Night on the Wild Side

Charles De Santos, who made many porn films some of which are interesting, most routine, aimed for a surreal fantasy in this Kay Parker vehicle but stumbled badly. It's intriguing to watch, up to a point.

Parker plays a woman who seems to have wandered into Limbo or Purgatory, depending on which myth one prefers, biblically speaking. It's just a night club named the Wild Side where sex is constantly going on, but no one will give her a straight answer as to where she is, not even what city, just remaining cryptic.

It seems like a dream, though De Santos' microscopic budget (normal for the grind 'em out VHS era of the mid-'80s) doesn't offer much visual style. At one point an uncredited Rick Savage comes in to give Kay an even more cryptic warning than usual, and he's carrying a huge statue bust that momentarily gives the show an otherworldly mood.

Apparently not enough coverage footage was shot, as De Santos keeps using the same reaction shots of Kay watching the ongoing sex acts, poorly edited and with awful continuity. In later reels the sequence of scenes is all messed up, including a vignette of deep-throat expert Janey Robbins (remember her: she was the porn semi-lookalike equivalent to still very active mainstream actress Christine Baranski) having sex with two masked jewel thieves. Endless shots of a full moon are inserted unsuccessfully in an attempt to create atmosphere.

With the proper script and direction this could have been a winner, now surviving merely on the basis of Kay's fabulous body and her sex scenes.