Change Your Image
lor_
Served as Chairman, New York Film Critics Circle: 1993/94.
Favorite interviews were with: Michael Douglas, Sophia Loren, DeForest Kelley, Joan Chen, Joe Henderson, Ismail Merchant, Klaus Kinski, Joseph L. Mankiewicz, Spike Lee, Malcolm McDowell, Zoe Lund, Melvin Van Peebles, Ultra Violet, Wolfgang Petersen, Claudia Cardinale, Serge Silberman, Margarethe von Trotta, Alec Guinness, Leonard Nimoy, Susan George, Joseph Losey, Gale Anne Hurd, Dennis Hopper, Peter Greenaway, Katt Shea, Ken Russell, Maggie Greenwald, Jim Jarmusch, Peter Brook, Jurgen Prochnow, Andy Warhol, Judy Davis, Chuck Vincent, Fred Zinnemann, Wim Wenders, Max Von Sydow, Michael Moore, Terry Gilliam, Rita Jenrette, Karen Lynn Gorney, Bruce Beresford, Jack Thompson, Russ Meyer, Sam Raimi, Abel Ferrara, John Sayles, William Greaves, Nino Manfredi, Lee Van Cleef, Michael Cuscuna, Bille August, Jewel Shepard, Andy Sidaris, Michel Deville, Claude Sautet, Claude Lelouch, Alfonso Arau, Alan Parker, Reinhard Hauff, Traci Lords, Jim Jarmusch, Martha Coolidge, Candida Royalle, Giuseppe Tornatore, Edward James Olmos, Paul Hogan, John Mackenzie, Peter Hyams, Jennifer Beals,, Adrian Lyne, Samuel Fuller, Dario Argento, James Toback, Lasse Hallstrom, Fred Williamson, Gabriel Axel, Joe Bastianich, Aaron Sanchez, Danny Meyer, Steve Hanson, Matthew Kenney, Douglas Rodriguez, Simon Oren, Stanley Donen, Lindsay Anderson, Helena Bonham Carter, Edward Pressman, Harold Becker, Larry Cohen, James Ivory, Jack O'Connell, Michael Phillips, Kevin McClory, Jackie Mason, Joan O'Brien, Stanley Donen, Joseph B. Vasquez, Don Bluth, William Lustig, Al Goldstein, Simon Wincer, Valeria Cavalli, Dave Fishelson, Lizzie Borden, Roberta Findlay, Rob Cohen, Doris Wishman, Robert Tapert, Bruce Campbell, Bill Cosby, Pasquale Squitieri, Menahem Golan, Yoram Globus, Tim Kincaid, Joel M. Reed, Gregory Dark, T.L. Lankford, Fred Olen Ray, Victoria Paige Meyerink, Lawrence D. Foldes, Rick Marx & Ted V. Mikels
Reviews
Attic Toys (1995)
Unusual porn fantasy weaves a spell
That underrated actress/filmmaker Teri Diver came up with an offbeat story of toys that have come to life in this Jim Enright video -not one of his comedies but an unclassifiable tale worthy of Irwin Allen (yes, I watched "Land of the Giants" back in the day).
With Debi Diamond in the lead role there's no shortage of hot sex, as she plays an initially inhibited character named Maddy who retrurns to her old home, only to find the dolls and other toys left many years ago in the attic are alive -just iny people (played by porn stars, of course). Brittany O'Connell plays a redhead Barbie who convinces Maddy to free up and live life to the hilt, which translates in porn terms into having lots of sex. Mandy had wished to tread places with her favorite old Barbie doll but instead is reduced to doll size hersel, and later Barbie puts on a strap-on dildo and shows Maddy a good time with it.
Meanwhile, Maddy's boyfriend Steven St. Croix invites over a girl he picked up at a bar (Bunny Bleu, also a redhead) and f*cks her while Maddy pretends to be away. The G. I. Joe-type toy, played by T. T. Boy, gets to hump not just Brittany but also a Raggedy Ann doll (with a crummy red wig) played by busty Jasper. Once liberated, Maddy has returned to full-size and has a 3-way with a couple of guys she picked up in a bar: Alex Sanders and Jonathan Morgan.
What makes it all work is the outsized sets, including huge chairs and building blocks that convincingly create, along with well-done photography, the illusion that these doll people are tiny. For example, when Mandy wants to leave a note for Steven she uses a 10-feet tall pencil to write it.
