“I got this idea for giving our cash-flow a little jolt.”

The third instalment of Greg Dark’s celebrated series opens in inauspicious surroundings. Frank Baxter (Jon Dough) – our hero – is sat in bed, bemoaning his fiscal difficulties. His wife, Tiffany (Crystal Wilder), tries to take his mind of things with her apparently exquisite fellatio, but the effect is not what she’d intended. A plan begins to take shape in Mr. Baxter’s mind: Tiffany’s skills would certainly have a market value – if only she could be persuaded to increase their availability. A hastily-arranged visit from two of his cronies – and the money that subsequently changes hands – is all the evidence he needs.

With his wife understandably reluctant to prostitute herself, Frank seeks advice from heavily-accented lawyer, Sol Shapiro (Rocco Siffredi). Clearly a man of some experience in these matters, Shapiro refers him to an establishment known as ‘The Deep House’ – an establishment which he claims can program women to respond sexually to rock music.  A simple demonstration proves to be quite compelling; a naked, motionless female is fitted with an innocuous-looking earpiece; at the touch of a button, she springs into life and starts masturbating. Our would-be pimp is convinced.

The only remaining hurdle is to trick Tiffany into undergoing this remarkable treatment – easily achieved by telling her that the doctors want to monitor her sleep (sleep being something she’s particularly fond of). Unfortunately, Frank’s plan has unforeseen consequences. When she returns home – outrageously attired in a mini-skirt and ‘boob-tube’, his previously-accommodating wife is unwilling to sleep with him until money changes hands, and Frank, as we know, is not a man of great financial means.

“Nothing could please me more than to be gang-banged by a gaggle of quacking duck-men.”

True to form, New Wave Hookers 3 is absurd, outlandish and politically-incorrect. The plot itself is actually quite engaging – ridiculous and potentially offensive, but engaging nonetheless – but it is spread very thinly across the near two-hour running time. In fact, this is a ‘classic’ example of the episodic structure that often afflicts adult movies, with the flow of the narrative consistently undermined by the intrusion of extended sex scenes. The first-person narration – courtesy of our man Frank – does alleviate some of the need for ‘real-time’ exposition, but it’s a poor substitute for narrative momentum and properly integrated sex scenes. That said, long, ‘nasty’ sex scenes are part the Dark Bros. appeal and it would be disingenuous of me to pretend otherwise. Personally I found the scenes herein to be pretty tedious, but committed fans of anal sex – or even foot fetishists – might well disagree. With the exception of Nikki Dial – who appears briefly as one of Tiffany’s friends – the women in New Wave Hookers 3 are remarkably unappealing; Danyel Cheeks (!) is encumbered with terrible breast augmentation, and Tiffany Million – in the role of Helen, ‘boss mama’ of The Deep House – supplements her own plastic surgery disaster with a very severe fringe.

I’m in danger of making the film sound like a complete disaster, and it really isn’t. It’s not entirely to my taste, but is not without points of interest either. The plot is amusing, the dialogue intermittently funny, and Dark is quite the auteur. Indeed, I wonder if my comments regarding the cast do the director a disservice. The film has a very distinctive aesthetic – garish and reminiscent of the mid-eighties, the period of Dark’s directorial breakthroughs – and the enormous, fake breasts could be argued to make sense in that context. The director’s technical prowess and subversive spirit are also frequently in evidence – from the distinctive editing to the infamous duck-men. The synth-rock score isn’t bad, the sets are convincing, and Jon Dough does a good job as the hapless protagonist.

“Lend me some money . . . so I can get a piece of my wife’s ass.”

Crass and cartoonish, by the time its 112 minutes have elapsed Tiffany will be known as Josephine and Helen will utilise a lethal earpiece in an attempt to make our hero ‘disappear’. Whether or not the viewer actually makes it that far is another matter. The film certainly isn’t intended for couples, and is likely to try the patience of anyone interested primarily in plot. The sexual aspects won’t be to everyone’s taste either – with the propensity towards group scenes and anal action likely to alienate as many as it attracts. It’s not really fair to consider any of these to be failings, though. New Wave Hookers 3 is deliberately provocative, consciously outrageous, and is quite successful when judged in those terms. The fact that I’m not best placed to appreciate it is really of little consequence.