John Stagliano wrote some very fine roles for his leading ladies but then sabotaged their performances by emphasizing interminable gonzo sex scenes. Result was an influential hit with porn audiences but a missed opportunity.
Shooting in 35mm, the Evil Angel release shapes up as a real feature film, except for its giving over so much of its 4-1/2 hour running time to XXX gross-outs. I wish to focus on the actresses in this review, as they certainly deserve praise.
Taylor St. Claire is nearly perfect as the fetish costume designer out to partner with mainstream fashion icon Antonio (played by Rocco Siffredi) and take advantage of him. She has a pair of lesbian lovers who she extremely dominates: Friday as her blonde employee and uninhibited sex slave, plus her idea lady and editor of promo videos Belladonna, who has the movie's lead role.
While Taylor and Friday excel at developing full-bodied characters, Belladonna gives a flat, rather uninteresting acting performace in what should have been the story's centerpiece. She plays the mousey, submissive underling who finally asserts herself -somebody the audience can root for. But in Stagliano's fetishistic (his fetish is not the movie's BDSM theme but rather ass-worship, as he has demonstrated in hundreds of videos under his aegis as "Buttman") universe we are supposed to root instead for Belladonna to constantly out-do herself in sideshow freak antics, the movie's selling point. Whether enjoying extreme anal penetration or having her nipples stretched (along with other body parts) to a scary degree, she is mistreated in the cause of impressing a jaded audience, which has only become more jaded and gonzo-oriented in the two decades since this influential movie was made. The sex in "The Fashionistas" is not erotic, but rather merely "spectacular" -something to gaze at in wonder
Alongside the other leading ladies, the best performance is given by fetish model extraordinaire Caroline Pierce as Rocco's ex, a buyer for a leading department store chain who more than holds her own in verbal sparring with him, and in later reels suddenly turns into an improbable sexual dynamo when dallying in the VIP back room of a BDSM sex club with Rocco's assistant Manuel Ferrera. Other femmes have juicy sex turns without being accorded dialog or characterization, notably Monique deep-throating par excellence in the VIP room and stunning fetish icon Star Chandler as the dominatrix who puts Belladonna through her paces.
Though the budget listed in IMDb for the movie is not credible (half a million dollars) the production is certainly lavish by Adult Cinema standards, and the cinematography credited to Don Crane (though the clapperboards list him as "F. Long") impressive.
