Not America, nor Africa, but the Lazio countryside provides the backdrop for this intricate story of death and more or less incestuous love affairs, inspired by the successful American film Mandingo.
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An Old South plantation owner lusts after his female slaves.Directed by Mario Pinzauti, who made a few things, but nothing of note.Clearly a take on the classic film "Mandingo" about a very sexual slave. This film, too, is taking place in the days of horse and buggy. And the word "master" is pronounced as "masser" -- why any black man would agree to appear in this film is beyond me (though I guess it has its moments).There is the theme that white men having sex with black women is okay, because they are property, but white women should not lower themselves to black men. It is an interesting race/sex dynamic, if you think about it. And, of course, it gets rejected. (Again, despite the film's name, there is just as much a "mandingo" as a "mandinga", if not more so.)
The Italians are undeniable masters in the questionable "art" of ripping off and imitating movies. What they do is take an innovative, money-making and foreign concept, maintain the basic plot and just add a whole lot of action, sleaze and political incorrectness. But what to do when the non-Italian original is already a reputedly notorious film and quite difficult to surpass in terms of slop and controversy? Well then, I guess, you simply disregard everything in terms of story-building or stylishness and fully focus on making something that is practically a porno movie! This Italian turkey was inspired by Richard Fleischer's successful slavery-saga "Mandingo", released one year earlier, but since the makers were even too lazy to think up a different title, you shouldn't expect anything that even remotely resembles a narrative depth, character drawings, unsettling atmosphere or thought-provoking statements regarding cross cultural relationships. "MandingA" is pure and simply a sexploitation effort where the plot only develops itself throughout the last ten minutes, in other words when you stopped caring a long time ago already. The characters in this film are a gathering of despicable bastards, which is of course to expect when you're dealing with wealthy and obnoxious white folks running a plantation in South America. The elderly and supremely sleazy owner of the place is a widower (who probably also won a couple of "Moustache-of-the-Year" awards) who exploits and extendedly whips the slaves working for him. His mistress, who if I understood correctly is also his cousin (?), is a genuine bitch of a woman who enjoys provoking arguments and sneaks out of the house overnight to copulate with crucified slaves. When the plantation owner's son returns from Europe, after approximately 25 minutes of purely wasted running time, the plot slightly begin to develop itself at last. The handsome young man has sex with the bitchy woman a couple of times (even in front of the slaves, supposedly to "demonstrate" how their masters do it ) but eventually he falls in love with the cherubic preacher's daughter. His romantic preference obviously makes the bitchy woman mad with anger, and she plots a horribly cruel act of vengeance that will alter life on the plantation forever. Hey I just realized this brief description of the plot actually makes "Mandinga" sound like an interesting film! Well, it's NOT and I apologize if I raised anyone's anticipations. It's an incredibly boring and hideous film to struggle through, but if the themes appeal to you, then definitely check out the aforementioned "Mandingo". Much rather than sick exploitation, that film is a truly insightful portrait of one of mankind darkest history pages and it was also a properly produced film, with real actors, great music and impressive filming locations. "Mandinga" has nothing, absolutely nothing to offer.
*SPOILER ALERT* *SPOILER ALERT*I bought this one for five bucks at my local video store. The cover has a white woman embracing a black man while he's chained up. Did someone order a sleaze sandwich? Yes sir! "Mandinga" is an Italian rip-off of "Mandingo" that is hot and ready to eat.As the movie begins, we see life on the plantation: Slaves getting whipped, slaves talking back and then promptly getting whipped. Lots of whipping. A white woman is lectured about how she should never lower herself and have sexual relations with a slave. Then she immediately has sex with a slave. The slave is chained up so she jumps on him. Well, at least the video box cover didn't lie. Soon the white man running the plantation has sex with a chained up slave woman. This is all in the first fifteen minutes. So besides interracial slave sex, what else does this movie have on it's mind? Not much. The plantation owner's son comes back from England. He is going to run the plantation and have sex. He falls for the local preacher's daughter and some family drama happens. More chained up slaves have sex with their masters. All in all, I counted about eight sex scenes. There is a nice, sordid vibe running through "Mandinga". I would bet there is another, harder version of this flick running around. But even this version was pretty strong for softcore. I can only recommend this one to the most fervent admirers of B-sleaze. Everyone else should avoid.
First viewed this film on 11/03/2002, and found the film humourous and pathetic, it didn't really deal with the real history of slavery it was mostly preoccupied with showing woman's breasts, a lot of frontal nudity, and sex, sex, sex, this was like a low budget, bad acting, very bad acting, badly dubbed cheap pornographic flick. Where did this guy go to film school??. A very bad imitation of the film 'Mandingo' starring American actor Perry King, and James Mason.