Review: Love Letters of a Portuguese Nun

Duplicitous and depraved Father Vincente (William Berger) spots virginal Maria Rosalia (Susan Hemingway) and uses his holy stature to con her family into taking her to the local convent to ‘save her soul’. In reality, Father Vincente is a pervert and the nunnery is a front for Satanists, headed by the cruel Mother Alma (Ana Zanatti) who is fond of torture. This poor girl is in some decidedly unholy company.

I’m not remotely a connoisseur of the so-called Nunspoloitation subgenre of sexploitation films. However, this 1977 entry into that subgenre is certainly a lot livelier than my previous excursion into Nunsploitation, the completely tedious and tame “The Sinful Nuns of St. Valentine”. Although it’s neither the most risqué, nor best film on his uber-prolific resumé, the presence of Spanish sleaze director Jesus Franco (“Vampyros Lesbos”, “She Killed in Ecstasy”) at the helm probably gives this trashy, kinky item a bit of a lift for the so-inclined. I’m not quite as inclined as some of you might be, as I’m not into the whole sadism/torture/S&M thing, but I must admit the film is so bonkers I couldn’t help but be somewhat interested in it. These nuns aren’t just kinky nymphos, they’re Satanists too!

I did wish it were more genuinely erotic and sexy, as even the Sapphic content here is held back by poor editing, with Franco throwing us into the ‘action’ featuring characters we don’t know and without context. So it didn’t really work for me so much on that level as some of Franco’s other films, though it’s still quite explicit and the climactic orgy is probably the highlight on sexual terms. It’s really something. The inevitable finale is pretty memorable too, with someone set to be burned alive for their sins.

In terms of acting, William Berger immediately impresses as the duplicitous, depraved and creepy Father Vincente. Berger is campy as hell, but you take what you can get in a Franco film from an acting standpoint, and he’s clearly the best actor here. I also enjoyed the completely nutty high priestess Mother Alma, played by a very game Ana Zanatti. I had a different kind of enjoyment in the performance by Herbert Fux as Satan. Whether intentional or not, I found his performance to be very, very funny. As bonkers as the whole thing is, it really gets nuts once Satan enters the picture. Apparently veteran Nazi villain player Anton Diffring is in here somewhere as an old priest, but I must confess to not spotting him, and pale-eyed Diffring ain’t easy to miss. A then 17 year-old Susan Hemingway is fairly forgettable in the lead role, but the only real dud is her hunky wannabe saviour, played by Hermann Krippahl.

Like a lot of Franco films it looks and sounds a lot better than you’d expect given the genre and material. He was a sleazy exploitation filmmaker who over-indulged in the zoom lens on occasion, but he was never a total hack like an Ed Wood or Al Adamson. In fact, from a production value and cinematography standpoint this one’s not all that far off from Hammer Studios in quality.

If you’re into the kinkier side of softcore entertainment you’ll probably enjoy this crazy film a bit more than I did as it’s quite well-made on many fronts for what this is. It’s clearly very much the film that Mr. Franco intended. Franco’s unique, bizarro vision and good work by William Berger are the chief assets here for me. I wish it had been a lot sexier and certainly it needed a better editor. Still, this is competent trash, and there’s definitely an audience for it. Beware of any cut versions of the film, I believe the version I saw was uncut. The screenplay is by Erwin C. Dietrich (The infamous “Ilsa, The Wicked Warden”, Franco’s “Women Without Innocence”) and Christine Lembach (Franco’s “Caged Women”), with a presumably very, very loose connection to a real-life situation.

Rating: C+