Cool Ass Cinema Book Reviews: Mandingo, Book & Film

MONDO MANDINGO: THE FALCONHURST BOOKS & FILMS

By Paul Talbot

306 pages; softcover; B/W; first edition 2009

Fantastic volume on the Antebellum Era trash novel by Kyle Onstott (and its subsequent novels from other authors); and the two films that broke the chains of the printed page onto the silver screen in the mid-1970s. Hard to put down, Talbot's meticulous approach to his subject will easily enslave the reader's attention, allowing only to turn the page till the last of the paperback is reached.

In the late 50's, there began a titillating series of novels detailing the lurid, sexually charged, and violent circumstances occurring on slave breeding plantations in the pre-Civil War South. The entire series of scandalous books sold millions and led to one of the most controversial movies of the 1970's.

Paul Talbot (author of the likewise recommended BRONSON'S LOOSE! THE MAKING OF THE DEATH WISH FILMS) has taken up the arduous task of amassing virtually any and every piece of background information on both the provocative, sizzling novels--and everything you would ever want to know about the feature films, MANDINGO (1975) and its far more exploitative sequel, DRUM (1976).

Those involved in the production of the two films (both in front of, and behind the camera) reveal the controversy and the difficulties bringing the two films to the big screen. Talbot also goes the extra mile in detailing other cinematic entries in the salacious sub-genre of slavesploitation.

Over the course of its 306 info-filled pages, those with a taste for the exploitative and wild side of sinema will come away with a more enlightened sense of the popular (as well as critically revered and reviled) series of novels; and their shaping of a controversial film style during the era in which they were made.