Sam Panico What happens when you combine British portmanteau films, William S. Burroughs cut-up techniques, 1970's philosophy, British men's magazines like Mayfair and throw in a mummy? You get a sheer burst of pure insanity like Bizarre.Also known as Secrets of Sex, the film starts with the story of a king who found his wife's lover and trapped him in a chest. This theme of trapping lovers carries on throughout the film.But never mind all that. Let's meet our narrator — a mummy voiced by Valentine Dyall (The Haunting, Bedazzled and the voice of Count Karnstein in Lust for a Vampire). He's here to tell us all about the battle of the sexes. Just listen to his words, as half-naked women and men fill the screen, one at a time: "Imagine you were making love to this girl. Imagine you were making love to this boy. Imagine you were making love to this girl. Imagine you were making love to this boy. Imagine you were making love to this girl. Imagine you were making love to this boy. Imagine you were making love to this girl. Imagine you were making love to this boy. Imagine you were making love to this girl. Imagine you were making love to this boy. Imagine you were making love to this girl. Imagine you were making love to this boy. Imagine you were making love to this girl. Imagine you were making love to this boy. Imagine this girl was making love to you. Imagine this boy was making love to you. Imagine this girl was making love to you. Imagine this boy was making love to you. Imagine this girl was making love to you. Imagine this boy was making love to you. Imagine this girl was making love to you. Imagine this boy was making love to you. Imagine this girl was making love to you. Imagine this boy was making love to you. Imagine this girl was making love to you. Imagine the consequences."We're then on the front row of this battle, with women in underwear facing off with me grasping machine guns. The women have vegetables thrown at them as the men advance. One of the women, a blonde, stares down the men, who fall to her beauty before she removes a straight razor from between her legs.Alright — let me be perfectly honest. Your ability to enjoy this film totally depends on the amount of drugs in your system, how late you're watching it and your tolerance for 1970's experimental filmmaking. If you're been reading this site for any length of time, you know that this movie was pretty much made for me and sent forward 47 years into the future.

rdoyle29 A strange little film that's a bit like a softcore sex version of "The Twilight Zone". A mummy hosts a series of odd horrorish stories involving sex ... a woman photographing a series of pictures of medieval torture devices really tortures her male model; a female burglar has sex with the man of the house and robs him anyway; and so on. It's somewhere between a brainy sex film and a fairly lame horror anthology. Director Anthony Balch had previously worked with William S. Burroughs, which isn't all that far off from the tone of this one.

LostHighway101 A challenging collage of psychedelic scenarios which push the viewer closer and closer (even though it most often feels further and further) from its ultimate revelation of the secret of sex.Highly thematic, "Bizarre" transcends its exploitation by fusing ideas of life, death, and afterlife with a pulpy and extremely weird stories and scenarios. As far as 70s Britsploitation goes, you can't get a more distinct trip than this (obviously it has to be viewed with an appreciation for the genre).It is also a likely inspiration for "Tales From the Crypt" as its narrator (Valentine Dyall) is a talking British mummy; a hilariously-campy but extremely well-executed idea.