The musical track is effective in sustaining a fantasy mood, and I appreciated a bittersweet ending after Mandy once again abandons her childhood toys in the attic and they all lie there, lifeless once more.
Everything Goes (1990)
What a complainer!
A nothing video by an awful pornographer (Michael Morrison = Milton Ingley) consists of Kristina King sitting on her couch, endlessly bitching on the phone how everybody uses her house and swimming pool as a place to have sex, without even consulting her. That's it: five flashback sex scenes, including her own, taking place at her pool or on her couch.
Ths sloppy video has silly mistakes, for example, she will call a character by one name but in the flashback he has a different name (Joey Silvera is either Joey or Dave). Ending has Krisitna's flashback of taking it in the rear from Tom Byron at her pool.
Sleepwalker (1990)
Fantasy goes nowhere
Title role goes to Aussie beauty Alice Springs, who delivers solid white nightgown action just like in very old horror films - in fact Canterbury ends the video with a shot of her discarded nightgown as the image behind the credits sequence. She appears as almost a hallucination to Tom Byron, out driving late at night with his girlfriend Lauren Brice. Lauren is giving him a blowjob while he drives, quite distracting.
So Canterbury has his inevitable ending -Byron finally finding his dream girl and going to bed with her. But what happens in between is dull and arbitrary. First, his girl Lauren doesn't believe the girl is real -she didn't see her. Later, Tom finds Lauren making love to Jeanna Fine, which understandably annoys him - Stuart's script has Jeanna identified as a recruiter for the Young Republicans - what??
A subplot is quite screwy: T. T. Boy found Alice wandering in a daze and brought her to jail, where she's sent to shrink Tracey Adams to receive hypnotherapy, and Alice under hypnosis imagines Tracey humping T. T. Boy on a stairway. Meanwhile back at the jail, cops Joey Silvera and Cal Jammer hump prostitute Cameo. Cal just happens to be a friend of Tom's, so he lets him know he's found the dream girl (Alice) and directs Tom to get her.
None of these contrivances or transitions are credible, just excuses to tie together (sort of ) six sex scenes.
Lesbian Sex 27 (2024)
Great pairings
"Lesbian Sex" is the least interesting of Girlfriends Films" many popular series -it's simply devoted in all-sex fashion to presenting talented femmes having sex, unencumbered by playing characters or enacting stories. In fact the "unscripted" nature of the show is touted in its marketing. With gonzo porn having conquered the industry, there's nothing special about this approach, but at least the casting here is effective.
The girls interview each other to open each segment, the usual self-serving mutual admiration content. It's not an issue of insincerity, it's just that they are sex workers making the most of another (in an undoubtedly busy schedule) of XXX performances.
For example: Cherry Kiss stresses the importance of kissing, while her co-star Eva Long stresses eye-contact. Their resulting scene is invigorating and well-played, but the notion of romance, drama, you name it is not present. We voyeuristically watch seasoned pros doing their thing.
My favorite scene of the four presented matches two dissimilar beauties: Euro porn queen Crystal Rush and exotic American star Ember Snow. It doesn't hurt that both are stacked ladies, but in the absence of characters, their contrasting looks give the standard girl/girl sex scene an edge.
Elsewhere, it's always a treat to see Jennifer White in action, this time as a MILF engaging with the lovely Chloe Amour. It is interesting the Jennifer is the Older and Chloe the Younger in the duo, with Chloe at age 33 still convincingly a sweet young thing next to Jennifer who is only three years her senior.
Heavenly Yours (1995)
Weak ghost story
That team of Patti Rhodes and Fred Lincoln came up with a loser this time in "Heavenly Yours", featuring Jon Dough as one of the dullest ghosts of all time. Fans of Lisa Ann will want to watch the superstar looking quite different, pre-nose job (similar to the transformation Celeste underwent earlier), but still quite sexy.
Show opens with either a nightmare or a flashback, take your pick, as Dough is murdered after humping Channone on a pool table. As stressed by Lisa's best friend Sindee Coxx, he was a philanderer, making it with many women while still married to Lisa.
