Review of Private Lessons (1981) by Papallama — 02 Nov 2018

In this political drama an illegal immigrant is forced into the under-age sex trade to escape deportation to an unstable third world country, France. Private Lessons was directed by Alan Myerson and written by Dan Greenburg, both screenplay and novel. Yes, you heard me right, novel (Philly, Simon and Schuster, 1969).

Much like a perfect dream there are some boobs, sexual frustration, a nostalgic soundtrack (Clapton, Cougar, Air Supply, Rod Stewart three times, and Earth, Wind and Fire - was music free then too?) and a young Ed Begley Jr.

Ms. Nicole Mallow, well portrayed by Sylvia Kristel, coaxes a reluctant fifteen year old boy, Philly, to sleep with her because the family chauffeur, Lester, previously a disc jockey from Ohio, is threatening to have her deported to facilitate his poorly planned blackmail scheme. She complies because I guess she’s really horny too (as established in the title sequence) and because it’s what Philly so obviously wants and needs so he can become an even larger creeper by the end. Throughout the film he demonstrates this by looking at several older women through expensive cameras, telescopes and an old-timey spyglass and, also, just his eye-balls. Eventually, Ms. Mallow concocts the five-move checkmate that is the final act, trapping Lester at the bottom of a pre-TSA LAX elevator, in a perfectly executed queen-side Begley bluff. By the end of the film Lester has ceded his $10,000 blackmail money back to Philly, which would be $10,100 in today’s money. Lester would later redeem himself by teaching gifted but surly children in a school on an outer-borough of Manhattan.

Anthropologically, the film reveals American values and culture during the late-middle twentieth century. The title sequence features a voiced over date-rape in progress with Ms. Mallow’s legs in FM pumps slung over a couch. Ms. Mallow’s journey suggests women in vulnerable positions will trade on sex and once they do they might find they rather enjoyed it and come to consider it a fond experience, maybe falling in love a little bit, as some acoustic guitar strings raised in the soundtrack while the dialogue was lowered. But if they want to get out they better be damned clever.