Peaches and Cream (1981)

My initial plan was to point out Peaches and Cream the title has nothing to do with Peaches and Cream the film, and wonder if the reason Robert McCallum didn't call it Sunny was because Warren Evans had released a Candida Royalle-helmed picture titled so two years prior. But then, the more I considered the film, the more I wondered if the title wasn't actually well-considered irony rather than a titillating wink, evoking fresh and sweet farm girls (doubled down on the poster). While we're shown protagonist Sunny (Annette Haven) as a sweet farm girl, via flashback, in the opening scene, Peaches and Cream is about Sunny's search for meaning and connection and how her life is anything but. The thing is, the theme is (sort of) hinted at through the first two thirds of the movie, but not specified until Sunny talks with her therapist (Aaron Stewart).

On a spectrum of "harsh" to "charitable" it could be argued that McCallum's direction and Haven's performance were "unfocused" to "nuanced". Since I like the oeuvre of both, I'll opt for the latter, though the nuance is too much by half.

Over the course of the film, we see Sunny: on the farm with her drunk and abusive stepfather Will (Dale Meador) and her loving boyfriend Tom (Jon Martin); with oil company-owning client Ted (Paul Thomas), who continually tries to convince her to join his business; rescue and mentor street prostitute Deborah (Tigr); in a session with her client/therapist; rebuke asshole porn producer Jerry (Hal Freeman); and ultimately - after returning to the farm she left - leave her "manager" David (unfortunately uncredited; the character and performance were great) and her career. (By "see" I don't mean "see fucking" since there's no sex with Will, Jerry, or David. Just so that's clear.)

Call it the Cry for Cindy effect, but my opinion of the film improved the more I thought about it. It would almost certainly benefit from repeated viewings and at less than 80 minutes (oh baby, you're speaking my language!), it's a great candidate. With the exception of the second hardcore scene (Sandra Martin, Sparky Vasc, and Mike Horner), the sex was well-integrated, and I can almost guarantee Robert Rimmer's gonna point out how it was often "caring" or "with feeling". In fact, let's see what he does have to say:

This is an adult film with class. [The sex scenes] are all romantic and caring and believable. Most women will identify with Annette.

"Romantic and caring and believable." Vintage Rimmer! The only thing he got objectively wrong was claiming that Annette Haven "plays in all the sex scenes," when she is most definitely not in the Martin/Vasc/Horner threeway or the (admittedly brief) encounter between Holly McCall and Neal Grace. Still, she does the film's heavy lifting, that's for sure.

In the review for Cry for Cindy I said, "I wouldn't be surprised if [it] really improves with multiple viewings (but not the sex scenes, I'm positive of that). So, I'll give a solid CC50." I feel much the same way about Peaches and Cream (although here the sex scenes were fine to very good), so I'm rating a CC25.

RANDOM NOTES
° In the wake of my "research" into when Sharon Kane phased out her pseudonyms, I was amused by Rimmer's take on names: The only question this film raises is why does Chelsea Manchester, Tigr, Chelsea McClane (all one and the same woman who has a naive schoolgirl quality use so many different names?

° I wonder if Jerry B. Hershey was modeled after an actual pornographer. The way he was an egomaniacal blowhard and his sunglasses and cigar look seemed super specific.

° I've always wondered what Dale Meador's deal is. It seems like he was tight with the Mitchell brothers. He was a capable character actor (for porn anyway), although it's too bad about his grody teeth. Same thing applies to Frederick Foster (both traits), though I'm surprised Foster's credits are only four titles long.... Maybe I have an inflated sense of his career since I've seen Pandora's Mirror and Roommates multiple times apiece.

*********************************************************

On deck:

Pornonomy Reviews: Trashi

Trashi (1981)

Directed by:
Louis Lewis

Starring:
Copper Penny
Dorothy Lemay
Lisa DeLeeuw
Loni Sanders
Lysa Thatcher
Nicole Black
Serena
Sharon Mitchell
Tigr
David Morris
Joey Silvera
Jon Martin
Kevin James
Michael Morrison
Paul Thomas

Sci-fi, detective noir, comedy? Yes, please!