Now she's remarried to Alex Sanders but can't get Jon out of her mind. She even hallucinates that his ghost is visiting her. The sex scenes are arbitrary, with Coxx comforting her gal pal Lisa with sex, but rebuffed when she talks about how bad Jon was. A masseuse (cameo role by Rebecca Lord, who was makeup artist for the video) isn't helpful but a prostitute at the massage parlor, after having a 3-way with customers, reveals she's the mother of Jon's baby.
Patti's script doesn't clear up Jon's murder and ends the show with a lousy scene of his ghost making love to Lisa on a phony rooftop, then urging her to commit suicide. Will she die or go back to husband Alex? You have to suffer through this clunker to find out.
She's a Sex Addict (2024)
Two golden oldies
A new Adult Time VOD brings back a pair of fine 2018 Girlsway vignettes directed by Stills By Alan for current porn audiences to view.
One that I've been unable to find on previous VODs or DVDs is "The Sex Addict", a well-acted scene featuring Penny Pax as a sex therapist being seduced (rather easily) by her new patient Whitney Wright. Their sex on the couch (the shirink's couch of course) is quite stimulating, and it's humorous watching Penny try to remain professional and resist sex addict Whitney's pressure.
The other scene, titled "Girlsway's Newest Director" was well-received on the 2018 DVD "Girlsway Crew". It was briefly reissued in March 2024 on a VOD titled "Ass Play" but that release was botched (contents misidentified), so here it is one more time.
Producer Bree Mills takes over center stage herself (and overstays her welcome, IMHO) as a parody of herself, barking out ridiculously detailed market-research-driven orders concerning desired content to neophyte director April O'Neil. April tries to carry out the silly approach to giving members what the want (Bree is definitely tongue-in-cheek when pretending to kowtow to her web subscribers' every wish), and of course the talent balks at this nonsense. Again, predictably O'Neil saves the day by humping her star Lana Rhoades herself, unfortunately leaving guest star Dillion Harper, who was supposed to service Lana in the scene, high and dry.
This is far, far from the "realistic sex" that Bree verbally emphasizes in character, but the campy approach is entertaining when performed by such skilled actresses. Hint that Bree is aiming for laughs is when she points out to April that "all women can squirt", perhaps an admonition that all it takes is a handy turkey baster and a bottle of Poland Spring.
5 ans après (2024)
New talent
A change of pace from Dorcel, this Alis Locanta feature has six 20-somethings who went to college together have a weekend reunion at a seaside rental home, with all sorts of hookups and sexual explorations occurring among them.
Clara Mia and Brit star Sam Bourne are the most familiar faces among the relative newcomers, and there's quite a difference from typical Dorcel fare in that the ladies aren't glamorous and don't parade around dressed in those trademark undergarments with garter belts.
This attractive cast doesn't have the porn star look, definitely a refreshing element. The porn is upbeat and positive, with none of the bondage or kink one usually expects.
Overall, there's a certain nostalgia value developed, as friends become lovers and characters make up for missed opportunities.
All Girl Massage: Make It Slow (2023)
Opposites attract
Call it inspired casting or maybe just random, but this Oiler segment pairs larger than life Siri Dahl with petite Liv Revamped in a nothing scene, living off the extreme contrast in body shapes to get one's attention.
They shoot the breeze about studying massage and end up with Siri letting Liv use her big body for practice, as she plans to open her own salon business after completing her training as a masseuse.
Siri has an unappealing hair style fo this show, and her reduced breasts look awful - what a contrast to the voluptuous beauty of a decade ago. But Liv's character reacts quite differently -she's instantly turned on when she sees her friend in the nude, and soon seduces her.
Both actresses do their darndest to make the scene work, but it has little to recommend it - zero story, zero characterizations and mechanical sex. So much for the trick casting of Siri opposite a girl who looks to be half her size.
All Girl Massage: Immediate Relief (2023)
A corny gimmick
The All Girl Massage label turns to an over-familiar story gimmick here -anything to get on to the all-important sexual content. Busty August Skye goes to her neighbor Serene Siren for help: she's injured herself and Siren is just the right person as a massage therapist to help her with her pain.
Their rubdown leads automatically to hot sex by the two women, marred only by Siren's very corny and gimmicky approach to cunnilingus -apparently beloved by her most ardent fans but a very hokey way of playing for the camera.
