Movie Reviews

Inspired by a true story, “Salon Kitty” is Tinto Brass’ movie about the Third Reich’s decadence. Brass once said that this film was about denuding power and you can take that quite literally because most of the time this movie is about Nazis taking off their clothes.

Madame Kitty (Ingrid Thulin)  runs a luxurious brothel where Nazis like to get down and party. When Kitty is ordered by SS official Helmut Wallenberg (Helmut Berger) to start a new brothel with him, she has no choice but to go along with the plan. What she doesn’t know is that Wallenberg wired the whole thing and recruited a bunch of girls that are loyal to the cause in an attempt to find out who has dissenting opinions about Hitler’s regime when their guard is down along with their pants.

Margherita (Teresa Ann Savoy), one of the young prostitutes working for Kitty, is extremely devoted to both her job and her country. However, when she falls in love with Biondo (John Steiner), a German officer disillusioned by both the warm and the Nazi regime, and finds out the purpose of “Salon Kitty”, she sets out to bring the whole operation down with the help of Kitty.

When reading the three previous paragraphs, you might think that the story is coherent enough… but it isn’t. It’s confusing and you hardly get to know any of the characters. Basically, “Salon Kitty” is just another way for Brass to show a lot of titties, butts and pubes. And I don’t know about you but there’s nothing even remotely sexy about seeing a girl having sex with a dwarf or an amputee.
This one might have been shocking back when it was first released in the seventies, but nowadays you can see it for what it is… a poorly made exploitation movie that takes itself way too seriously.