Entire Story In Fewer Words Than Are In This Sentence:
Tourists are caned and whipped.

Victim Appeal:
Seven Hungarian girls get a healthy dose of corporal punishment. I won't describe them all in detail, but each one is good-looking and has a few lines of dialogue. The acting is average but not atrocious, and there is enough story to empathize with the victims.

The video is about a group of female tourists who are arrested for drug use. It opens with a strip search of one girl, then another girl talking to their lawyer, then all of them in their cell as they await trial. The following courtroom scene is fairly long, with a lot of scolding from the female judge and statements from all the tourists. The defence lawyer hardly says a word, which is fine by me - we all know where this is going, anyway, right? Some girls plead guilty and get a lenient treatment, others make a nuisance of themselves and receive a more draconian verdict. Not a single acquittal, of course.

It also goes without saying that all of them choose to commute their prison sentences, ranging from one to ten months, to corporal punishment (that option exists in the "South American country" where it is all taking place, though we never learn which country).

Gratuitous Sadism:
Large cast, lots of action. In the opening strip search scene, the girl gets her rectum examined, black glove and all. In the cell, another one urinates on the floor (she's not allowed to go to the toilet) while the rest of the group avert their faces in embarassment. After these humiliating appetizers, severe thrashings are on the menu as the main course.

Let me get my notes so I can remember this correctly. To begin with, the two girls who plead guilty get 10 cane strokes each. The third one gets 50 because she made a pass at the medical examiner to get the test results changed - how naughty! Next up, whippings. Three tourists who plead innocent get 50 lashes each to teach them how the local justice system works. And for the grand finale, the ringleader: she also had the audacity to plead not guilty, she gave the other women the drugs, and she had a violent outburst in the courtroom. 50 cane strokes and 50 whip lashes ensure that no repeat offenses will ever occur. Or maybe she'll just never travel to South America again, I don't know.

Best Reactions:
C.C. Graf, the model who gets 50 cane strokes. We never actually see her trying to seduce the medical examiner, and it's hard to imagine such a scene - the girl just looks incredibly annoyed and sullen throughout most of the movie. A lot of evil looks for the judge, the caner, the caner's assistant, everyone... However, that eye-rolling "Whatever!" attitude imbues her character with a certain stubborn, defiant pride. I love that.

Miss Graf (any relation to Steffi?) is also the most restrained during the punishment. Not a lot of screaming like some of the other ladies, but a sequence of delicious, half-suppressed gasps and yelps. Her facial expressions progress from grim determination to desperate hope that the ordeal won't get any worse, that maybe the next stroke won't be as hard as the last one. Most of all, she glows with the refusal to lose her dignity. She does cry in the end, of course. Just a little, before angrily wiping away the tears with her arm. Good stuff.

Best Line:
"Your honor, I would just like to apologize on behalf of my defendants." That is the only line the lawyer utters during the trial! He looks more frightened than the girls, actually. Did the judge beat him into submission before the proceedings started? And if so, why don't we get to see it? In any case, I find it hilarious.

Nice Psychological Touch:
I liked how the girls themselves decided to commute their prison sentence to canings and whippings. It's the sort of "semi-consensual" scenario I enjoy a lot.

How Good Is It Really?
The movie runs for over 80 minutes, and most of it is taken up by the CP scenes. You can easily figure out that it is not about intricate drama and character development - this is the equivalent of "wall-to-wall gonzo" porn. However, "South American Vacation" does offer an interesting scenario idea and has a nice brooding athmosphere during the buildup scenes, so it's not all about chicks getting thrashed. Of course, severe thrashings are the main attraction. If you are into that, it is an awesome video.

What You Learned:
If I were in the tourists' shoes, I would commute my sentence to corporal punishment, too. Hell, I'll take 50 lashes by Mistress Larissa over six months in the joint any day! Then again, I'm a pervert. I'd make sure to plead not guilty to get a harder sentence...

A classic theme for the genre: a group of attractive female tourists have made casual with local drug laws in some banana republic, are arrested, convicted, then given the Big Alternative to time behind bars. Their representation by a weak male attorney puts a thin veneer of legitimacy on what is about to happen to them; the six girls are given sentences of 6 months in jail, with a choice of a session with the cane or the whip in lieu of jail time.

A seventh girl, DiGuiliani, brought into court wearing chains, apparently the instigator or ringleader of this sordid affair, is given a stiffer sentence--- 7 months or 50 with the whip AND 50 with the cane. Plot details in this performance are subject to how carefully you want to unravel subtitles.

There is much work to be done in the time allowed, so the scene shifts to the Punishment Room at the 10 minute mark. Lili Blockberg, a solidily built blonde with stylish eyeglasses (always extremely erotic when the the glasses end being all the girl is wearing), reports first and slowly strips to nudity. She bends naked over a slanted bench, yet another one-purpose device surely not found in the Sears catalogue. Her ankles are tied with ropes, as are her wrists, stretched forward full-length, positioning her bottom in the most vulnerable bend-over position. A blonde uniformed guard, in Mood tradition just as attractive as the prisoner, lays on 10 cane strokes--Lili's sentence is one of the lightest. The strokes are blistering, and there are only 10. Lili's ankles are pulled wide enough that we can see she is aroused by the caning.

Sharon Green is next, a flashing raven brunette, the prettiest of the group for us, a distinction one could debate among this admirable crew. She has been assigned the alternative of 50 cane strokes, seemingly impossible after the brief but intense session we just saw. She too undresses and surrenders her clothes item by item. She is stunning naked. She is fastened over the bench and in fact given 50 mean and penetrating cane strokes. Lots of wonderful glimpses of her miserable worried expectant face during the session.

Ana Cortez, a lusty heavier brunette, has been assigned a whipping, so that after she hands over her clothes, she is handcuffed to a cross, with an angled vertical support conveniently placed for her to straddle and rub against if she needs some comfort. Legs are fastened far apart, and Ana is very vulnerable from any vantage point. The glamorous female guard lays 50 strokes on her back, only a few on her bottom, with a thinned-down bullwhip. She is crying after only 7 strokes.

Tourist #5, a skinny brunette, is stripped, fastened to the cross for her 50 lashes, again, none on her bottom for some reason.

Long curly haired brunette Kate Volowsky is next for her whipping. She is quivering and screaming immediately. 50 on her back; her bottom is also spared. The guards keep moving her hair to expose more bare skin Very exciting.

And lastly the instigator DiGuiliani, another stunning brunette, who seems born to be naked. 50 cane strokes over the bench, full swings---the guard leaning into her work; lots of marks, flecks of blood. This girl is getting whipped also. Switch to the cross for a batch of 50.

The finale is memorable: the girls lie naked, bottoms up, tending each other. A sea of flesh. Mood excels. We especially enjoyed the scenes with the camera pulled back, the naked victim fastened and centered setting, the guards attending and at work, pink skin in stark contrast to the drab punishment room.