 1970s. Guys with long hair. Women with hair, well you know where women had hair back then. 70s fashions. 70s cultural attitudes guaranteed to make twenty-somethings of today burst into tears. 1970s Sydney street scenes. Sydney’s notorious red-light district, King’s Cross, in all its seedy sleazy 70s glory. Surfer’s Paradise in the 70s. And that attitude to sex - that it was naughty but lots of fun.
No mondo film was ever meant to be taken seriously and this one is no exception. There’s some obviously genuine footage and plenty of obviously staged footage.
Lamond went on to make the best of all Emmanuelle clones, Felicity, in 1978.
I’d love to be able to report that there’s a fully restored special edition Blu-Ray but sadly that hasn’t happened. Your best bet is the old Umbrella Entertainment DVD double feature which also includes Lamond’s 1978 follow-up, The ABC of Love and Sex Australian Style (this DVD is still available). The transfer is letterboxed and not fantastic but this is the kind of movie that is more fun to watch if the print looks a bit scuzzy.
That time capsule element is certainly the reason to see this film. It’s just like being back in the 70s! If that appeals to you you’ll enjoy Australia After Dark.
The idea of a mondo film focused on sex was not exactly original back in 1976. British filmmakers Arnold L. Miller and Stanley A. Long made several in the 60s, beginning with West End Jungle (1961) and continuing with London in the Raw (1965), Primitive London (1965). Their sexy mondo films are actually quite entertaining.
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