I am sure nearly everyone who reads this review has at least heard of Dr. Livingston and his missionary exploration of Africa, but a far more interesting contemporary, Richard Burton, has been nearly forgotten. Mountains of the Moon is the epic story of his journeys to Africa to discover the source of the Nile. Funded by the Royal Geographic Society, success meant that he would become wealthy from his memoirs. He traveled through land never seen before by a European in Eastern Africa, and dealt with some decidedly unfriendly natives and severe hardships along the way.

This is not what makes him such an interesting person, however. He was keenly interested in ancient cultures and beliefs, and the search for the Nile source was merely an excuse to get the funding required for his explorations. As the story opens, he is joined by John Hanning Speke, who is in it for the fame and riches. A man from a "good family," he was the second son, and so had essentially nothing but a good name. The two became friends under adversity, but eventually split mostly because of very different goals.

Burton was a linguist and a poet, and translated many Indian works of erotica. Fiona Shaw plays his wife, Isabel, who is seen naked in two very dark sex scenes. The screenplay was based on a biographical novel, and actual journals of Burton and Speke. The photography is at its best in the African expeditions, presenting a loving panorama of this mysterious continent and its customs. Great imagery, fine portrayals of fascinating characters, and plenty of action makes this one of the best historical epics I have seen.

Critics agree on 3.5 stars, and Apollo readers say 81%. IMDB readers have it at a very respectable 7.1/10. US gross was $4m.

And Justice For All is the preachy Al Pacino rant about the corruption and incompetence inherent in the US court system. Makes its points with exaggerated examples that border on bathos. Some people defend it as a satire holding up the mirror of distortion. Maybe, but if so, it's the least funny satire ever made. Would be a forgotten movie except that one of the greatest and most effusive actors in the world took it upon his shoulders and carried it to respectability.

• Allisha Council (1, 2, 3)

The poll results for the Top 10 Nude Scenes of 2000 are summarized here.

I still don't have the DVD version of The Five Senses, that Canadian art film thingy, but Dann does, and he did collages of the nude scenes from the Parkers, Mary-Louise and Molly.

• Mary-Louise Parker
• Molly Parker

Correction in the TomCat section: Celebrity Sleuth wrote in to say that yesterday's underwater scenes from Tomcat are not from Ecstasy, but are Maureen O'Sullivan in the original Tarzan. I guess TomCat was looking at some kind of program about the history of cinema nudity. The forest scenes are really Miss Lamarr in Ecstasy.

TomCat's project today is some seriously twisted shit. Florinda Bolkan and other women in the Eurotrash/sex/gore film "Flavia the Heretic" (1974) which has kind of a cheerful Hollywood ending - the heroine is skinned alive. Sounds a lot like a Sandra Bullock movie, doesn't it? Anyway, you should check these out if you enjoy seeing some softcore porn masquerading as art.

• Bolkan (1, 2)
• Other twisted and demented individuals. They are nuns but, and correct me if I'm wrong, I don't think these are the "koom-by-ya" type of nuns. (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)

The Encyclopedia Volume B, Number 8, is updated. 195 additions just in the little area from BOA to BOQ, including 50 or more than have never been in the Fun House (must be about 40 new ones of Daneen Boone alone. (These numbers represent only the new ones, and this is only one of 11 sub-volumes in volume B. When I finish with volume B later this week, it will have more than 3200 entries. There were 1600 at the end of 1999, so it doubled in the last year. The whole encyclopedia is right around 30,000 now, but I don't have an exact count at the moment. The back issues contain more than 80,000 pictures and the site, including scoopy.com, contains approximately five million words - about five times Tolstoy's lifetime output)

Shannon Tweed was also in Hard Vice (and ain't that a shocker? Dame Shannon in an erotic thriller. What next? Judi Dench in a James Bond movie?).

What strikes these eyes 'bout Rebecca Ferratti's scene is the pair of hands all over her boobs. (1, 2) Now that is truly a rarity, a playmate-turned-actress letting someone touch her boobs (Dame Shannon and the Oscar-award winning Teri Wiegel aside). Thought they all had contracts with a picture of their hooters and a note: Keepa you hands off. In fact, the only other occasion of manual-boobal contact is this scene from the Sidaris classic, Do or Die, with Roberta Vasquez playing the touchee.

Dona Speir was in Do or Die, changing clothes in an airplane, for the second time in a Sidaris movie (the other time was Hard Ticket to Hawaii. Don't ask why I remember this crap). So far, two movies with two playmates in each. So you see? They do travel in pairs, kind of like nuns.

Or in triplets sometimes, because that uber-cutie Cynthia Brimhall was also in Do or Die. Apparently they Did and Lived, because their were about fourteen more Sidaris movies starring this trio.

The herd mentality was broken in the next two movies. Sandy Johnson in Jokes My Folks Never Told Me. (1, 2, 3, 4) Sent in a single collage of her a while back. Here is the rest of Sandy's toplessness. Not the most beautiful woman to ever grace the Hefner publication, but she had a first-rate recreational body. And Lynda Wiesmeier in R.S.V.P. (1, 2) Lynda was not exactly my own taste in women but I can appreciate that she aroused certain feelings among many guys.

Well, RSVP is an obscure little movie with a truckload of nudity (the conversion from metric tonne to truckload has to be worked out fully, which accounts for a NASA mishap or two), but it is nowhere near as obscure as the next two:

Marlene Jannsen in School Spirit. Miss Marlene had the most impressive legs in the history of upright primates. They made Anna Kournikova's look like stubby little tree trunks. Here we get to see mainly her much less impressive upper body parts. There is another truck load of nudity in School Spirit, which I promise to post one of these fine days. (1, 2)

And we end with the sine qua non of horror cinema, Blood Mania (1970), starring two playpersons Reagan Wilson (1, 2, 3) and Vicki Peters. (1, 2) See, even back then they traveled in pairs. Well, that's not strictly true 'cuz Reagan had already been a playperson (sometime in '67) whereas Vicki wouldn't appear with a staple in her navel until 1972. So it goes for today. Tomorrow, a seriously obscure little thing starring Kim Morris and every nekkid scene of Barbara Edwards brilliant career.