Chameleons: Not The Sequel Review

I used to have a VHS copy of John Leslie's Chameleon, in which Tori Welles seemed to have the ability to change shape at will - although there was a certain element of ambiguity about the events that no reviewer has seemed to pick up on. What exactly was real?

The not-sequel from 1992 features Deidre Holland and Rocco Siffredi as a couple of vampiric shape-changers and Ashlyn Gere as an adventurous woman who is seduced and intrigued by them. The plot is less ambiguous this time around, although not exactly mainstream. I suppose the viewer is aided by the obvious loans from other movies, most obviously Tony Scott's The Hunger. Watching the movie I was struck by a realization of how much I had been missing real and intriguing plots in porn.

Chameleons is by no means a perfect movie - I did not get the opening scene, which appears to be taken from an entirely different kind of movie. All it seems to do is to establish the bitchiness of the Ashlyn Gere character, and not very effectively. After that, and after the first sex scene between Ashlyn and Rocco is out of the way, the movie starts to get interesting, as the characters become a bit more complex. Some of the dialogue scenes are a little hard to follow because of Rocco's thick accent. Looking beyond that, I found myself very well entertained by the movie, even if I occasionally wanted to fast- forward through the obligatory sex scenes and get back to the story.

Instead of writing an in-depth analysis, I will shamelessly refer you to a review by an anonymous reviewer from the RAME archives. This review is quite intelligent, but it does spoil the entire plot, so if you haven't seen the movie I don't advise reading it if you want to be surprised by the plot.

As for the sex scenes, they are not very explicit by today's standards, and you won't be getting the usual athletic by-the-numbers anal/DP/facial routine. However, being a little tired of that myself, I found the change of pace refreshing. The sex scenes actually reflect the plot and the characters and do not stick out as something external to the story. Contrast this with the typical Private feature, where the characters are just meat puppets going through the motions dictated by the inane plot or engaging soullessly in Pierre Woodman's carnal choreography. The sex in this movie is not about love and tenderness, it is about power, as in the scene where Ashlyn, wearing a strap-on dildo, dominates Deidre, or it is about hedonistic adventures, exemplified by P.J. Sparxx and Micky Ray in the final scenes. (But those kinds of adventures can turn dangerous.)

Jaded as I am, I was not exceedingly aroused by the sex, although I do not see that as a flaw. You can watch it for just the plot and the B- movie experience, or you might want to watch it in good company. (This could be one of those couples' movies people are talking about.)

The jazzy musical score - or at least the title song - appears to be written by Leslie himself, and the DVD features and advertisement for John Leslie Blues Band.

As a DVD, this release is very light on features. Besides a couple of ads and a picture gallery, all you get is the 98-minute movie. The DVD quality is pretty good: the picture is very grainy occasionally, but that may be what Leslie wanted. There were no problems with the sound.

They don't make movies like this any more, do they?