“Trader Hornee” (1970)

Studio: Entertainment Ventures Inc.
Starring: Buddy Pantsari, Elisabeth Monica, John Alderman, Deek Sills
Directed by: Jonathan Lucas
Rated: X
Running Time: 84 min.

Synopsis: A group goes to Africa to search for a girl who has been missing in the country since she was a child.

REVIEW

Chris Woods

Trader Hornee is one of David F. Friedman’s many sexploitation films from the 60’s and 70’s. This is one of Friedman’s well-known soft-core sex comedy films that he produced. It is a very entertaining film in some parts, in others it is dumb or silly, and it is filled with lots of T&A and soft-core sex. The film is a great example of what a sexploitation film was like in the 70’s.

The movie is about a private dick named Hamilton Hornee, played by Buddy Pantsari from TV’s Combat. He is hired to find a missing girl somewhere in Africa. Many years ago she was with her parents who were zoologists looking for the great white ape. During their search they were killed by an African tribe and the little girl was pronounced missing. She would now be twenty-one years old and entitled to her rich family’s estate. Hornee is hired to go to Africa and see if she is still alive. If she is not, her cousin and his wife get the money. Hornee and a few others go there and search all through the jungle to find the lost girl.

Of course with rating a movie like this you are not expecting it to have a great story, acting, and photography. That is not their job to deliver that or have that their high priority. It is a skin film and it has to have lots of sex and nudity to make it a good sexploitation film and that it does. There are plenty of beautiful babes that take it all off in the hot steaming jungle. Although I did read that there are some copies of the film that cut a lot of the T&A and sex scenes out. The version that I viewed had a lot in it, but I noticed when watching the trailer there were more sex scenes shown that were not in the cut I saw.

As far as the story goes it is very funny and entertaining at times. The cast actually has good comedic timing and they play their roles pretty well. The film was of course not shot in Africa, but they were able to disguise it well by shooting in a wooded area that looked like a jungle. Also, they were lots of stock footage used to show some wild animals. The whole movie kind of reminded me of an episode of Gillian’s Island, well, an adult version that is. Just the humor and bits they did plus the setting had a Gillian’s Island vibe. Other parts were kind of stupid and the ending was rushed and didn’t really follow through.

All in all this is a sexploitation film from the master of grindhouse, David Friedman and a good film regarding the T&A factor just with a decent story. It is a good piece of history from that genre and time. Friedman would go on to make other great exploitation and sexploitation films throughout the 70s and Trader Hornee is one of his good ones.