It was 10:30 p.m. on a Saturday. I dragged myself out of bed (yes,
BED), lured an unsuspecting friend into my automobile, and headed to
the Grand Illusion for the late-night showing of Pets (part of
its series of extremely obscure ’70s exploitation movies, continuing
this weekend with Teenage Hitchhikers). The film nerds arrived
in ones and twos—nary a female to be seen. I was the only lady
for miles! Had I foolishly stumbled into some real-life
sexploitations? I wished I knew what the fuck sexploitation meant so
that I could avoid being sexploited.
The projectionist, shy behind his beard, addressed us like so: “Due
to some severe water damage, I had to cut out about five minutes. But
it won’t really affect the plot.” We laughed.
“Plot.”
Unless you’re super into dog murder and lady-on-doughy-old-dude
rape, Pets is not so very sexy. But it is historically
fascinating. It seems that back in 1974, when I was but a wee
negative-8-year-old future-baby, ladyfolk were up to nothing but
shenanigans. Ladies wanted to, you know, have jobs and “wear the
pants” and maybe even be active participants in their own lives. But at
the same time, ladies were still totally sexy, even in
masculine trouser pants! “CONFUSING!” shouted the dudes. And that
confusion begat Pets.
Bonnie (Candice Rialson) is on the run—which means, literally,
she’s running, underpants in hand. The vacant-eyed fugitive is
basically the walking dead, and she indifferently bounces along with
every (sexy) circumstance. Eventually, she shacks up with Geraldine, an
artist looking for a live-in figure model (she pays in room, board,
and LESBIANISM). When she’s not baking muffins wearing nothing but
an apron, Geraldine proceeds to create history’s most hideous painting
of Bonnie, which catches the eye of Vincent, an art dealer who looks
like Mark Hamill (post janky facial reconstruction).
Okay. Then there’s this whole amazing part where Bonnie sexploits a
hot knife-wielding hobo, but let’s just skip ahead, shall we? Everyone
ends up in Vincent’s basement where he keeps his dark sex menagerie
(including, hilariously, a squirrel named Diane, and Aphrodite, who is
some sort of emu). He’s lured Bonnie and Geraldine there with lines
like, “Perhaps it would change your mind if I offered you an unusual surprise?” and now he wants to keep them
in a cage and hit them with a whip! As his Pets!
Vincent is cast as the villain, and he gets his comeuppance (kind
of), but you can’t miss the film’s tacit agreement with his
anxiety: “Women treat men like animals, don’t they? Taking over
their jobs… masquerading as lawyers and politicians!” Because, after
all, Bonnie (our heroine) isn’t a lawyer or a politician so much as she is a RETARDED, FLESHY COAT HANGER FOR AN INVISIBLE
BLOUSE. This is the funniest movie I have ever seen. 