gavcrimson SPOILERS INCLUDED Antony Balch was the famed abominable showman of the swinging London era- as a distributor and cinema programmer his niche lay in retitling Euro-sexploitation fare with 'bums on seats' titles like Do You like Women, Don't Deliver Us From Evil, When Girls Undress and The Weird Weirdo. In the early months of 1970 Balch released his own first feature length film, a contentious film about the battle of the sexes, executed in portmanteau style. Supremely offbeat by nature- Secrets of Sex has survived all these years essentially in anecdote form- not that its hard to see why- for no one forgets the only British sex film narrated by an Egyptian Mummy easily. Locked in a chest to hide from the husband of his lover, the narrator ended up buried alive- emerging thousands of years later as a Mummy who has observed the war of the sexes and become drawn to the more 'bizarre aspects of human behaviour'. Voiced by Valentine Dyall the Mummy watches a girl strip, theres further cut- aways to lovely ladies and shirtless men with machine guns- over which the Mummy repeats 'imagine you were making love to this girl, imagine you were making love to this boy' as a form of mantra atypical of the films ambiguous sexual view. 'When the Saints go Marching in' is heard as go-go dancing girls get cabbages and tomatoes thrown in their direction- the machine gun men advance, a girl draws a cut-throat razor- the battle of the sexes begins. Our man in bandages laments how people 'will go to any lengths to get what they want' with that we're spirited off to a photoshoot with a torture chamber theme. A male model feigns pain for an older photographer who seems a little too much into her work- the creepy situation is added to by her assistant, a not unattractive girl who nevertheless comes across as a Caligari somnambulist. 'Norma go get me the Spanish horse' she says prompting the arrival of this torture device- a sort of hobby horse with a blade down the middle which the suspended victim has to straddle- gradually the horse will dissect its victim between the legs (ouch). The ghastly inevitable happens with the model left to die this horrible death in the contraption while the women chat away during dinner, returning to find a dead bloody mess that makes the perfect book cover- some people really do have to suffer for their art. With horror movie shots of lightening we're onto the second tale- Mary-Clare a female scientist despises her older husband Sacha for his greed and privilege. Sacha longs for a son but when Mary-Clare discovers she carries a defective gene she knowingly gives birth to a freak monster son instead- raise that thing daddy-O. Next up a young man catches a female thief looting his house 'Christ, a bird'. The allure of the bad girl proves too much for our Genet reading hero who joins her in an amorous shower and some risque bedroom antics. After sex, the girl continues robbing, he threatens to call the police but both know things have gone a little too far for that- they won't buy his story but the girl drawing his attention to a picture of his wife imagines someone will. Following that is a detour into the misadventures of spy Lindy Leigh-Agent 28 complete with comic book like intertitles charting her missions - whether its donning white knickers to creep around a foreign embassy or checking out 'Bedroom Beauties of 1929' a nudie silent farce- in a sex cinema. Lindy seduces a military attache, slipping him a mickey finn 'sleep well sweet jerk' and tries her hand at topless safecracking, only to end up locked in the safe where she finds agents 1 to 27 'that military attache wasn't so stupid after all'. Then we have 'the strange young man' who rings up for a call girl- enter little dolly Sue Bond- whose bemused by this nerds attempts at 'hip' speak which includes referring to her as 'pigeon'- but all goes wrong when he gets out his pet lizard 'Pangy' telling her how permissive it would be if the reptile watched or better still joined in their lovemaking. 'Not for all the coffee in China' is Sue up for the geeks plan and makes for the door while he considers writing to the Financial Times- outside Sue runs into an old women saying sweet nothings to her own lizard 'beddy byes'. Finally a dotty dear relates how she imprisoned the souls of former lovers in potted plants to her valet- the one way conversation turns to the one man who escaped her. He is, of course the valet who strangles her 'die you filthy, alien garbage heap'. Arriving full circle back to the machine gun men and the go-go girls 'armies are disarmed' and the battle turns into a free for all orgy intercut with shots of fireworks- 'so it goes on, and on, and on'. Secrets of Sex encapsulates every aspect of Balch's gloriously outrageous career- from his early experimental shorts made with William Burroughs, to his life long love of horror movies and the censor-baiting exploitation film distributor. Mostly-improvised the film comes across as a freaky yet very personal chain of thought, spanning everything from the sweet Lindy Leigh episode to horrific imagery that rivals any 1970 horror movie- a dynamic penchant for tongue in cheek humour cuts through the film like its mascot spanish horse. An incredible headtrip to lay on audiences- Secrets of Sex lives up to everything you'll ever read about the film and Balch himself who by all accounts, was as colourful as his films. Secrets of Sex is a terrific film for people who like their movies with a healthy disregard for normality.