Private DVD Pack 13: Tatiana Trilogy Review

Tatiana Trilogy
Private
Directed by Pierre Woodman
Starring: Tania Russof, Rita, Myrca, Inga, Bettina, Keri, Sarah, Katalyn, Peggy Sue, Deborah, Vanda, Eva, Lydia, Karina, Sandra, Marianne, Jennifer Red, Brigitte, Myriam, Ines, Ophelie, Natacha, Margareth, Nora, Timea, Suzanna, Caroline, Sheyla, Francesca, Magalie, Angela, Gabriella, David Perry, Jean Yves Le Castel, Andrew Youngman, Alain Deloin, Jean Michel, Frank Versace, Mephisto, Bruno SX, Tibor, Ferenc, Attila, Laszlo, Yves Baillat, Zoltan, Alain Kraut, Laurent, Tamas, Vincent, Laslo, Tibor, Layos, Attila, Tibor, Lasly, Yannos
Running times:
Part 1 - 2hrs
Part 2 - 2hrs 15mins
Part 3 - 2hrs 15mins

All three volumes of Pierre Woodman's epic costumed drama from 1998 are packaged in one handy edition, which also includes Private's DVD Sampler 5. So without further ado, let's dive headlong into what promises to be a suitably lengthy review of this grandiose porno experience…
Alternatively, jump to part 2, part 3 or the conclusion.

Tatiana 1
The tale is set in 19th century Ukraine. Tania Russof takes the title role, as Tatiana, the daughter of a poor miller. She walks in the countryside to escape her family's financial woes, where she happens upon a handsome young man (Andrew Youngman - the character is evidently the Tsar's son) playing piano in an abandoned chateau. Entranced, Tatiana can't resist his charm and soon they are in each other's arms. The romantic sex scene (i.e. she doesn't get it up the arse!) that follows is beautifully lit, Tania's sexy curves and sadly rock hard "enhanced" tits to the fore.

Meanwhile, the Marquis (David Perry), a local noble and a moneylender too, comes to the mill to collect his debt, but with her father away, Tatiana's little sister Svetlana (Rita), a dusky little dumpling with a great arse, agrees to be gangbanged by the Marquis and his soldiers, submitting herself to a relentless all-holes fucking, in order to settle the debt. The hard sex includes much anal, double penetration and five facials.

Naturally, the mean Marquis has no intention of honouring the deal, and Tatiana, who witnessed the gangbang, vows to avenge her little sister. In the meantime, the Marquis has his own marital problems and has instructed his officer-servant (Jean Yves Le Castel) to find him his dream girl. The officer turns up at a brothel where Tatiana happens to be in search of a job to earn quick cash. In order to learn the trade, she's taken to spy on the clients.

Three illustrations of brothel life begin with the officer having his wicked way with two painted hussies, pretty brunettes Vanda and Eva. Some girl-girl contact adds to a raw anal scene. Next, a gent who has to watch a good-looking red-head touching herself before sex, including anal, and finally perhaps the best of the three - pretty, buxom brunette Peggy Sue entertains Leslie Taylor, her wriggling body as she rides being a particular delight, as is the sight of her heavy tits wobbling as his big cock squeezes into a small anus. In each scene the girls wear superb sexy lingerie and stockings.

Sara (Jennifer Red) helps Tatiana out with a dress and some advice, relating how the madam once punished her. The flashback sequence shows Jennifer accepting a large, metallic dildo in her ass hole, licking the madam's pussy, and then having tea poured on her face through a giant glass cock (!) as though the madam were pissing on her.

At his stately home, the Marquis enjoys a hot, hard make-up sex session with his wife, Helena (Myrka), perhaps understandably as keen to get his hands on her statuesque figure as to repair their marriage. While they couple in the boudoir, outside servants (Bettina, Sarah and Alain Deloin) are peeping and soon begin their own, less interesting session. Lots of frilly dresses and bloomers feature. I didn't like coloured lighting or the cutting between the two scenes, particularly as the bedroom scene reaches boiling point with some very vigorous anal sex.

