Burning Sensation

With talent on board, Eric Roberts, Kari Wuhrer, Ron Perlman, Ed Begley Jr., and Paul LeMat, this pseudo-science based thriller starts strong, but ends up a mess. Intriguing at first with Roberts employing Wuhrer to test his theory (Psychometry) that objects retain impressions of the past, the middle part seems very repetitive and drags, while the rushed conclusion is really an "are you kidding me?". Roberts is his usual quirky self. Wuhrer is sexy with several erotic scenes and plays a character who can see the past by touching things, similar to Christopher Walken's in "The Dead Zone". Perlman is under used as a police detective, while Begley Jr., and LeMat are totally wasted in unnecessary roles. - MERK

B-movie stars Roberts and Wuhrer are appropriately cast in this slick B-flick which tells of a young woman who has psychometric visions in which she sees her college professor as a sex crazed murderer. As one might expect, Wuhrer vamps it up showing off oodles of skin while Roberts teeters between legit and psycho in an attempt to hold audience interest in the absence of a real story. Titillation and psychobabble are the hallmarks of this lame hodge-podge of murder, sex, and the paranormal. Okay for adult couch potatoes in the mood for a sexsational no brainer. (C-)

Sensation is a very erotic thriller that breathes hot, heavy and hard all over its audience, almost overpowering the murder mystery at it's center with the large number of sex scenes throughout. It's essentially trash, and wouldn't be worth much of a mention if it weren't for some great actors, and an opening score that sets an eerie mood the film hardly deserves. Eric Roberts is Dr. Ian Burton, a college teacher who is looking for people with vague psychic abilities, for some sort of research. Enter stunning Lila Reed (Kari Wuhrer), a student with the unique ability to experience an object or person's past simply by physical contact. Roberts is in fact looking for the person who murdered his lover, unbeknownst to her, and jumps at the chance to use her talent for his investigation. Many suspects run about, there's sex scenes between Roberts and Wuhrer, in which her abilities flash back to... even more sex scenes from the past, and it's all a wee bit disorganized, but oh well. Ron Perlman, always welcome, shows up as a Detective who thinks he can crack the case, winding up in over his head as well. There's also a bizarre and inexplicable cameo from a creepy Ed Begley Jr. who hassles Kari in a bar and runs off as quick as he showed up, never to be seen again. It's sleazy late night cable fun, without much to go crazy over except the actors, and that score I mentioned. Oh and.. you know... all the naughty bits, of which there is an overload

Despite a promising start and an intriguing premise, this film falls apart, and winds up being little more than a fairly routine and predictable thriller. Kari Wuhrer does a good job as the lead, and Roberts and Perlman are solid as usual, but all the good ideas in this film were used up in the first half-hour. The killer seemed obvious to me for much of the film, and things were further hindered by the needless character that was played by Ed Begley, Jr. Considering how impressive the opening was, this turned out to be quite the disappointment.

Sensation is an early 90's erotic thriller with a great cast and quite a unique premise. Lila (Kari Wuhrer) is a college student and an artist whose picked for a very unique study. She is tasked by psychologist Ian Burton (Eric Roberts) to sense items for feelings or who they belonged to. Soon she begins seeing violent and sexual visions caused by the items which leads her to believe he must be the killer.

All of the above got me interested and hankering watching this and I was severely disappointed. I like erotic thrillers and this era was the goldmine for them Color Of Night, Jade, etc. Etc. Sadly the only good thing about this film is the cast and introduction. There is little to no substance to this film, nudity took up an unruly amount of time and felt like it was there to pad the weak script. I generally appreciate the mystery aspects of these style of films, but even that aspect was quite boring and predictable.

This film is one you should skip, the performances are good but forgettable. However the rest of this film is very much a waste of time. I hate being hard on film makers because it's an art and artists want their pieces of art to express something however this expresses nothing of value or interest in my opinion.

3 out of 10 for the great cast and good acting.