Roommates

This movie has a well-told story about real characters who grow and change, portrayed with (mostly) credible performances. Veronica Hart is a good actress by mainstream, let alone porn standards. Music is even appropriate to the action most of the time. It lacks many of the traditional porn cliches such as sex scenes that have no connection to the story, and external come shots. In short a well-made movie with explicit sex. It isn't Schindler's List but it's better than a lot of mainstream movies that had 100 times its budget.

An incredible melodrama that actually works better as a drama than a sex film. This one finds the three leads, Hart as the actress looking for a break in New York, Nichols a model doing the same, and Fox as a New York native sex worker who's trying to change her life who needs the roommates to help make rent. Each puts in a career best performance, the sex is presented many times in a non-erotic way, which helps to push it over the edge when it is presented more erotically. Add in Jaime Gillis in an all-time pervo-creep role and this one stands as one of the best hardcore films I've seen.

This Chuck Vincent-directed drama (with X-rated sex scenes) is one of very few adult features that crossed the street into the mainstream -- at least for a week or two. After playing X-rated venues, it was re-cut and released in mainstream theatres across the country with an "R" rating.

It's easy to see why. It's an engaging girls-about-town drama that boasts convincing performances and a believable series of conflicts which are truthfully resolved by an exciting conclusion.

Samantha Fox, Veronica hart and Kelly Nichols are the three female leads; all had appeared in countless X-rated features prior to this. Hart, now directing quality porn under the name Jane Hamilton, impresses greatly as a budding actress in a loveless relationship; she's natural and very attractive.

Vincent regular Larry Revene photographed the pic while Vincent and regular scripter Rick Marx shared the screenplay.

Chuck Vincent is perhaps the first "mainstream" filmmaker to crossover into adult films. When one is able to watch "Roommates" (1981), without having to utilize the ffwd search button, that is the mark of any good adult film. It has above-average acting and storyline, shot entirely on-location in NYC (most romanticized city in TV/film), and fairly arousing sex scenes. This film is on par with any mainstream B-movie. Sidenote: cult fans of "Raw Talent" (1984) will get a kick out of seeing Jerry Butler in what appears to be a precursor to his "Eddie" character. This role seems to have been the basis for his casting in "Raw Talent," right on down to using the same name, "Eddie." Butler once again gives a wacky and unpredictable performance as a struggling actor looking to make the big time.

My review was written in February 1982 after a Midtown Manhattan screening: "Roommates" is an extremely well-acted drama of three women trying to launch careers in New York City, cast and filmed with a key difference from ordinary product. Producer-director Chuck Vincent has used familiar thesps from sexpo films to enact a "straight" story, in which sex scenes are brief and do not destroy the picture's narrative. Softcore version reviewed (a similar hardcore version exists, using different camera angles) is hot enough to qualify for an X rating, but emerges as an uncensored story film with sex angles rather than a toned-down sex pic.

Three title characters are Billie (Samantha Fox), an ex-call girl working in tv commercials production, taking Joan (Veronica Hart) and Sherry (Kelly Nichols) as roommates from out of town to share her posh Manhattan apartment. Amidst humorous and frankly sentimental incidents, film concentrates on the women's mistreatment by various men in their lives.

Billie suffers from sexual harassment on the job, as her boss (Bobby Astyr) insists that she dispense sexual favors to clients or he'll fire her. Joan, dropping out of drama school to try and make it on (or off) Broadway, has a romance with her drama prof, but he drops her in favor of renewing his relationship with his wife. Sherry is from L. A. and building a modeling career, but gets beaten and abused by men she picks up.

Despite the melodramatic format, Vincent and his co- writer Rick Marx find positive elements for the heroines, such as Joan's falling in love with a sympathetic fellow actor (Jerry Butler), and even contrive a happy ending as each one embarks on a new life style, drawing upon the lessons they've learned. What makes the picture work is sock performances, particularly Samantha Fox's tough portrayal of a woman trying to "go straight" and Veronica Hart's winsome and innocent bundle of energy. Kelly Nichols is stuck in a less convincing role, that of a woman self-destructing through drugs and random men, but her glamorous beauty and a torrid sex scene (in stop-motion photography) are arresting.

In support, Jamie Gillis is truly frightening as a sickie who dominates Nichols, Gloria Leonard provides an hilarious, wise-cracking cameo as Fox's former madam, and Jerry Butler is very sympathetic as Hart's new boyfriend. Tech credits are sharp, especially Larry Revene's varied lighting to enhance each scene's mood.

While pic's lack of a Hollywood major pedigree may lead to it being dismissed as porn, "Roommates" deserves a shot at mainstream audiences.