Intrepid and sexually voracious photojournalist Emanuelle (the insanely luscious and captivating Laura Gemser) takes on a dangerous assignment concerning violence against women in various male-dominated societies. During her investigation Emanuelle uncovers a sordid underworld that includes a white slavery ring, prostitution, a bogus Indian sex cult, bondage, lesbianism, degenerate American politicians, vicious rapists, and even a little bestiality. Director Joe D'Amato, working from a scrupulously kinky and depraved script by Maria Pia Fusco and Gianfranco Clerici, delivers oodles of tasty female nudity and scorching hot soft-core sex set pieces while relating the blithely trashy story at a snappy pace and maintaining a suitably seamy tone throughout. This picture further benefits from a sturdy cast of reliable Italian exploitation cinema regulars: Voluptuous blonde bombshell Karin Schubert as Emanuelle's gutsy reporter rival Cora Norman, Ivan Rassimov as the dashing and helpful Dr. Malcolm Robertson, George Eastman as smarmy and lecherous charlatan Guru Shanti, and the fetching Brigitte Petronio as the perky'n'pretty Mary. Legendary porn stud Paul Thomas pops up in a quick bit as a randy truck driver. The exotic globe-trotting locations add an extra tart'n'tangy flavor. Nico Fidenco's funky throbbing score does the get-down groovy pulsating trick. D'Amato's glossy cinematography provides a pleasing polished sheen. Well worth seeing for Emanuelle fans.

Emanuelle Around the World seems to be a direct sequel to D'Amato and Gemser's most notorious collaboration, Emanuelle in America, with Emanuelle returning from the paradise island she escaped to at the end of that film and going on, believe it or not, an even more extraordinary adventure. The film begins with her making love on a Louis VVI bed, but this luxurious piece of furniture is in the back of a removals van in which Emanuelle is hitching a lift from the hunky driver. There's something curiously postmodern about the image of the antique being transported in a large van across contemporary America, and the scene sets in motion a series of dizzying and equally postmodern conundrums in the shape of the many adventures of our photo-journalist heroine. The trucker deposits Emanuelle at a luxury hotel in San Francisco, and in the lobby we meet a different black Emanuelle than we have seen before – she's impatient and rude to the concierge, and we wonder why our normally sanguine and affect-less heroine is on such a short fuse. She meets a fellow journalist, the feminist Cora Norman, and finds out that her friend is onto a story about female exploitation. A sexual encounter with a UN envoy persuades Emanuelle that her work ought to have a more political edge, and her experiences during her next job – exposing a phony love guru in India – push her into activism, but not before she has re-established herself as part of the consumer West by doing a pile of shopping.The sequence with the guru is a remarkable set piece. Filmed in a Hindu temple, the avatar of love instructs his disciples in delayed orgasm building towards spiritual enlightenment, as D'Amato films various God's eye views of the revellers interrupted and upwards genuflections at the guru by more down-to-earth sceptical shots. Emanuelle, surprisingly for a woman who has always preached free love, sees how nonspiritual the guru's message really is – surely he'd spend more time helping the poor and less time improving the love-lives of vain wealthy Westerners if he really had a hot line to god? This disillusion with hedonism sends Emanuelle to Rome, where she teams up with Cora to expose a gang who have been kidnapping and trafficking women as sex slaves to the Middle East. Emanuelle goes undercover and we see two young men pick her and two other young women up, sell them to an older man at a restaurant who in turn sells them at a higher price to another man. Pasolini couldn't have given us a more striking illustration of human beings reduced to things, commodities. At the halfway house, as they wait to be sent outside of Europe, the women are raped by a hideous man whose face is terribly scarred, making him look like a demon. In the meantime, Cora is being raped by a gang of hoods as punishment for her investigations and a young man who is on Emanuelle's side finds where our heroine is being held and phones the police. This is striking because, for the first time in a D"Amato Black Emanuelle film we see a sequence which does not involve Emanuelle, as if to say that once activism and collective responsibility has come into play, the protagonist centred dramaturgy won't do.Even more strikingly, the rescue of Emanuelle and the girls happens between scenes. We cut straight from the demon's pillage to Emanuelle emerging from the police station with her young ally. They then go to a boat his father owns and end up hiding and bonking in a closet, but there's something curiously inappropriate at this return to generic soft-core adventures after the sexual violence we've been witness to. The cramped condition of the lovemaking seems to mirror D'Amato's need to break free from the conventions of the genre.We need to take the original Italian title – Emanuelle: Why Violence Against Women – at face value. D"Amato seems to be wilfully subverting the sexploitation genre as a way of asking a question about the treatment of women, a problem that he (like John Lennon in his famous song Woman is the N**ger of the World) sees as global. The film cuts from the US to India to Italy to China to the Middle East in the blink of an eye, and the point seems to be that the same patriarchal attitude treats women as chattels and sexual slaves no matter where on earth you go. Along the way, monsters and villainy (including enforced bestiality) more at home in the pages of de Sade than in harmless erotica are encountered.Finally, we return to the US where a Senator sets up a beauty pageant queen to be raped by some down-and-outs for the entertainment of various rich slime-balls. Things get out of hand, the wealthy disappear and Emanuelle is degraded by being forced to fellate a bum. Women are mere objects to be used for the amusement of the rich or thrown as pornographic entertainment to the powerless. We as an audience are left with a very foul taste in our mouths. D"Amato has refused to give his audience what they expect from a soft-core frolic – is an artist painting a picture of exploitation rather than a mere exploitation filmmaker? Or an extraordinary and complex mixture of both

Emanuelle travels the world once again on a crusading mission to report on the abuse and degradation of women at the hands of male-dominated organizations.At her first stop in India she meets up with George Eastman who plays a guru who has discovered the secret of prolonged sexual pleasure. While at the temple she also meets gorgeous Brigitte Petronio and it's not too long before both are having hot lesbian intercourse.While at her next stop in Rome she meets Karin Schubert who gives her a lead about a white-slavery ring...Joe D'Amato's "The Degradation of Emanuelle" is not as sleazy and shocking as infamous "Emanuelle in America",however there is enough sex and violence to bring the smile on the face of any self-respecting smut peddler.The erotic scenes are mostly soft core,but there is a bit of hard core sex added for a good measure.The film is nicely photographed and immensely enjoyable.Give it a look.

Certaintly not as sleazy as Emanuelle In America, but not as lightweight ad Emanulle In Bangkok. Similar to Emanuelle in America we have Emanuelle traversing the globe discovering sex scandals. The set peices range from fairly innocent romp in the back of a moving truck to rape and beastality (implied not explicit). Of course it all remains fairly softcore. D'Amato handles the cinematography masterfully, its easy to see why he's so at home in adult films. Hes a master at creating suspenceful erotic sex scenes. Watch for ol Joe himself in a quick cameo near the end of the film (hes the man being arrested at the very end).