V - Violent Nuns
Well there is only really one violent nun on the list but she is such a blinder, she deserves her own entry. In Killer Nun, Anita Ekberg plays Sister Gertrude, a psychotic nun who is addicted to heavy painkillers. She works in a hospital for geriatrics. Among her evil habits: throwing an elderly man out of the window after witnessing him having sex with a fellow nurse, becoming a tyrant of the hospital she works in, crushing a poor old woman's dentures in front of her, initiating a lesbian affair with another nun, seeking out sex in the city with a random guy, inflicting calisthenics on the geriatrics. Ekberg manages to carry the diabolical carryings on listed above with aplomb and with a full face of make up plastered on at all times. Very nun like! The film belongs to a genre called Nunsploitation in which the focus is on naughty, anti-clerical behaviour by religious women. There are a load of them out there - including Walerian Borowycz's awesome Behind Convent Walls and Bruno Mattei's truly diabolical The Other Hell. I really like Flavia the Heretic in which the incredible Florinda Balkan goes on a Middle Ages era women's rights crusade. You go girl!
W - Whitehouse, Mary
This list would not be complete without mention of a little white haired old lady who set herself up as the moral guardian of an entire nation and went to war against Video Nasties with all the ferocity of a ferocious lion finishing off a baby springbok. Yes, it is Mary Whitehouse CBE. Figure of fun to Video Nasty hounds, she was a formidable opponent to deal with. She had the ear of the Conservative government who took what she said alarmingly seriously. And of course Maggie Thatcher at the time liked to look like she was promoting family values and cutting down on sleaze. Mrs Whitehouse, a committed Christian, was President of the National Viewers and Listeners Association. A pressure group to stamp out 'sleaze' in broadcasting. They gave The BBC a pain in the backside for many decades. When the socially conservative movement the Nationwide Festival of Light was set up in the 1970s, Mrs Whitehouse was a key figure in the set up. During the Video Nasties brouhaha, Mrs Whitehouse was in her element. Already in tight with the ruling Tories, she presented a video to Parliament of violent highlights of the Nasties. A lot of her influence went into the decision to pass the Video Recordings Act 1984 which effectively banned the movies. She seemed to have an obsession with Evil Dead. For her this was the absolute worst Nasty and she loved to single it out for extra bile filled rants. Mary died in a nursing home aged 91 in 2001. RIP Mary, we knew ye well.