Page 171 - Alternative Europe Eurotrash and Exploitation Cinema Since 1945

FIGURE 33 Attentive and deadly: Gemset in Emanuelle and the Last Cannibals (1977)

Under D'Amato's direction, even the more innocently titled films from the series continued the
tradition of immersing the heroine in death and decay. For instance, Emanuelle in America finds the
reporter investigating a trans-continental snuff-movie ring, where women are raped and tortured on-
screen. This film, with its frequent and unmotivated oscillation between sexual pleasure and death not
only reiterates the heroine's connection to the monstrous, but also provides an interesting overview of
the way in which the series manipulated the motifs of eroticism. Although one of the more extreme
examples from rhe series, a witnessed act of intercourse combining eroticism with either humiliation,
violence or implied threat remains central to the series as a whole.

DEADLIER THAN THE MALE: BLACK MAGIC, BLACK BODIES, BLACK COBRA

The tensions around monstrous sex that the cycle displays are also present in Black Cobra (D'Amato,
1976). Although not strictly an example of the Black Emanuelle series, the film clearly draws on Gemser's
established (and increasingly monstrous) 'black' persona. She is cast as Eva, a woman who performs an
erotic routine with snakes at a Bangkok nightclub. The film details Gemser's ill-fated relationship with
the wealthy Judas and his treacherous brother Julius. This bizarre love triangle ends with the heroine
plotting a deadly revenge against the latter after he murders her white lesbian lover Gerry.
While this plot overview indicates that Gemser becomes once again associated with death and
the macabre, Black Cobra also demonstrates the elements of ambiguity surrounding racial and sexual

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