With the help of his "Igor", Boris (James), Dr. Schtup (Morrison), is in the business of creating love drones to staff his brothel (at least that's an educated guess; it's never addressed directly as far as I recall), and he has just produced his masterpiece, Trashi (DeLeeuw*). His odd laboratory has aroused the interest of the police, specifically Inspector Crotch (Silvera). A cursory questioning doesn't yield information, so Crotch enlists the aid of PI Bic Boner (Thomas) - who also acts as the narrator.

Bic gains entrance to the house by disguising himself as an exterminator. While snooping around in the basement, he's beset by the fembots, CP3X(Thatcher), Vibrata (Tigr), and finally R69D69 (Lemay), before being discovered by Boris. Tied to a bed, things look bleak for Boner before being literally saved by an orgy.

In the end, Schtup's nefarious plans are thwarted and Bic gets the...girl?...girl robot, anyway.

At a brisk 74-minutes, there's a lot to love about this film. The scenes are shot terrifically, the sound design touch of placing reverb on the robots' voices is great, the tongue-in-cheek tone of the film is perfect for Silvera and Thomas (who is always great in roles that require "charmingly aloof, with a wink"), DeLeeuw looks amazing (although it'd be nice if she'd have been able to act a little more, which she always did capably), and it includes one of the best examples of an integrated sex scene I can recall:

Bic Boner's introduction comes while he's in the throws with his secretary (Sanders). Both are in character the entire time, but there's also an admirably funny exchange in dialogue.

Secretary: Bic, you're dick's so fuckin' slick. Do your trick, Bic.

Boner: Would you like me to flick my Bic?

Secretary: Yeah, flick my Bic!

Boner: I love it when you talk to me!

Secretary: Yeah, there's so many words that rhyme with "Bic" it's great!

The delivery of the punchline is so good, it threatened to make me reassess my opinion of Sanders's acting abilities. (The few times I've seen her, she's come off as pretty wooden.)

Trashi also features a few hilariously awful accents. In his autobiography, Ron Jeremy mentioned he always strove for comedy over authenticity in accents, citing specifically his "Southern" accent in Sizzle. If you've seen the film, "comedy" would be the only explanation for his bizarre "New York Jew meets rural South Carolinian" twang. Here, Morrison and James attempt some sort of German/Austrian deal, but Morrison's sounds like some sort of German/Swedish/Indian mess, and James's waffles between the intended and an awful British accent. As the maid, Mitchell attempts a French accent initially, but by the end, it's sort of a generic "Aristocrat" accent with hints of Dracula. Of course, it's ludicrous to nitpick adult actors' abilities (or lack thereof) attempting accents - as long as they're not detrimentally distracting - so the grade won't suffer as a result.

If there is a knock against the film, it's that neither Schtup's grand scheme nor Inspector Crotch's suspicions in that scheme are ever adequately addressed. Honestly, a little more care given to the story here, in my opinion, would have made Trashi an All-Timer. As it stands, it was a lot of fun, and really well put together. A-

* Before the film starts, there's a First Amendment PSA narrated by Lisa DeLeeuw. Now, I'd assume her name is pronounced "Da-Loo", but she actually says "De-LAY-oh". After nearly twenty years of saying it one way, though, it's unlikely I'll change....

Pornonomy Reviews: Hot Dallas Nights

Hot Dallas Nights (1981)

Directed by:
Tony Kendrick

Starring:
Hillary Summers
Raven Turner
Tara Flynn
R.J. Reynolds
Sam Grady
Turk Lyon

This is a weird little piece of work. A parody of Dallas (a show which, to my recollection, I've never seen), Hot Dallas Nights sort of tells the story of the Brewing family, Texan manure magnates: Rock and Millie (presumably Alexander Kingsford and Greer Shapiro in mercifully non-sex roles), sons R.J. (R.J. Reynolds) and Robbie (Turk Lyon), their wives Mary Ellen and Pat (Tara Flynn and Raven Turner), granddaughter Lindy (Hillary Summers), though she doesn't seem to be either son's daughter, and ranch hand Duke (Sam Grady).

