1974's Alice Goodbody, writer/director Tom Scheuer's comedic tale of a would be actress who falls in with casting couch auditions and horny Hollywood power players, is an appropriately scathing poke at the American movie industry machine. It's also pretty damn funny and it features an interesting cast sure to appeal to any fan of seventies drive-in cinema.

Sharon Kelly (probably better known as her XXX alias, Colleen Brennan), plays the titular Alice, a gorgeous redhead who works a day job at a Los Angeles diner run by a Mr. Popadopalous (played by the mighty Vic Ceaser, immortalized in Duke Mitchell's Massacre Mafia Style). Like many others, however, Alice wants to make it as an actress. When she meets a production manager named Myron Mittleman (David Kaufman) who sees in her a spark of talent, she leaves her job for a chance to work as an extra on the upcoming production of Julius Caesar, Crowd Pleaser. Things don't quite work out as she had envisioned them, but with the fire lit, she's not going to give up on her dreams without a fight.

Not quite able to make it just on the merits of her thesping alone, Alice realizes that she's got other ways of getting the attention of Hollywood moguls as she sleeps her way through a production manager named Arnold Nern (Norman Sheridan), a director named Roger Merkel (George 'Buck' Flower), a leading man named Rex Livingston (Keith McConnell), a director named J.C. Van Himmel (Norman Fields) and eventually a studio head named Manny Spearman (Arem Fisher).

A strange mix of slapstick and raunchy sex comedy, Alice Goodbody works far better than it probably had any right to. Thanks to Kelly's charisma in the lead role, it's hard not to like Alice and hope she's able to make it one way or another. Of course, we're hip to the fact that she's maybe not the sharpest tool in the shed but we still want her to get her shot. While she spends almost as much time injuring herself with her clumsy ways as she does bumping uglies with various parodies of the Hollywood elite, Kelly nails the role so well that you do wind up feeling for her. On top of that, Kelly is obviously quite comfortable in her own skin, which stands to reason as she shows a lot of it here. A regular in softcore sex films throughout the seventies before going the hardcore route as Colleen Brennan and becoming a staple of eighties era big bust fans, Kelly's about as foxy as foxy can be in this picture. Fans of her formidable figure will certainly appreciate the fact that she spends much of its running time gallivanting about in her birthday suit.

While Sharon Kelly is the real start of the show, you've got to hand it to Scheuer for assembling a pretty interesting supporting cast. The aforementioned Vic Ceaser is always a blast to watch, he also contributed to the film's score. If his presence wasn't enough, there's the presence of the inimitable George 'Buck' Flower, a man who appeared in pretty much every type of movies under the sun, from Ilsa - Harem Keeper Of The Oil Shieks to Delinquent School Girls (which also starred Sharon Kelly) to TV shows like Power Rangers later in his career. Lorna Thayer from Five Easy Pieces even has a small role as a wardrobe chief who, just like pretty much everyone else in the film, wants a piece of Alice for herself.

With enough character development to hold out interest and enough slapstick comedy to tickle our collective funny bone, Alice Goodbody is smarter and better than most sex comedies. It still deals in lowbrow humor but that can be a plus rather than a minus depending on how you look at it, while Scheuer's script provides enough interesting people and set pieces that the film breezes by. It might not be an undiscovered classic, but it's a good bit of sexy fun with a stand out performance from the lovely Sharon Kelly.

NOTE: The following review is based on a test disc that may or may not represent final, finished, retail product.

Code Red presents Alice Goodbody in a good 1.78.1 anamorphic widescreen transfer. The color reproduction looks pretty accurate and while the black levels probably could have been a bit darker, this is probably more to do with the source material than the transfer. Detail is fine for an older low budget feature and only mild print damage is noticeable. You can't really call it reference quality but given the age and obscurity of the picture there's really nothing to complain about here, the movie looks pretty good and it's nice to see it in its proper widescreen aspect ratio.

The Audio:

The audio chores are handled by a English language Dolby Digital Mono track. There's the odd pop in the mix and some really minor fluctuations in the levels but otherwise things generally sound just fine. The score and sound effects all sound okay and the dialogue is clear enough and easy to understand. The film shows its age in that it has got a fairly limited range but you can't fault it for that.