‘LADY BEWARE’--OR DIRECTOR BEWARE?

How could director Karen Arthur (“The Mafu Cage”) have turned out a piece of glossy exploitation like “Lady Beware” for Scotti Bros.--including numerous gratuitous nude shots of star Diane Lane?

The explanation, according to Arthur: The version being released Friday isn’t hers. When Scotti Bros. saw her cut of the movie, “They didn’t like it. So they set out to make their own movie.”

“Lady Beware” is about a pervert (played by Michael Woods) who harasses a window dresser (Lane) on the phone and in person--waging psychological rape. The final cut seems clearly aimed at the exploitation crowd. Producer Tony Scotti didn’t return our numerous calls.

Arthur said some distributors who viewed a sample reel asked for “more sex, so they took outtakes of Diane Lane standing there naked and incorporated them into the film. . . .

“To me, that’s exploitative. They printed up negatives where I never said, ‘Print.’ I, as a female director, would never exploit a woman’s body and use it as a turn-on.”

Arthur planned glimpses of nudity: “When you get one tiny little look of this woman standing there Botticelli-like, it’s beautiful. When you get six or eight looks, it’s exploitative.

“When you’re working with actors and you ask them to be nude, they trust you to use that material well and wisely. The actors believed that I would be there to take care of their work. That’s why I didn’t remove my name from the film. They can’t remove their names.” (See box above for directors who take their names off films.)

Arthur also is upset about some trims involving a character played by Cotter Smith and the complete excision of another, played by Viveca Lindfors. Arthur claims that scenes involving these actors allowed Lane to talk about her state of mind and, when removed, make for jerky transitions and unmotivated actions.

But, oops. The production notes for the press kit were written before the flap. They quote Arthur as saying: “It is a loaded subject any time a woman is a victim. In prurient hands, the subject could have become exploitative. But this picture is not exploitative at all.”