Two thirds of the film is the story of intrigue (R.J.'s plan to mortgage the ranch in order to buy a competitor's manure operation) and infidelity (the sons with each others' wives, the wives with each other and with Duke) in the glamorous world of Big Shit, highlighted by gloriously stilted performances of delightfully awful dialogue. The film really falls apart in the end, though. The final third, after the sons are kicked out of the family - R.J. for being a shady jerk, Robbie for being a dummy - and Duke is elevated to boss of the company for orchestrating a merger with the competing manure-ers, is just three consecutive sex scenes between Duke and Lindy, Duke, Mary Ellen, and Pat, and then Duke and Pat. By and large, the sex scenes are average, but they're definitely momentum killers.

After I found out that Kendrick's only other directing credit was Nurses of the 407, Hot Dallas Nights made a lot more sense. Since I gave Nurses a C-, and Hot Dallas Nights was moderately more amusing, doesn't get knocked for wasting its cast, and gets a few bonus points for a relatively funny call back in the closing shot, I'll give it a C.

Pornonomy Reviews: Exhausted

Exhausted: John C. Holmes, the Real Story (1981)

Directed by:
Julia St. Vincent

One thing you can't help but take away from I, Goldstein was Al Goldstein's obsession with John Holmes. While talking about Holmes, and the Wonderland murder trials, he brought up Exhausted, "a strange fuck film, a pastiche of interviews, clips, and testimonials, a 'documentary' on John Holmes the man.... The film was fascinating but...phony."

From the outset, it's obvious that Exhausted was the inspiration for Amber Waves's Dirk Diggler documentary in Boogie Nights. (Although it should be said that at his rock-bottom Diggler never looks as haggard as Holmes.) While P.T. Anderson basing Boogie Nights on the rise and fall of John Holmes is well known, I was amazed to see two things in Exhausted that were recreated almost identically in Boogie Nights: a clip from a Wadd scene that became a scene in a Brock Landers film ("Good? No it's not good. It's probably the best place to eat in Los Angeles,"; San Francisco, for Wadd) and the Holmes/Bob Chinn, Diggler/Jack Horner sex scene blocking interview.

(Two other brief Boogie Nights observations: 1. The character Jessie St. Vincent must be named for Julia St. Vincent. 2. While I've read that Veronica Hart was a major part of the composite porn actress that was Amber Waves, the most Amber Waves-like performance I've seen to date was Honey Wilder in Sweet Alice, a film that I'll definitely have to review for this site.)

Goldstein mentions that Exhausted was cobbled together by St. Vincent, Holmes's 21 year old girlfriend, to take advantage of the notorious press of the Wonderland murder trials, and there's nothing to make you assume otherwise. The documentary approach is an interesting spin on what would otherwise have been a standard compilation film. While the "man on the street" aspect is fairly pointless (and, in fact, one of the "interviews" is obviously staged), the direct question and answer bits with Holmes are quite interesting. He speaks with such earnestness and feeling that it's a kind of chilling reminder that he was, by all accounts, a compulsive liar, completely delusional, or both. It's also interesting that while Holmes performed with scores of women in his career, the only actress interviewed is Seka. On the one hand it makes sense considering he had more scenes with her than any other actress (although Annette Haven and Desiree Costeau were right up there, too, according to IAFD), but on there other it begs the question why there were no other interviews. If the production of the film was as hurried as it seems, time and scheduling may have been a factor, but frankly, burned bridges and an obviously biased portrayal of Holmes seems more likely.

If you've got an opinion of John Holmes, Exhausted isn't going to change it (for the better, anyway), but is quite a fascinating film, and I'd definitely recommend it, if for no other reason than it's a trip to see a full-length version of the fictional documentary from Boogie Nights. A

Pornonomy Reviews: Skintight

Skintight (1981)

Directed by:
Ed DePriest

Starring:
Annette Haven
Connie Peterson
Cris Cassidy
Lee Caroll
Lisa De Leeuw
Mai Lin
Maria Tortuga
Starr Wood
Aaron Stuart
Billy Dee
Blair Harris
Mike Horner
Michael Morrison
Paul Thomas
R.J. Reynolds
Randy West

I thought I had this review pretty well written while I was watching Skintight. That is, until the last twelve minutes. I was going to say that Skintight seemed to be cobbled together with scenes from (at least) two different movies: a light-hearted film that focuses on a sex therapy clinic, staffed by Annette Haven, Lee Carroll, and Maria Tortuga, and a film in which Paul Thomas deals with a fiance saving herself for marriage with leather and chain fantasies springing from a fetish magazine.