At the brothel, Tatiana overhears the officer and madam in conversation, and offers herself as the ideal candidate to fulfil the Marquis' dream of a blue-eyed girl with a ring through her clit, and collect the 5,000 crowns he offers. Never mind that she has no clit ring, and is certainly no virgin, her plan is being put in motion…

Tatiana 2   top 
The greater part of this second episode is taken up with the sex lives of the Ukrainian nobility, rather than furthering the plot, which is not necessarily a bad thing. The marquis receives a duke (Yves Baillat) and his wife and daughter. While their wives converse over tea, the noblemen make hay in the stable with two comely stable girls - Sandra, a very curvy brunette who was made to ride cowgirl, and Marianne, a pretty red head. The lusty action includes anal, double penetration and facials for both girls, and then after the Duke and Marquis ride out, the peeping stable boy gets a blowjob too.

Away from their mothers, the daughters (Inga and Karina) frolic in the woods and gardens, and benefit from the experience of a rough-hewn gardener (Leslie Taylor) in a scene that plays heavily on the thrill of the pretty young girls, hair in elaborate ringlets, lifting their many skirts to ride cock. Both girls "enjoy" anal and there's some pleasing girl-girl kissing, and Inga is a little sweetheart.

Like mother, like daughter - for while Tatiana furthers her plan by getting her clit pierced, the Marquise Helena and the Duchess (Lydia takes the part) enjoy sex with valet Alain Deloin in a rowing boat on a lake. In a beautiful pastoral setting, the sex is spiced by the delightfully naughty notion of these two elegant, splendidly costumed aristocratic ladies having illicit fun with the hired help. If the sex, including lots of anal, is perhaps a little mannered, the bodies of the women and the staging in an awkward location are impressive.

Having related the news of his discovery, Tatiana, to a delighted Marquis, Le Castel's officer-servant character returns to the bordello to make arrangements, taking his commission for the deal in the form of sex with the madam (Caroline), the military man using his mighty weapon on the slim, sexy brunette's pussy and tight ass. A notable POV come shot rounds the scene off.

Later, the Marquis arrives at the bordello with his company of men. As soon as he is taken upstairs to meet Tatiana, the soldiers take the chance to fully sample the pleasures of the house. All around, a selection of delightfully costumed harlots entertains the troops in pairs and groups. Cocks are sucked, skirts are lifted and pussies are filled - some girls even perform with each other. However, I'm not sure this is performed, staged or captured to maximum effect.

Meanwhile, the Marquis has agreed to take part in a little game with Tatiana and two lingerie clad brunettes (Natacha and Margareth, I believe, who have worked together many times). The Marquis is chained to the bed and the girls suck and fuck him, including anal for both and some contact with each other too, while Tatiana sits back, spreads her legs and teases him with her clit ring. It's a sexy (if slightly drawn-out) scene, especially because the girls have to do most of the work, and Natacha looks particularly good. Tatiana finally calls a halt and uses hand and mouth to make the Marquis come before he's had the chance to fuck her.

Elsewhere, the soldiers' fun with the girls has entered the anal phase of the operation. All around, girl after girl (including one who looks rather like recent Clark plaything Sandra Taylor) has her ass filled with hard cock. There's more vaginal sex, double penetration and girl-girl sex too, as cries of "salope" ring out.

The guys are too busy using girls' bottoms for their pleasure and dumping come on pretty faces to hear the Marquis cry for help as, back in the boudoir, Natacha and Margareth lick his arse in preparation before Tatiana breaks out a dildo and a whip to carry out her revenge on the helpless restrained nobleman. The act of revenge itself isn't shown, but of course being a degenerate aristocrat, he actually thanks her for opening him (no pun intended) to new pleasures. She agrees to meet him again, but further revenge isn't far from her mind.