I had seen Skye before but was surprised this time by her uncanny facial resemblance to supermodel Tyra Banks. She would be perfect casting in a porn video taking off on the hit TV show Tyra has hosted. A.
All Girl Massage: Doing Something Sweet (2023)
Oiling sugar mama
Contrasting body types is the theme of this All Girl Massage vignette, starring Lauren Phillips as one hot Sugar Mama, taking care of petite cutie Lily Larimar.
As thanks for all she's done for her, Lily offers Lauren a present, in the form of a sensual, loving massage. Watching the tiny girl enthusiastically giving her benefactor an oily rubdown is stimulating to watch, as is the inevitable Sapphic sex enjoyed by both of them. Nothing special here, but just what the fans addicted to Oiler content crave. And it doesn't hurt that Lauren provides an extra large canvas for Lily's magic fingers to work on.
Love on the Hershe Highway (1989)
Ron Jeremy lectures and demonstrates
Anal Sex is a long-running porn genre, often advertised with the intentionally misleading (and pointless) claim of "all-anal". I bet this was a popular VHS release in its day, but hardly holds up over the years.
Ron Jeremy introduces the show and has sex with Scarlett O., telling us about anal eroticism with various warnings for the uninitiated. Lynn LeMay with an insipid sort of Valley Girl spiel dominates the rest of the vignettes, very loosely tied together by cross-referencing.
All the girls indulge in anal sex, including double penetrations. The goal of appealing to fans of the genre is achieved, with plenty of closeups "proving" we're watching anal sex, but nothing of interest beyond that.
Up to and Including Her Limits Volume 4 (2024)
Domination time
Kayden Kross and her fellow Deeper label directors provide four particularly cold, empty segments on this DVD, aiming for a heartless approach. With overworked Seth Gamble on hand for two of them, his sullen demeanor exemplifies the overall mood.
Busty Black actress Medusa stars in "Smooth Operator", no relation to the Sade classic but instead a dumb scene supposedly about phone sex. She services Vince Karter but otherwise it's as pointless an exercise as the rest of the show.
In "Play Again", dominant Seth abuses Slimthick Vic who only wants to please him. The corny premise is that he rejected her because she would not sign up for anal sex. He demands absolute trust, but she gets another chance and in the gonzo scene she delivers lots of anal sex, rewarded with a ring at the end. Along the way the fans get to see her choked and flogged for good measure.
A similar misogynistic scene is titled "Repurposed", its name bluntly explained when Dante Colle has two palls (Seth and Vince Karter back in action) over and points out his new 'coffee table" -it's actually slave Emma Hix as super-sub, he points out that she used to be an interior designer but he "repurposed" her. Talk about women as objects! The ensuing gang-bang has poor Emma reduced to plenty of double penetrations, never batting an eyelash.
Manuel Ferrara is featured in a 3-way scene banging big-tits gals Lena Paul and Alyx Star, who also enjoy hot lesbian sex. It's titled "I Want Your Touch" and unsubtly again demonstrates the joys of submission.
I suppose this DVD is designed to put you into a bad mood, or at least cultivate bad thoughts of abusing women, just what we need now. And I thought KK was a pioneer advancing the cause of women! Only thing missing from her Deeper formula here is the complete absence of Black studs in the cast.
Route 66: How Much a Pound Is Albatross? (1962)
A terrific diversion
Like a true breath of fresh air, Julie Newmar rides into Pico County, Arizona and takes over "Route 66" for an episode, winning the hearts of M & M. She even upstages their trusty Corvette.
Not necessarily the best role of her career, this is nonetheless the showiest. Silliphant wrote for her the most elegant collection of New Age and Zen dialogue, as she's presented not as a Beatnik and of course no Hippie, they having yet to be invented, but a fabulous Free Spirit and Nonconformist. With her on screen, no supporting cast is needed, though veteran character actor Frank McHugh adds a fine scene of pathos as a barfly struck by her "princess"-level beauty, reflecting on how sad his own life is.
Newmar's delivery of Silliphant's poetic prose is mavelous, covering a range of emotions but always spellbinding. First style butch on her motorcycle, she is simply dazzling emerging suddenly in a dress George bought for her. (Maharis is quite funny, playing his starstruck role with an SEG on his face, and later having an amusing turn impersonating a British military officer in the Punjab, mocking an equally starstruck Milner.)
