#1,768. The Brick Dollhouse (1967)

Directed By: Tony Martinez

Starring: Tina Vienna, Janice Kelly, Peggy Ann



Tag line: "Tormented by burning desire!"

Trivia: Because he purchased the film unfinished, Producer David F. Friedman had to direct several of the scenes himself








The music is groovy, the starlets are naked, and the story is as flimsy as a tissue in a hurricane. It must be another nudie cutie from the “Mighty Monarch of Exploitation”, producer David F. Friedman, and true to form, his 1967 offering The Brick Dollhouse gives us boobs galore, and not much else besides.

Exotic dancer Min Lee (Joyanna) has been murdered, and police Lt. Parker (George French) is bound and determined to find the one who killed her. So, he interrogates the victim’s roommates: Carmen (Tina Vienna), Danielle (Lee Cory), Sherry (Peggy West), Linda (Helena Clayton) and Sandy (Frankie O’Brien), a quintet of luscious babes who recount their experiences with the deceased, most of which involve a party of some kind. With few leads to go on, Lt. Parker finally gets the break he was looking for when he answers the all-important question: why was the victim wearing a red wig?

In the guise of a murder mystery, The Brick Dollhouse features nudity in just about every scene, which you’d think would be enough to hold the attention of every red-blooded guy in the audience. Well, it isn’t. Take, for example, the flashback sequence in which one of the girls is taking a shower. In close-up, we see her lather up her breasts, the water cascading down her back as she does so. But it doesn’t end there; we next follow the girl into the bedroom, where she puts on make-up (topless), then walks over to the dresser to decide what she’s going to wear (exposing her bare ass). After trying on a pair of pants, she changes her mind, and grabs another. In short, the scene plays on far too long. Yes, the actress has a great body, but when you find yourself shouting “Get on with it!” at a screen that has a naked girl on it, you know something is very, very wrong.

Aside from the shower sequence, The Brick Dollhouse gives us nude massages, stripteases, skinny-dipping (er…, make that skinny-splashing), orgies, a little S&M, sex on a pool table, and girl-on-girl action, all crammed into a scant 55 minutes. Yet when it’s over, you still come away feeling that half the movie was filler. The Brick Dollhouse is, indeed, a swinging ‘60s party, but if you decide to attend, be sure to bring some No-Doze along.