Tatiana 3    top
The third part opens with two of Marquis' servant girls washing clothes on the verdant lakeshore. Gossip between Bettina and this very attractive blonde (Gabriella, who I think is the one who often does translations for Woodman) provides the framework for the opening handful of scenes. This gossip appears to be true - the Marquis is besotted with Tatiana, quarrels with his wife and takes to fucking servant girls, like Sarah as he does here, while calling them "Tatiana". This turns out to be an unnecessarily long scene, even if he does fairly bang the pretty red-haired maid's ass.

The Marquise and her daughter have had enough, and with an escort of soldiers they take a horse and carriage to take them away from the chateau. En route, and with all those uniformed men around, the Marquise gets a little bit frisky and disappears into the woods with a few of them, leaving her lovely young daughter with one guard (Frank Versace). They soon get to grips with each other (Inga, the minx, whose timid blowjob style is worth a million dollars, is knickerless under her dress) while in the woods her mother is down among the ferns, being buggered in turn by Le Castel, Mephisto and Bruno SX. She only wants it in the ass, and voraciously sucks the spare cocks. So while one horny guard is mounting the young filly (funny how the coachman sits there oblivious!) in pussy and ass, until his cracking come shot streaks her face, the Marquise is having her ass plundered till she shares her spunky smile with the camera. I must say that Myrka shows as much star quality as anyone here.

Over at the bordello, Tatiana receives the Marquis' gift of a dress but she resolves to leave this place. She won't be bought, which is odd considering she originally went to make money in a brothel, but there you go. Meanwhile, in the chateau kitchens, valet Alain Deloin seeks respite from his master's moods in the arms (and mouths, pussies and assholes) of two attractive, comely kitchen girls. Both are in peasant costume and have nice boobs, Angela is tan, curvy and shaven; Magalie is pale, plump and hairy. They're happy to please him, and not averse to pleasing each other. The sight of Magalie's full curves bouncing as Alain's dick lodges itself in her ass is a particular pleasure. The scene ends with the customary facial finish.

Tatiana's return home turns sour as her remarkably perceptive father guesses she's sold her body to earn the pile of cash she presents him. Storming off in a huff (again) to find her beloved Dimitri (so "beloved" we haven't seen hide nor hair of him for approximately 5 hours of the tale), Tatiana manages to arrive at the exact point that Dimitri is engaged in a post come frolic with three girls whose ripe bodies have tempted him into some nude bathing that quickly turns to sex. Even though the over saturated colour cheapens the appearance, as it does in too much of this movie, the sex looks beautiful, the sunshine in a lake location beating down on an ample acreage of female flesh - one blonde (Nora, who looks like the girl called Emmanuel in Clark movies), one dark (Timea, who I think is Laura Black) and Suzanna, brunette. Each takes it in pussy and ass in turn, but it's an overly long, drawn out affair before Dimitri shares his come with them.

And that's where Tatiana comes in, getting into such a strop that she rushes off to the arms of the Marquis, who is engaged fucking one of his servants yet again when Tatiana arrives at the chateau. It's similar fare to before, but who am I to say no to seeing another scrumptious girl, Keri, getting it in her pussy and ass? The Marquis comes on the girl's face just in time to receive the news of Tatiana's arrival, leaving Keri to Le Castel's tender mercies while he dresses in his finery. No anal for Keri to this point means the poor dear has to accommodate Le Castel's sizeable knob in her ass, an anus that's soon filled with bubbling spunk.

As the sodomy continues elsewhere, the Marquis plays the perfect gentleman, eager to get in Tatiana's good books as he shows her around the mansion, its library and treats her to dinner. Quite inexplicably, this scene is shot, as used earlier, in hideous blue and red light, and the same alien glow is used to near-disastrous effect when Tatiana accompanies the Marquis to his boudoir for what should be a climactic coupling. The skin on Tania's face looks tight as a drum in this light that does nothing to flatter her. Regardless of the flaws, the sex that ensues is hardly soft-focus romance, as the white lingerie-clad Tatiana sucks cock and takes quite a pounding in her succulent, shaven pussy and luscious ass. Ms Russof doesn't look nearly as enthusiastic as the overstated dubbed moaning suggests, though she does consent to stroke her partner off on to her tongue.