The last scene (in which Paul Thomas rapes Maria Tortuga) ties both directions together with a darkness and intensity not even barely hinted at earlier in the film.

The way the film (and it's seemingly contradictory tones) comes together in the end leaves me with two (seemingly contradictory) opinions:

1. The film is a hot mess that was put together on the fly (or there's a director's cut out there with an additional 30 minutes that makes sense from beginning to end), or

2. Skintight is a bit of auteur genius that has more in common with Cronenberg's Spider or Herzog's Bad Lieutenant than with Deep Throat or even Behind the Green Door.

If it's the former, then I can at least say that it's worth checking out for a great opening credit sequence (on par with Triple Xposure), and the film rates a C-.

If it's the latter, though, Skintight is the most mind-bending adult film I've seen since the excellent Neon Nights and rates an A.

At this point I'm pretty much split 50/50, and I'm not sure if I'll ever be able to firmly come down on one side or the other.

Pornonomy Reviews: Neon Nights

Neon Nights (1981)
Directed by:
Cecil Howard

Starring:
Arcadia Lake
Jody Maxwell
Kandi Barbour
Linda Vale
Lysa Thatcher
Veronica Hart
Ashley Moore
Eric Edwards
Jack Teague (as Jake Teague)
Jamie Gillis
Roy Stuart

Oh, hell yes! You know, lately it seemed like every movie I was putting on seemed to be a big disappointment. I hadn't read anything about Neon Nights before watching it, so when it started up my expectations were nil. The first thing I was struck by was the quality of the transfer. Really, if it weren't for the fact that within the first few minutes Jamie Gillis is fisting Linda Vale, the quality of the picture, camera work, and music could easily convince you that you were watching a mainstream movie from the early '80s. The way the scene was cut between what was going on in the master bedroom and teenage daughter Sandy's (Lysa Thatcher) room got me more interested, and by the time the title card hit the screen, I was sold.

Giving a plot synopsis would actually be a disservice considering the way Neon Nights plays out, so I'm going to keep that part as vague as possible. Sandy is seduced (or seduces, perhaps) her mother's boyfriend Robert (Jamie Gillis). Predictably, her mother catches them in a compromising situation, so Sandy decides to escape her mothers house and run off to New York to try to find her identical twin sister who'd run away earlier. Along the way, she's given a ride by a magician (played with twisted glee by Jack Teague) who takes her to the motel room he shares with Sweet Marie (Jody Maxwell), presumably his magician's assistant. She finally gets to New York, and to the home of her sister's employer (Veronica Hart), but not before being offered a bunch of balloons in a park by Lilah (Arcadia Lake).... I was going to say that it makes more sense when you see it, but, really, it doesn't. Finally, there's a twist at the end throwing much of what happened before into question that was intriguing enough to ensure that, eventually, I'll watch Neon Nights again.

Neon Nights was absolutely bonkers in the best possible way. Like I mentioned before, the camera work was excellent, the shots were typically interesting and well-considered (there was maybe a slight over-reliance on the "reflection in a mirror" angle, but then they are very thematically appropriate), the music was spot on and contributed to the overall ominous and surreal tone of the film, and the performances were all top notch. A

Pornonomy Reviews: Lips

Lips (1981)

Directed by:
Paul G. Vatelli

Starring:
Brook West
Pipi Anderson
Kathy Harcourt
Lily Rodgers
Lisa DeLeeuw
Tigr
Vanessa del Rio
Billy Dee
Herschel Savage
Paul Thomas
Reggie Gunn
Ron Jeremy

I suppose it's not a bad idea for couples with unsatisfying sex lives, like John and Kathy (Ron Jeremy and Kathy Harcourt) and Neil and Linda (Herschel Savage and Brook West), to seek counseling. I am surprised, though, at the efficacy of Dr. Jim Matlock's (Paul Thomas) sex therapy resort/clinic, considering it seems all that's required to fix a sex life is for the partners to have a brief, unfaithful tryst.

The main problem with Lips (other than the fact that the name seems to have been picked out of a hat*; there's hardly the oral fixation such a title would suggest. In fact, Neckerchief Bonanza would have been far more appropriate since literally every actress wears one....) is that there's no narrative cohesion. While the scenes aren't completely disconnected (you at least know how the characters got in the situations...well, for the most part, anyway) the idea of a film taking place in a couples' sex therapy lends itself to far better execution than what was put on film.

