Before THE DRILLER KILLER, director Abel Ferrera plumbed the female psyche (and the female form) with 9 LIVES OF A WET PUSSY, on Blu-ray/DVD combo from Vinegar Syndrome.

Socialite Pauline (Pauline LaMonde) is only happy with her hedonistic but detached husband (David Pirell) when they are having sex, but she considers her extramarital forays with stable boys, chauffeurs, and gas station attendants to be adventures that she recounts in letters to former lesbian lover Gypsy (Dominique Santos). An occultist, Gypsy is sickened by Pauline's stories that her friend hopes will encourage her to "learn to love men again," and has been using her powers to track and even manipulate the events of Pauline's life which has been dictated by a curse after the sexual repression of her mother (also LaMonde) and aunt (Peggy Johnson) under their religious father (Ferrera under his "Jimmy Laine" pseudonym) lead to an act of sin. Pauline's sexual appetite has also lead to misfortune for those with whom she tried to form more serious bonds including Nubian princess Nacala (Joy Silver), and Gypsy may be willing to damn herself as well to be reunited with Pauline.

Supernaturally-tinged pornographic films were not at all unusual, including ones dealing with the trauma of incest like the same year's infinitely superior THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS, but 9 LIVES OF A WET PUSSY is of interest primarily as a stepping stone for director Ferrera. On the disc's commentary track, Diabolique Magazine's Samm Deighan characterizes the film as stylized like a European art film, particularly those of exploitation filmmakers like Jean Rollin who had to direct porn out of necessity and tried to shape it to their own interests and obsessions. She also discusses the themes explored in the films that carry over to Ferrara's legitimate filmography. Since Ferrera was directing a porn film with mob money and hoping to raise money for his more personal works and demonstrate that he could bring in a feature on time and on budget, one could not exactly say that the stakes were low, but perhaps his lack of investment with the genre may have allowed him to be more experimental (even reckless) with a typically episodic structure. A violent rape scene is the only real element that has any impact, while two major scenes on the taboo of incest have considerably little impact. Ferrera's regular writing partner Nicholas St. John (MS. 45) has a brief role as a chauffeur.

Released to VHS by VCX and in a censored DVD in 2002 under the amended title 9 LIVES OF A WET PUSSY CAT – which lost the rape scene but kept the incest – the film comes to Blu-ray in a 1080p24 MPEG-4 AVC 1.85:1 widescreen transfer from the original camera negative that is virtually flawless with the fine detail of bare skin and pubic hair registering right away while colors are bold throughout. The more rough and tumble Little Italy-lensed night scenes are less consistent but this is an issue of the photography and not the restoration of the scene which was presumably only removed from the video master and not the negative. The DTS-HD Master Audio 1.0 mono track is in good condition with its mix of on-set dialogue and voiceover along with the jazzy score by Ferrera-regular Joe Delia (THE FUNERAL) which is more interesting than the usual seventies porn library music accompaniment. Optional English SDH subtitles are available.