But that's not the end - the couple awake to the sound of sword fighting. Dimitri has arrived to challenge the Marquis for the love of Tatiana, a challenge that is settled with a duel. Will it all end in tears? I won't give the game away, but don't hold your breath hoping for dazzling swordsmanship in this dramatic conclusion!

Thanks to Roger @ Private for helping me out with a new disc to complete the review!
You can read other reviews and differing opinions here - Flash's Tatiana Trilogy review, Flash's Tatiana 3 review, and Houston Don's Tatiana 3 review.

Overall    top
So how to sum up a colossal six-hour-plus serving of porn, very much cast in a particular mould? This is a massive, hugely ambitious project that weaves what is, in the end, a very slender thread of plot around a generous number of sex scenes that rarely deviate from the Woodman formula, but ultimately I felt it was generally very entertaining, if not dramatically gripping.

The revenge plot device, or more specifically the act that motivates the revenge, is a dubious one given that the director intends the audience to relish the defilement of Tatiana's sister. Sure, the revenge is more about the double-cross that follows, but it's vaguely questionable. To make it worse, I actually didn't like the Tatiana character very much, which makes it harder to care about the story. Tania Russof still looks good but is on the cusp of becoming another victim of modern surgical procedures. David Perry also makes a weak baddie, but the compensation of so many gorgeous girls, with all the beautiful costumes and lingerie (for all the fastidious attention to detail, I am grateful for the historical oversight that permitted the wearing of nylons!) is abundant. Great locations and consistently colourful visuals, though very occasionally marred by inappropriate camerawork, add to the appeal. One observation I should add is that the colour is often quite excessively bright and does tend to cheapen the look of the production. It's not quite as polished as I am sure they'd have wished.

It's hard to comment on the acting, given that the movie is entirely dubbed, but what I would say is that the English narration, as though spoken by Tatiana, is so crass as to render aspects of the plot laughable and quite probably contributes to my dislike of her character. It is at best inaccurate, and at worst misrepresents the story. Perhaps it would be better to persevere with the French, German or Spanish soundtracks, which have a full overdub of all dialogue. English and Italian speakers will have to make do with occasional comments as the French dialogue unfolds.

However, the effective use of a musical soundtrack featuring the works of Vivaldi, Mozart, and Schumann is not only refreshing; it actually provides an amusing contrast to the decidedly inelegant sex that it accompanies. Speaking of which, I suppose the sex scenes are not specifically to my taste (there's little chemistry as such, although that's not what they're about anyway), but there's plenty of hard action featuring really beautiful women, most of whom participate in anal sex. Some scenes are notably better than others, but overall the standard is reasonably consistent given the sheer volume of sex. Whether it might have been better to just get on with the story rather than show yet another brothel scene, for example, is perhaps a matter of preference.

In the end, if I did believe the hype then, just like Private's current Gladiator extravaganza, Tatiana might come as a disappointment. It is largely but not entirely successful and the period costumes can be an acquired taste. However, taking it for what it is - a well made porn melodrama with a period setting and a constant stream of sex scenes starring beautiful women - then it's easy to enjoy it. I am only sorry that Pierre Woodman isn't continuing to produce such ambitious movies today.

DVD Comments    top
This is a good quality product, which represents good value as a boxed set. The picture quality is good, though it sometimes lacks sharpness and oddly the second disc has slightly more realistic colour than the very vibrant first and third parts. Naturally, shooting on video (and from the report it appears they used camcorders rather than Betacam) placed a limitation on the quality that perhaps means the overall quality fails to achieve the lofty ambitions that such a grand project might dictate. The sound is fine; with dubbed dialogue there are few quality problems - though English subtitles would have been better than the narration.

The extras are not stunning - the same report features on each disc, there are photos and cast notes, but in the end this seems to simply be a re-packaging of the existing discs rather than a reissue. On the subject of packaging, the four-disc box might have seemed like a good idea on somebody's drawing board - in reality it is awkward to use and doesn't hold the discs very securely in transit, yet they are in danger of breaking during extraction once you fasten them in properly!