This particular "Route 66" segment should be placed in a Time Capsule. In fact, seeing it for the first time 62 years after broadcast, my admiration for Julie Newmar has expanded tremendously.
Crawlspace (1972)
Taut, unusual TV thriler
One of my sci-fi/horror/fantasy reviews written 50 years ago: Directed by John Newland; Produced by Robert Berger; Executive Producer: Herbert Brodkin, for Titus Productions. Telecast by CBS-TV. Screenplay by Ernest Kinoy, from Herbert Lieberman's novel; Photography by Urs Furrer; Edited by Carl Lerner; Music by Jerry Goldsmith. Starring: Arthur Kennedy, Teresa Wright, Tom Happer and Eugene Roche.
Very fine contemporary horror telefilm which handles a limited-space abstract situation (a boy gone primitive holed up inside a protective childless couple's house) with finesse. Unfortunately watered-down to fit broadcast television standards, this clearly post-"Straw Dogs" and "Willard" tale has an obsessional thematic directness which is unusual for television.
Count Yorga, Vampire (1970)
Amateur night horror
One of my sci-fi/horror/fantasy reviews written 50 years ago: Directed by Bob Kelljan. Produced by Michael Macready; Released by American-International Pictures. Screenplay by Bob Kelljan; Photography by Arch Archambault; Edited by Tony de Zarraga; Music by William Marx. Starring: Robert Quarry, Roger Perry, Michael Murphy, Michael Macready, Donna Anderson, Judy Lang, Julie Conners and Marsha Jordan; Narrated by Geoge Macready.
Just an amateurish horror film tediously recounting the story of a Los Angeles vampire. Ripping off both Hammer Films and George Romero in stilted exploitation-minded fashion. Note the small role for soft porn star Marsha Jordan in the cast.
The Wide World of Mystery: The Color of Blood (1973)
OK TV thriller
One of my sci-fi/horror/fantasy reviews written 50 years ago: Directed by Robert Tronson; Produced by John Sichel for ITC (Incorporated Television Company -England), Telecast in America by ABC-TV's "The Wide World of Mystery" series. Screenplay by Brian Clemens; Music by Laurie Johnson. Starring: Norman Eshley, Kate Schofield, Derek Smith, Tom Wylton and Eric Mason.
Norman Eshley is perfectly cast as an urbane psychotic red-carnation killer in this improbable too-tasteful psychological thriller by Brian Clemens which adroitly mixes tape and film. Lovely, plain Kate Schofield makes a fine, shaggy-dog victim.
Countdown (1967)
Solid Altman SF drama
One of my sci-fi/horror/fantasy reviews written 50 years ago: Directed by Robert Altman; Produced by William Conrad for Warner Brothers release. Screenplay by Loring Mandel from Hank Searls' novel; Photography by William Spencer; Edited by Gene Milford; Music by Leonard Rosenman. Starring: James Caan, Robert Duvall, Joanna Moore, Steve Ihnat, Charles Aidman, Barbara Baxley, Michael Murphy, Stephen Colt and Ted Knight.
Tense straight sci-fi of the American side of the Space Race to put the first man on the moon, focusing on the human drama rather than the hardware aspect. Datedness and the surprisingly standard-style Altman direction are outweighed by the ultra-memorable combo of real-life buddies as stars, with this a career milestone for Duvall. Altman saves a dark poetry for the no-natural sound scenes on the moon plus a subtle, thrilling climax.
Cry of the Banshee (1970)
Poor Price vehicle
One of my sci-fi/horror/fantasy reviews written 50 years ago: Directed by Gordon Hessler; Produced by Gordon Hessler and Louis Heyward for American-International release. Screenplay by Tim Kelly and Christopher Wicking; Photography by John Coquillon; Edited by Oswald Hafenrichter; Music by Les Baxter. Starring: Vincent Price, Hilary Dwyer, Essy Persson, Elisabeth Bergner, Hugh Griffith, Sally Geeson and Robert Hutton.
Mindlessly sadistic Price vehicle has typically poor Hessler direction of witch-hunting activities. Fine but strait-jacketed Coquillon's crisp visuals, and an attractive Dwyer performance including white nightgown action. An embarrassing "comeback" by Silent Era actress Bergner.
