I'm Watching You

In a moody and noir-like story of love and murder, we follow the sexual education of a young innocent plunged into the Bohemian world of artists' lofts. Sounds like the company line, eh? Actually what we have in "I'm Watching You" is a well-paced "erotic thriller" with a fine balance of nudity and plot, an attractive cast, and an evocative sound-track

The lively and uninhibited Jacqueline Lovell plays the painter's model, Alisha, who never misses an opportunity to shimmy out of her dress or join in an energetic romp with the handsome young artist. With Alisha as her role model and guide, and through the urging of a stranger on the phone, Laura evolves from innocent girl to wanton woman (even if she has to struggle with lines like "I guess it was the way I was raised. Pleasure is evil.it's a sin.." to emphasize her innocence) And we become watchers too, watching Laura as she indulges in a bit of exhibitionism at the window of her loft and finally progresses to masturbating while the mysterious stranger listens on the phone.

And fortunately, because this movie follows the unwritten rules of "erotic thrillers", the next stage of Laura's sexual education is a girls' night out, complete with lingerie modeling, dancing, and finally the seduction of Laura by Alisha

We also have two very torrid scenes with the manipulative wife of the artist (played by Vanessa Blair) and her infidelity with the artist's agent, with some mild S & M moments making the mercury rise in Laura's thermometer as she watches from her window.

All of which leads me to the innocent heroine, played by Lori Dawn. The IMDB lists only one other film, also made in 1997, with her in the cast. It's a Kira Reed vehicle called "Madame Savant", which unfortunately hasn't entered my late-night cable circuit. Perhaps it's a personal preference for pretty redheads, but I couldn't take my eyes off Lori throughout this movie. And of course my natural reaction is to want to see more; why else do we assemble around the flickering altar late at night? I know the adult movie business is unstable, actresses come and go (literally), appear under new names, get out of the business and marry wealthy producers, get out of the business and marry broke saxophone players, and so on. But it's a real disappointment when a face and form of such promise simply vanishes. Any recent sightings from you watchers out there?

I'm not sure if this falls into the category of compulsive fan but I thought that I'd add an update on this delicious redhead.

A recent issue of "Femme Fatales" (quite a resource for late-night cable viewers) has an interview and an update on LoriDawn Messuri (there's also a few uninspired photographs and one very beguiling shot of a naked LoriDawn).

The update is a movie called "Cruising Purgatory", with LoriDawn playing a stripper with bad dreams. A promising idea but don't expect this to show up at your local multiplex. Probably a straight-to-video release and, unless your local cable programmer is either very hip or also a fan, it may be a while before this shows up on the airwaves.

There are a bunch of good 90's softcore movies (where the acting is passable and there is some sort of coherent plot - "Friend of the Family" or "Play Time" or "Temptations", to name just three standouts) and then there is this kind: "I'm Watching You" isn't good, even by the lax standards I normally apply to these sorts of movies.

What little plot there is could charitably be called "nonsensical", someone's attempt at the kind of dark erotic crime/murder/revenge-type movie you might have seen someone like Michael Douglas star in around the same time. Needless to say, it fails miserably.

Of course, there were plenty of sex scenes. So many, in fact, that at times the plot developments seemed shoehorned in just to separate the times the cast is naked. I've seen better scenes in these movies, too.

Like every other movie released by any company even remotely related to Playboy Video, you can rest assured that the film you are about to (or just have) watch(ed) has little to no plot, but luckily it usually will have a cast full of gorgeous women. This movie is no exception. They try to write in a plot of murder and mystery, but no one who watches this film will give a care in the world about any of that nonsense. I'm guessing anyone who rents or buys this movie will do so for the sheer pleasure of seeing beautiful women, who are, in most scenes very nude. The sex scenes in the movie are fairly good, with nice shots of Sara St. James, listed in this film as Jaqueline Lovell. She is definitely the one to watch here, even tho the other female lead is beautiful too.

The film is about a young shy female artist named Laura who moves into an artist colony (go figure) and meets Lovell's character, Alisha, who is a nude model for one of the artists living in the colony. Laura wants to concentrate on her work, but Alisha just wants to take off her clothes...ALL of the time. She's an exhibitionist, she admits, and she loves it. It turns out, Laura isn't so shy when she starts talking dirty on the phone with an unknown caller. Don't ask me who would get nasty on the phone with someone they don't know for no reason, but she did it anyhow. The film progresses into some small sembelance of a plot, and the writer tried to add some murder and mystery in here, as I said. It comes off as well as it possibly could in a movie like this. The dialogue is far and in between, and the film is mainly just sex scene after sex scene after sex scene. Alisha stripping for the artist, Alisha having sex with the artist, Alisha stripping for Laura, Alisha having sex with Laura. It's an erotic thriller, what do you expect? All I say is you can't go wrong with Sara St. James. 6/10

This movie has a plethora of gorgeous women engaging in soft-core pornography acts. The plot is stupid. The acting is terrible. This is solely made for the enjoyment of middle-school boys who sneak downstairs at midnight to watch "skin-e-max".

If you like to see pretty women in the nude doing fake sexual acts this is your movie. If your looking for a good movie go elsewhere.

Please take my advice and invest your time in watching something worthwhile. I know its a horrible feeling to not have anything to watch at 12 am, but at least tune in to Adult Swim instead of watching this junk.