Getting Schooled

Alektra Blue was nominated for a best actress "industry" award (about as merited as Pia Zadora's fishy Golden Globe nod decades ago) for this desultory Jonathan Morgan rom-com. No screenplay credit is the tip-off of trouble ahead, as even gaffers and grips and p.a.'s are all duly noted in the end crawl.

James Deen gives a typically surface, unsuitable attempt at acting as Alektra's pesky next-door neighbor, invoking the feature's title when he attempts to teach sad-sack Blue (the stage name does fit here) in the ways of internet dating. Her mishaps with these essentially blind dates make up the duration of a ridiculously over-long trifle (2-1/2 hours plus for what Wicked and Vivid used to knock off in 70 minutes).

Lighting looks like a TV show, and nothing of interest happens. Morgan even telegraphs and ruins the one gag, that Alektra has been in a 5-year funk since her heavy boyfriend Tommy Gunn put on a dress (matching hers for attempted sight-gag) when she was expecting him to propose marriage - sex change due in a sequel, God forbid.

Ryan McLane is insufferable as a smug, mindless date who never takes his shades off, intent only on preserving his fetish string of having had sex in every bathroom wherever he goes. Alektra promptly takes a hike so Ryan improbably humps the busty waitress (tattooed alt-star Christy Mack) in the restaurant's loo.

Another crappy date has an uncredited schlump (probably played by a crew member) interested in a threesome with Alektra and his busty wife Kaylee Brookshire. When Alektra quickly exits stage left, so does unnamed hubby as Prince Yahshua shows up to hump her instead for some trendy IR content. The Prince even wears his trademark kneepads, these videos not interested in charaterization but rather mere star turns.

Jessa Rhodes, pre-breast enhancement, is Deen's drunken date in the opening sex scene, and the cad can't even remember her name (how amusing!). A flashback before the reveal has Gunn humping Alektra, and the utterly cornball potboiler ends with Deen finally hooking up with Blue, fade out on her facial, not an hour too soon.

One gimmick here that is irritating is that Alektra wears glasses and unflattering bangs-hairdo, but when she's having sex, she doffs the glasses and looks just like the fans remember her -uber-sexy, replete with trademark high heels (that oddly look just like the ones India Summer alway wears to bed). To call this an award-worthy performance merely underlines how phony those AVN honor are. Maybe the ever-present condoms should have been nominated for an award.

P.S. with hours to go watching this before I sleep, my mind wandered, causing me to conjure up a high-concept title Wicked neglected to develop into an Alektra vehicle while she was under contract: "Alektra Glide in Blue". I guess that winner was too obvious for the brain trust at the label.