I don't mean to say the film was bad necessarily, just kind of underwhelming. Oddly, the most interesting sex scene was one that wasn't: after assistant carpenter Arlene (Tigr) gets busy with John and Kathy, she decides to let her boss Skip (Reggie Gunn) finally score after repeated advances. Only when finally presented with Arlene's body, Skip's unable to perform. Either Tigr is the best ad lib actress in the history of porn, or that was a scripted soft scene, which seems like a really bizarre thing to write in.

I wouldn't actively steer anyone away from Lips, but it wouldn't be the first (or fifth) Vatelli film I'd recommend. C+

* And the box cover has even less to do with the film than the title does.

Pornonomy Reviews: Roommates

Roommates (1981)

Directed by:
Chuck Vincent

Starring:
Kelly Nichols
Samantha Fox
Veronica Hart
Bobby Astyr
Don Peterson
Jack Wrangler
Jamie Gillis
Jerry Butler
Ron Hudd
Ron Jeremy
(and a bunch of others)

While perhaps not as hard to get my brain around as Taboo American Style, I've had a hard time coming to grips with exactly what I was going to write about Roommates. First, the objective facts: Roommates is a film about three women sharing an apartment in New York City, embarking on new or different career trajectories, and is directed by Chuck Vincent, one of the few openly gay directors of straight hardcore films (the only I can think of off the top of my head, truth be told). The scope of the effect of Vincent's sexual preference on the end product can be debated, but that there is some effect, is likely a given.

Billie (Samantha Fox) is a high class call girl looking to leave the profession: turning her back on lying on her back, you could say. (Good one, Rog!) In order to keep her apartment on a lowly production assistant's salary, she places an ad for roommates which is answered by Joan (Veronica Hart), a drama student moving to New York to follow her dreams of acting on Broadway, and Sherry (Kelly Nichols) an LA model - with an epic substance abuse problem - looking to check out the New York scene for awhile.

From the top to the bottom the cast is excellent, the writing quite good, the direction and cinematography top-notch - including a non-sex scene as tense and scary and a sex scene as gripping and squirm inducing (both on the strength of Jamie Gillis acting as only Jamie Gillis could) as you'll find in any film, porn or mainstream. And yet the reason I kept waffling on how to review and grade the film is that the sex scenes, by and large, aren't particularly "sexy," though primarily by design. Only two (Fox/Wrangler* and Hart/Butler) are completely consensual and playful or sweet. The others are either preying on the delusions of a mistress (Hart) fueled by the threat of blackmail (Fox) or show the perils of drug abuse (Nichols).

On a tangent, one thing that stood out to me was the scarcity of pop shots. Now, don't get me wrong, it's not like I clamor for them, but even in a less facial-oriented era, they were the norm and a film that had two (I think), one of which was strictly, uh, manual (Gillis) stands out. It's tempting to attribute the quirk to Vincent's sexual orientation, but I don't recall the few other Vincent pictures I've seen holding to this "low pop" formula.

So, after much musing and chin stroking, I'm giving Roommates a B+.

* Samantha Fox and Jack Wrangler have such great chemistry that it's a travesty they only acted together three times: The Filthy Rich and Jack and Jill (another Vincent picture) besides Roommates. I'm really interested in checking out Jack and Jill, now, to complete the set.

Pornonomy Reviews: The Filthy Rich

The Filthy Rich (1981- Caballero)

Directed by:
Michael Zen

Starring:
Jesie St. James
Lisa De Leeuw (as Lisa DeLeeuw)
Samantha Fox
Vanessa del Rio
George Payne (as George Paine)
Hershel Savage (as Hubert Savage)
Jack Wrangler
R.J. Reynolds

The Filthy Rich was the very first porn I ever saw. Like I mentioned in the review for Stiff Competition, this film dictated what I expect(ed) from all porn: a fun plot, well written, well acted, and well directed. Of course, the "fun" plot qualification has since been revised to "interesting" as I encountered films that weren't intended to be light or funny.

