X-Rated: Adventures of an Exploitation Filmmaker

For four decades Stanley Long wrote, produced, and directed some of the most commercially successful low-budget movies in British film history. An X-rated movie trailblazer, he gave the postwar cinema audience something they couldn’t see elsewhere—bare boobs, saucy thrills, and naughty postcard humor come to life. Controversial, unapologetic, and wildly successful, Stanley Long’s productions came fast and furious—infuriating highbrow critics, the police, the church, and the government—but they proved to be box office gold. Stanley ruffled feathers with his cult 1969 documentary The Wife Swappers, an overnight sensation that broke box office records in London’s West End and ran continuously for six months, going on to play to packed houses in New York. Stanley’s 1975 comedy hit Adventures of a Taxi Driver spawned two sequels and was sold to more than 35 countries. In addition to all this, Stanley also became one of the most successful independent film distributors in Europe, controlling a business empire respected, and envied, by his contemporaries. Packed with fascinating, sexy, and sometimes poignant anecdotes, Stanley’s unique story explains how he made it big in the toughest industry in the world.