Hiding behind a myriad of pseudonyms, the Cooper Brothers cranked out a seeming infinity of interchangeable porn flicks, highlighted only by crude-but-effective exercises in poor taste like GOLDEN BOYS OF THE SS and the infamous WET WILDERNESS. Emblematic of their devil-may-care attitude, credits are listed in the same font and interchangeably swapped between films - pseudonyms ultimately representing no one. For the desultory EAGER BEAVER, "Ted Most" gets the directing credit (having also "acted" in BUCK'S BIRTHDAY and "written/directed" Y'ALL COME), while Alec Reon, supposed auteur behind MORTGAGE OF SIN and SEX MUSEUM, is here listed as writer (a credit "he" shares only with the aforementioned GOLDEN BOYS).
What all this jabbering is to say is that these films, like their credits, are largely interchangeable, and it's clear - as though the movies themselves didn't make it so - that the creators cared little for most of them on any individual basis. Still, even by that low standard, EAGER BEAVER is more half-hearted than the majority: it has effectively no plot and even fails the ultimate porn test of being erotic. What passes for story follows Mary (Christine De Shaffer), whose husband John has developed a bad habit of privileging his office job over his marital duties. Left home alone after John goes to work, Mary hooks up with neighbor Sue and heads to the beach, where she frolics in the surf as Sue gets it on with handsome lifeguard Jim and his less appealing friend Steve. When John calls Mary to tell her he'll once again be working late (he's busy getting a hum job from his secretary), she and Sue decide to invite the lifeguards over. No prizes for guessing who decides to stop by on his way to a date at the movies...
Less a story than a succession of random incidents, BEAVER has nothing to offer from a narrative or character standpoint - it's strictly sex, half-heartedly performed. The problem is the Coopers are so lazy they can't even manage to get a sex scene right: their privileged angle is bed-level, like Ozu on his tatami mat, locking the camera down like Warhol and limiting themselves to zooms into portions of the action which are then intercut with returns to the wide shot. For some reason, they also seem to love positioning guys so they are leaning back with the woman mounting them, resulting in an angle limited to buttocks-and-penetration alone. A legitimate enough vantage point for inserts, this becomes maddening as the backbone of a sex scene, where it reduces to action to a pair of disembodied genitals. The result is not just useless as entertainment (natch), but even for the specific purpose for which it was designed - forget good art, this isn't even good porn! That's too bad, because some members of the cast are attractive, and one wonders what could have been made of them by a director with even the most marginal investment in the material.
What all this jabbering is to say is that these films, like their credits, are largely interchangeable, and it's clear - as though the movies themselves didn't make it so - that the creators cared little for most of them on any individual basis. Still, even by that low standard, EAGER BEAVER is more half-hearted than the majority: it has effectively no plot and even fails the ultimate porn test of being erotic. What passes for story follows Mary (Christine De Shaffer), whose husband John has developed a bad habit of privileging his office job over his marital duties. Left home alone after John goes to work, Mary hooks up with neighbor Sue and heads to the beach, where she frolics in the surf as Sue gets it on with handsome lifeguard Jim and his less appealing friend Steve. When John calls Mary to tell her he'll once again be working late (he's busy getting a hum job from his secretary), she and Sue decide to invite the lifeguards over. No prizes for guessing who decides to stop by on his way to a date at the movies...
Less a story than a succession of random incidents, BEAVER has nothing to offer from a narrative or character standpoint - it's strictly sex, half-heartedly performed. The problem is the Coopers are so lazy they can't even manage to get a sex scene right: their privileged angle is bed-level, like Ozu on his tatami mat, locking the camera down like Warhol and limiting themselves to zooms into portions of the action which are then intercut with returns to the wide shot. For some reason, they also seem to love positioning guys so they are leaning back with the woman mounting them, resulting in an angle limited to buttocks-and-penetration alone. A legitimate enough vantage point for inserts, this becomes maddening as the backbone of a sex scene, where it reduces to action to a pair of disembodied genitals. The result is not just useless as entertainment (natch), but even for the specific purpose for which it was designed - forget good art, this isn't even good porn! That's too bad, because some members of the cast are attractive, and one wonders what could have been made of them by a director with even the most marginal investment in the material.