The Wrong Woman (1990)
Thoroughly inept
Combine the moronic dialogue of Cash Markman with clumsy direction by Scotty Fox and you get the truly awful VHS feature "The Wrong Woman". Even by the low standards of this team, it's embarrassing and phony start to finish.
Bear with me as a I beat this dead horse, its failings perhaps instructive. A very intrusive use of voice-over narration by heroine Heather Lere spoon feeds the plot to the viewer as the movie is one long flashback. She visits a pal, played by Sabrina Dawn for the weekend, but arrives to find Sabrina's not there and the home has been ransacked.
Story has Sabrina a photographer who shoots video of a Senator (running for re-election) played by Randy Spears making love to her, and then supposedly gives him the roll of film. A political operative played by Sandy Sonners (a one-shot actress who can't act) is working for the opposing candidate and has told the media she will have a scandal to expose (using that same film).
Movie begins with a shot of a telescope, located in Sabrina's home, and the neighbor Paula Price figures in the plot as being blackmailed by Sabrina. Heather is the "wrong woman", supposedly mistaken for Sabrina and getting into danger as a result.
Markman's poorly contrived script ties all this farfetched nonsense together, but it is the braindead direction by Scotty that makes everything fall apart. The actors recite their lines in a monotone and the conversations are so brittle and fake that it plays almost as a satire of amateur non-acting. Several plot twists at the very end are supposed to be clever but are totally asinine. Instead of the intended suspense or mystery, we get 100% unconvincing and arbitrary.
Home in Her Arms (2024)
Blonde on blonde
It's hard to resist lovely River Lynn as she seduces her mature stepmom Addyson James in this well-titled romantic Allherluv vignette. It's anything but a pleasant situation, as River's dad is ready to throw her out of the house after he reads the kids' text messages sent to a lesbian lover.
The two actresses play well together, with mom the timid, resistant one, and young River the insistent, aggressive woman. This role reversal is the key to the scene's success, as well as the passionate and believable attraction between the two ladies.
One refreshing element stands out in particular, ma Addyson's pantyhose and the erotic effect of such a fetish item, once a porn staple but largely absent in recent years.
Wet Kink (1989)
Evidence of brain damage
Duck Dumont and Charles De Santos (a/k/a Charles Webb) signed as directors of this very irritating, inept porn movie. It's sort of about psychiatry but the filmmakers are the ones with mental illness.
I knew I was in big trouble in the opening scene as Joey Silvera is improvising gibberish, making no sense, and his co-star can't stop laughing as she tries to react to his unprofessional nonsense.
He forces to leave their swimming pool and go upstairs to make love, and then insists that she let him cum in her face. He succeeds but she resents this, and he launches into a tirade how "everybody does it" and orders her to go to a shrink.
This awful display of male chauvinism on steroids is supposed to be funny, and sure enough, the next scene has her telling this sad tale of abuse to her shrink, Angel Kelly. Rather than sympathize, Angel says she likes this from men and even likes to cum on women's faces. Soon she seduces Megan.
Okay, I'm sitting through a very poor porn video pandering to its assumed lowdown male audience with anti-women cliches. Well, things get much worse, as the pair of directors deliver random scenes constatnly intercut together, confusing and contradictory, all meant to be just slightly kinky, per the title. It's hard to imagine a worse result.
There's a sloppy, improvised foursome on a couch, including Silvera, while a new character played by Brandy Willows watches. Then Billy Dee emerges from the foursome to take Brandy to another room for sex in front of the roaring fireplace. He asks her about her life as a sexual surrogate, and I couldn't make any sense out of that.
Another foursome member turns out to be Angel Kelly's husband and he, too, insists on giving her a facial, but contradicting what she told Megan, Angel refuses. Don ends up cumming all over her face. In the sloppy cross-cutting, we see Megan and Silvera also having sex, and she squirts all over Joey's face. He gets very angry -what's good for the goose is not necessarily good for the gander.
Finale is random footage, playing almost like out-takes from two previous scenes, with the movie suddenly ending in the middle of one. Where Don is humping horny Renee Morgan (one of the foursome survivors) insists on double penetration with a dildo in her posterior).
As Ashton Kutcher used to say (a decade and a half after this awful video was released), I've been punk'd.
