Jo Ann Harris nudography.

Here I go again, with another obscure actress. I actually watched all of these films yesterday, and made all new clips. They are all in Blu-Ray quality except The Gay Deceivers, which is a DVD clip.

I haven’t thought about Jo Ann in decades, but in re-watching these films, I realized that she was a real babe, and although most of these films were awful, Julie did a good enough job in all of them. Her range was limited, but what she did, she did well.

1969 – The Gay Deceivers. (5.9 at IMDb. WAY overrated. It would be a weak episode of Three’s Company.) It’s a Vietnam-era comedy about two frat boys who pretend to be gay to avoid the draft. It’s filled with stale jokes and embarrassing stereotypes. Jo Ann was 19 or 20. She played the sister of one of the guys and tried to seduce the other. When the seduced guy couldn’t … er … cut the mustard, she started to suspect that the guy and her brother were really gay.

The two leads are two of the worst actors I’ve ever seen. Their mincing, while offensive, is much more natural than when they are being “themselves.”

The better actor of the two, Kevin Coughlin, died in an auto accident, at age 30.

I think Larry Casey is still alive, but I don’t know what he does now. His IMDb credits stopped more than 30 years ago.

1971 – The Beguiled (7.2 at IMDb). This Clint Eastwood film was the only one of the films that was watchable. “While recuperating in a Confederate girls’ boarding school, a Union soldier cons his way into each of the lonely women’s hearts, causing them to turn on each other, and eventually, on him.” Jo Ann, now about 22, plays one of the lonely women. It’s a film with no appealing characters, too little action, and perhaps too much psychological depth. Director Don Siegel was a frequent Eastwood collaborator in that era.They did five films together including Dirty Harry. This movie is competent, but I’d rather watch the Siegel/Eastwood shoot-em-ups than this arty, emotional stuff. Eastwood usually plays an anti-hero, but in this one he just plays a bitter and sometimes whiny jerk.

1971 – The Sporting Club. (5.2 at IMDb) An incoherent, chaotic film about a sociopath who just wants to destabilize and destroy the Centennial Club, a summer sporting resort for snooty upper-class Michigan families. The Thomas McGuane novel was probably unfilmable, but in 1971, anything anti-establishment could be pitched and sold. I did enjoy seeing Jack Warden playing his usual character, reminding me of “Normie, Normie, Normie. Hockey, Normie.”

Camera operator John Courtland worked on Bullitt, Getting Straight, Papillon and the first Superman film. He was good. Better than good. His talent was wasted here, but the camera work is technically perfect. The film looks absolutely beautiful in Blu-Ray. Most important to us, Jo Anne’s upper body looks spectacular in perfect lighting, even in a night scene.

1971 – Based on two nude scenes in 1971, the rabbit mag chose her as one of the highlights of “Sex in Cinema, 1971”:

1974 – Act of Vengeance. (5.5 at IMDb) Original name: The Rape Squad. A group of women who have been victims of rape form a club to learn martial arts and take vigilante revenge on rapists and perverts who have avoided the grasp of the law. Pure amateur hour. Jo Ann is the only one of the women who can deliver a line naturally, but there’s a lot of nudity to hold your attention.

1982 – Deadly Games (4.1 at IMDb.) Just a typical 1980s slasher flick. “A woman falls to her death after getting attacked by a black-clad assailant. Her sister arrives in town and starts dating a police detective, who’s friends with a strange movie theater curator, as other women fall prey to the killer.”

As you’ll see in the film clips, Jo Ann’s best nudity was almost impossible to see. It was a peeping tom sequence and they reduced the image down to show it in the peeper’s eye.

As you can see, they did go to the trouble of getting her naked (or rather getting her character naked, but I don’t know whether it’s Jo Ann). Sadly, they totally wimped out on sharing it.

There was some additional nudity:

There was also a shower scene behind frosted glass that is not pictured here, but is included in the film clips.

All videos here.