Movie Review: Unquestioning Obedience

Producer:
Mood Pictures (released in 2009)

Entire Story In Fewer Words Than Are In This Sentence:

Slaves in rich household get whipped

Victim Appeal:
"Unquestioning Obedience" is the first high-definition movie by Mood Pictures. Sadists (and masochists!) can now enjoy the extreme beatings which the company has become famous for at a resolution of 1280 x 720 pixels (the downloadable .wmv file comes at a massive 2.7 GB!). The Hungarians have assembled an impressively attractive cast of victims for this premiere, even by their own high standards. Half a dozen models get thrashed here, four with the cane and two with the single tail whip. One of them, Suzie Muller, is interesting for reasons that go beyond eye candy. I'll come to that in the last section of this review.

The video also marks the return of Angie Vicious. She's a pornstar (her "mainstream" name is Yvette Balcano) who used to top for Mood in the early days. After a break of three years, she is now back in action. And not a moment too soon - it really was getting a bit boring to watch Lady Jessica doing the brunt of the work in almost every release.

Gratuitous Sadism:
Mood Pictures love scenarios that harken back to the sexploitation films of the 1970's. Their first HD title is a variation on the "mistress of the mansion tortures her girls" theme, which they already covered in previous efforts like Schizo. Angie Vicious plays a rich lady who hires beautiful young girls as house slaves - in return for a large sum of money, they sign a "slave contract" for a certain period of time, which deprives them of all rights. Of course, such a contract would be illegal in almost every jurisdiction in the world, but hey... It's just a movie! So, the girls are kept behind bars, they must show "unquestioning obedience", and every little infraction is punished severely.

I'm not going to recount the entire story for you, but it's quite nicely done, actually. There are opening scenes with an applicant getting interviewed for the job, signing the contract and being introduced to the household. There are some great-looking sets, like the bedroom for the slaves with its black and white chessboard floor. I also liked the fact that there is a hierarchy among the girls - Jessica Lee and Miss Prince play "stable girls", higher-ranking slaves who act as overseers for the others.

Some of the "lesser" slaves, plus Miss Prince, get two demonstration strokes each with a crop in the early part of the movie. But the first proper CP scene stars Alisson Sew, a dark-haired model who takes 50 cane strokes from Lady Jessica while bent over her bed. Next up are Cassie Totta and Suzie Muller, two blondes. In the stable, they are whipped side by side by the husband of the mistress, played by Maximilian Lomp. It's back to the cane for the final three action segments, which take place in the living room of the mansion, with the victims tied to a frame made from wood and metal. Miss Prince, one of the stable girls, gets 50 strokes from Jessica. Then, it's Angie's turn to wield the cane. She gives 23 strokes (a merciful punishment) to Judith Gretto, the thin redhead who plays one of the new girls, and a full 50 strokes to Hannah Black, an exotic-looking, dark-haired maid.

All Mood Pictures titles of recent years feature a fairly large cast, and often, the results are somewhat hit and miss (literally as well as figuratively). However, "Unquestioning Obedience" is one of the cases where every single CP scene is good - in terms of action, it's one of the most consistent Pedro and Pablo productions I've seen in a long time. The thrashings are very hard as usual, they are mostly on target, the girls are beautiful and their reactions are nice to watch. Moreover, Jessica Lee, Max Lomp and Angie Vicious provide a good mix on the top side.

Best Reactions:
While all action scenes are good, the whipping of Cassie Totta and Suzie Muller is just absolutely unbelievably awesome. It really blew me away - I don't remember a CP scene coming this close to my idea of perfection since Rose Sardy's caning in the (otherwise mediocre) Elite Club Special Case by Elitepain. Actually, I probably haven't had a "Here is what I always wanted to see!" moment of this magnitude since watching the original Wild Party by Rigid East almost ten years ago. Which is interesting, because I thought I had seen it all by now.

It's also interesting because, at first sight, there are several reasons why this shouldn't be my favourite scene of the film, let alone one of my favourites of all time. To begin with, it's a single tail whipping of the back and the buttocks - I like the single tail well enough, but I prefer a thrashing of the buttocks only, ideally with the cane. Moreover, two girls get lined up side by side here - I usually hate that, I like a clear "focus" on one victim at a time. Thirdly, Miss Totta and Miss Muller are screaming their lungs out at full volume - and I usually hate such loud, hysterical reactions, too.

But somehow, all these "wrongs" add up to a near-perfect "right" here. Punishing two servants with the whip, at the same time, while they holler like banshees - in this context, set in a stable, as an episode in a tale about slavery, it all fits very nicely. The concept is great, as is the execution. The girls are gorgeous, they take one hell of a beating, Max Lomp does a fine job, there is a lot of verbal interaction between the three of them by Mood standards, the rhythm of the lashes is just right, so is the "crescendo" towards the end, and last but not least, the whole thing is beautifully lit and photographed.

It is also one of the most intense, gruelling scenes I've ever seen in a spanking film. Not the hardest in physical terms - Cassie and Suzie "only" take 50 whiplashes each, and while some blood is drawn, there are other Mood floggings that have produced far gorier results. However, in my judgment, they have never done anything as intense as this. Which goes to show you, once again, that there is more to severity than simply hitting hard. There is also the severity of the reactions: here, the girls' non-stop unisono screaming creates a veritable cacophony of anguish, and for once, that enhances the scene for me instead of ruining it. It really is one for the ages.

Best Line:
There aren't any really good lines here that I can remember. How about this one, spoken by the mistress to two girls who aren't renewing their contracts: "Every girl who is leaving us gets a last caning. Not for punishment, just as a token." And she genuinely means it in a nice way! Aaaaaw.

Nice Psychological Touch:

I liked how all three tops in the film are portrayed as having different motivations. The mistress has her ideas about discipline, but she has a sense of fairness and affection for her servants and isn't outright cruel. Her husband, on the other hand, simply enjoys beating the girls for the fun of it - even though he strenuously denies it and, in fact, punishes two of them for calling him a sadist behind his back. As for the stable girl, she just seems to be a careerist who follows orders (a "disgusting bootlicker" according to the other slaves). An accurate depiction of the real-life personalities of Angie, Max and Jessica? One wonders...

How Good Is It Really?

If this is an indication of what Mood Pictures have in store for 2010, then it could be their best year yet. "Unquestioning Obedience" is certainly their best film in a while, and I'm including the one I guest starred in (which, I thought, was also quite good, but didn't have the overall consistency). The setting is interesting, the lighting and the camerawork is good, the new HD format looks fabulous, the models are pure eye candy, and there are some excellent CP scenes - including The Whipping in the Stable, which is now one of my all-time favourite scenes. Truly a guilty pleasure.

What You Learned:

Ironically, the two girls from the best scene are missing from the credits, so I wrote to Pedro to find out their names. It seems to have been a dumb, honest oversight ("Fuck! You are right!"). Pedro wrote to me that Suzie Muller was "the surprise of the century" for him: she's beautiful (a platinum blonde with a great figure and a very spankable bottom), she has decent acting skills, and most impressively, she is genuinely kinky - one of a tiny handful of Mood models who aren't simply doing it for the money. After her action scene, she thanked Max Lomp for the whipping, which wasn't in the script. And during another shoot, for Elitepain (still unreleased), she was hungry for more strokes than originally planned - so they did an encore. Good girl! More of her, please.

Apparently, Pedro is now reconsidering his filmmaking philosophy a bit: "Well, who the fuck said that he doesn't like shooting with submissive girls? Was it me?" Goodness! I wonder what is next for Mood - movies with actual storylines, perhaps? Lots of dialogue? Character development? Life is full of surprises!