The film revolves around a wealthy couple, Trent and Tiffany Trumaine (Jack Wrangler and Samantha Fox), having trouble in the bedroom: the lady of the house is frigid (that my first exposure to Fox was as a woman that was sexually frustrated and naive is pretty hilarious given that, by much of what I've read, she's very aggressive in real life). In order to improve their sex life and save their marriage, they decide to enroll in a sexual encounter group at Loadstone in Carmel (look for it in a segment on "69 Minutes..."). In their absence, they leave their maid and butler, Freida and Jarvis Leer (Jessie St. James and Herschel Savage) in their proxy.

As the faux-Trumaines, Freida and Jarvis tend to the estate: greeting the new Cuban cook, Chili Caliente (Vanessa del Rio); seeing that the pool gets cleaned - Dirk (Randy West), filling in for his kid brother and sporting a bad-ass perm and hilarious cut-off denim shorts, predictably lays into Freida, who's under the influence of del Rio's "special" refried beans; and do some market research for the sexual aide equivalent of the Avon lady, Magnolia Thunderpussy (Lisa de Leeuw).

Ultimately, Loadstone unleashes the sexual animal hidden within Tiffany Trumaine, which is put on full display at a bizarre, animalistic dinner party. In addition to the scenes between the Trumaines, the Leers, Freida and the pool "boy", and Jarvis and the cook, Jarvis and Magnolia Thunderpussy, there's one between del Rio and the two bikers that dropped her off at the Trumaine residence. This scene is problematic in that it plays out the "classic" trope of threatened sexual assault with the victim changing to willing participant part way through. Given del Rio's performance in BDSM pictures, it's not a stretch, I guess, for her to be in a scene like this, but it still makes me uneasy.

Much like violence in music, mainstream films, and videogames (sexual or otherwise), violence in porn is going to be seized upon by detractors to highlight the social evils of the medium. Any violence in porn is worse, still, because at the end of the day, the goal of pornography is to excite sexually, and drawing sexual excitement from rape situations is dicey, to say the least. Of course, plenty of normal, well-adjusted people indulge in rape fantasy, and the fact that, after having seen this film as an adolescent, I'm neither a sexual predator nor a mysoginist could suggest that scenes like this aren't harmful, it's impossible to lay out a blanket statement for everyone. It's possible, though not probable, that playing Grand Theft Auto or listening to NWA or watching The Filthy Rich at an impressionable age could warp one's development. All this is beyond what I intended for this blog or this review...so I'm going to leave the topic with this quick note: while I don't empirically disagree with the biker scene, it'd make it a helluva lot easier defending pornography if scenes such as this (tame, really, by comparison to other films) weren't filmed....

The Filthy Rich closes in a very American Graffiti/Animal House fashion, with a narrator telling what becomes of all the characters. Included is that Chili Caliente operates a chain of taco trucks in Tijuana, saying: "If God had not wanted man to eat pussy, he wouldn't have made it look like a taco. Cha cha cha." Words to live by. B+

Pornonomy Reviews: Between the Sheets

Between the Sheets (1981 - Caballero Home Video)

Directed by:
Anthony Spinelli

Starring:
Annette Haven
Arcadia Lake
Tigr (as Chelsea McClane)
Seka
Vanessa del Rio
Veronica Hart
Eric Edwards
Joey Silvera (as Joey Sivera)
John Leslie
R.J. Reynolds
Randy West
Richard Pacheco

The premise of this flick is that a talking bed receives a new talking mattress. While the bed is trying to seduce the mattress, he relates a series of sexual Trysts Throughout History that have taken place on him.

Straight away, it's a pretty ludicrous construct (which, generally speaking, gets bonus points from me right off the bat). When you encounter a film that has a series of unrelated sex scenes tied together with bits of narration, you have to wonder if it's an actual movie or convenient vehicle to recycle clips or Swedish Erotica-type loops. In this case, though, it's apparent from watching the sex scenes that they were all filmed for this movie.

The first scene takes place in colonial America. R.J. Reynolds plays a British lord that barters tea for sex with Annette Haven's colonial lady. Right off the bat this scene establishes the trait that marks all of them as scenes filmed for the movie and not culled from other films: the tendency for the pre-"action" back-and-forth dialogue to amble (as though there was no post-production editing whatsoever).