Fire & Ice: Caught in the Act (1995)
Too vague
There's the famous Nouvelle Vague - the French New Wave of Godard, Truffaut, Varda, Rivette and many others that revolutionized cinema in the late 1950s. But here we have fetishistic pornographer Paul Norman making a Wicked Pictures feature I never saw, and his vague screenplay is impossible to follow.
It concerns a secret sex club/night club where there's pole dancers like Jill Kelly, private rooms for sex, and the novelty of live sex acts on stage and right out there in the audience humping at ringside.
Scenes come and go pointlessly, with a running "theme", too common in a porn context to actually mean anything (it's so implicit in XXX movies) of men dominating women. We see Mickey G. Billed as "Nick Knight" in the credits (a fake name that seemingly I'm the first one to see through 30 years after???), abusing his beautiful spouse P. J. Sparxx. She ends up leaving him and signing on as a new dancer at the club, befriended by Jill Kelly, but needs a stage name. Jill cleverly comes up with a two-act: she'll be Ice and P. J. will be Fire.
Jill has similar issues: her man Vince Vouyer explicitly states his need to dominate her and memorably orders her by pointing his finger this-a-way to hump a guy named Dr. Dan (a/k/a Dan Steele).
As a team having lesbian sex on stage Fire & Ice are a hit, enough to turn on Dick Nasty and his wife Channone, who have sex together just feet away from them in the audience. The pointless, meandering movie ends suddenly with them on stage as the announcer voices over that they'll be traveling nationally to a club near you as the team "The Wicked Girls", after all this is a Wicked Pictures release.
Cards on the Table: Episode Four (2024)
The (ho-hum) finale
Hack director Marvin Love and hack screenwriter Jon Drexler wrap up this desultory Digital Playground crime series with a level of "who cares?" disinterest that is a bit sad. I know that porn budgets are asymptotically approaching zero, but I had thought that the love of B-movies would have provided something interesting or perhaps strange to occur in the final segment.
Instead, the show is wrapped up in utterly dull fashion. Wearing a ludicrously obvious little camera to capture incriminating footage of villain Mick Blue as she humps him, Lilly Bell instantly turns from good girl helping out her undercover detective/lover Isiah Maxwell get the goods on the bad guys to skillful prostitute in a threesome with happy hooker Vanessa Sky and Mick. It's just an excuse for half an hour of gonzo sex, filled with very fake passion by the girls.
No twists, surprises or action make this ending as dull as dishwater (or perhaps the original phrase ditchwater).
Caught Looking (1996)
Unnecessarily dull
Beginning with a very boring walkthrough by lead actor Jon Dough, Jim Powers' "Caught Looking" is a listless peek at voyeurism. Its credits in references on-line have been incorrect for 3 decades.
For starters, it was written, produced and directed by Jim Powers, not Fred Lincoln -I'm correcting this mistake. Secondly, Missy shows up with Mickey G. In a scene where they pick up Dough for a threesome, yet the immediately identifiable (made more obvious since he's with wife Missy) Mickey is mis-identified as "Nick Knight", another fix-it for me.
Dough is an aspiring actor who's just moved to Los Angeles from Cleveland and he rents a room at Steve Drake's home. Drake is a proud peeping tom with a fancy telescope, and Drake enjoys also using it to stare at beautiful neighbor Kaylan Nicole who masturbates a lot. In the end credits the movie is called "The Voyeur", evidently its shooting title.
Dough is listless throughout, even though he's getting to have sex with some beauties like Kaylan and Missy. There's some phone sex thrown in and a very predictable groaner of an ending.
Cards on the Table: Episode Three (2024)
A side issue
The sexy girls working for John Strong, Vanessa Sky and Sinatra Monroe, heard not only Lilly Bell having sex with Isiah Maxwell but also his admission that he's working undercover to catch their criminal boss. They decide to help out, wishing to start up their own business with a reward for putting Strong and his colleague Mick Blue out of commission.
So much for the minimal plot advancement in Episode Three. Before they can put their plot devised by Vanessa into operation. She receives a call from Strong, assigning her and Sinatra to service a wealthy young tech industry nerd. With glasses on, Parker Ambrose pits the role, and jacks up while he's content just to watch the two beauties indulge in Sapphic sex, Sinatra wearing a strap-on dildo. It's a fairly routine filler segment of this Digital Playground series.