pictorial
European film makers, cagily aware of U.S. screen prudery, have long been shooting certain sequences twice. These are usually love scenes involving nudity or semi-nudity and a good deal of close personal contact between the actors concerned. Such scenes are enjoyed in the theatres of their home countries, but for American consumption, the actors put their clothes back on, move a "respectable" distance from each other, and an alternative version is photographed.
With the United Artists release, Cry Tough, Stateside producers are beginning to emulate their European colleagues, but backwards: spicy for export, bland for domestic use. Cry Tough co-stars beauteous Linda Cristal and fan-mag idol John Saxon in a stark story of Puerto Rican gang warfare in New York. Saxon and Cristal play some sizzling love scenes together, which will no doubt be applauded by European audiences, but not by American audiences, who will see only a toned-down, dressed-up version. There is one rather unlikely possibility that would make the overseas scenes available to the U.S., however, and it is interesting to consider. A recent Supreme Court decision on the French filmization of Lady Chatterley's Lover makes illegal the form of free-wheeling local screen censorship long tolerated in many parts of this country. A clever U.S. movie importer could conceivably, therefore, arrange with the European distributors to bring the rough Tough back as a "foreign film."
Far left: rising star Linda Cristal poses for the Playboy lens.
Above: a moment of quiet repose before beginning an intimate scene for the European version of Cry Tough with her co-star John Saxon.
Below, left: in the version for domestic distribution, Linda is modestly clab.
Below, right: she abandons the concealing robe and, for her European audiences only, puts on a transparent negligee.
Above: American version, with Lollobrigida-like Linda Cristal in a slip.
Below: the same sequence in the export version.
Linda is minus the slip as John Saxon moves closer for clinch.