Next up is a "contemporary" scene between Richard Pacheco and Veronica Hart. This one's interesting in that it doesn't spell out exactly what's going on between the two of them and relies instead upon the actors' ability to convey a back story through the dialogue and the viewers' ability to put the pieces together. Pacheco's character was up for some sort of advertising contract with a business that Hart's character is involved with. The job ended up going to another firm, which Hart reluctantly tells Pacheco. In the immediate aftermath, Pacheco's pissed. In the shortly-thereafter-aftermath, he's pissed/horny enough to fuck her while pointing out the irony that she's just told him he didn't get the job and still expects him to fuck her. Overall, I was impressed with this scene because it didn't turn into an exploitative "hate fuck" like it easily could have. (On the other hand, my wife pointed out that Veronica Hart laughs a lot through this scene; something I'd probably attribute to her wanting to keep the tone playful.) Additionally, as the second scene, Spinelli's formula for sex is put into place: dialogue, cunnilingus, intercourse. While "talking/oral/fucking" isn't the cure for cancer, Spinelli's focus on male-on-female oral over female-on-male oral is interesting. Oh yeah, and at one point, Veronica Hart says, "I want you to fuck me like a dog," and then, while she gets on all fours, she barks. So there's that.

Overall, the preceding scene and this one are neck and neck for Best of Show. Here, Joey Silvera and Tigr play San Francisco hippies. Basically, Tigr fucks Silvera out of a bad trip on the premise that doing so makes great karma. Honestly, when you're dealing with rapid-fire dialogue that goes: "My dick is melting.... It's huge.... It's two inches," you know you've struck gold! Factor in a rocking soundtrack and, forget gold, that shit's platinum!

The next scene comes in without a bed/mattress narration buffer which bucks the trend of the film. On the one hand, it's a bit disruptive. On the other, it's not so bad because it features Eric Edwards (one of the era's best actors) and Arcadia Lake who's awfully hot and holy cow is she tiny (she acts big, I guess). At any rate, this scene's noteworthy for three reasons: first, it's the only one with a semi-unwilling (initial) participant (the Southern Belle) - the "even if she says otherwise, she really wants it" thing is a theme in both porn and mainstream films as well (see: Harrison Ford and Sean Young in Blade Runner, for instance) and skeezes me the hell out - second, it features the only "crotchless bloomer" scene I've ever seen in my life, and third, it exposes a fundamental misconception of the Civil War on either Edwards', Spinelli's, or Edwards and Spinellis' part: Edwards' Union soldier character ends his tryst with Lake's Confederate lady character with a sound "Long live the Revolution" statement. Just stop and consider that for a second....

If the first scene (Haven/Reynolds) established the film's prime characteristic - the seeming attempt to edit in-camera instead of, you know, in an editing station - this scene writes that prime characteristic in permanent ink. John Leslie stars as "Ricco" a Capone-era Chicago gangster facing the G-Men with his platinum haired dame played by Seka. For a pairing of male and female superstars like Leslie and Seka you'd be right to hope for something more than what's put down. Don't get me wrong, the action they produce is fine, it just takes an e-fucking-ternity to get there. It's almost like Spinelli gave his two superstars waaaaay too much time out of respect for their contributions to the craft. So, it's like the porn equivalent of Righteous Kill. (ZING!) This marked the first time I'd ever seen Seka with bleached pubic hair. Trust me, it's weird.

Another bizarre bed/mattress bumper intros the last scene. While the Leslie/Seka scene dragged on for awhile, the fact that there were at least a few peripheral characters cycling into and out of the scene took a bit of the edge off. This one, with Randy West and Vanessa del Rio as '50s Philadelphia greasers really pushes it. You start to get the sense that every line was read at least six times. And if you created a drinking game that had you take a shot every time del Rio said, "Shelden, I sweah to Gawd...," you would black out well before the action started. Eventually, they get down to it, though.

Finally, there's one last shot of the bed and mattress. In which they...have...sex? I guess that works somehow. Anyway, now's as good of a time as any to mention that whoever voices the bed sounds similar to the narrator in A Christmas Story, which adds an additional bizarre level to this flick.

It seems kind of pointless to try to give starts or a grade or, I don't know, hard-ons to an adult film. That being said, I'll give Between the Sheets a B+.