Flashpoint (Wicked) Review

Reviewed by astroknight  on  1/11/2001

Running Time: 111 min.

Production Date: 9 / 28 / 1997

Director: Brad Armstrong

Cast: Jenna Jameson, Jill Kelly, Johnni Black, Sindee Coxx, Missy, Brittany Andrews, Sydnee Steele, Asia Carrera, Brad Armstrong, Mickey G., Mike Horner, Steve Drake, Eric Price, T. T. Boy, Jonathan Morgan, Anthony Crane, Veronica Hart, and a bunch more people in non-sex roles.

Initial Expectations: Wicked and Jenna have put out some amazing movies that have turned into top-notch DVDs. From what I’ve heard, Flashpoint is one of those.

Initial Reaction: Wicked and Adam & Eve really pulled out the stops for Flashpoint and it shows. This is a great DVD.

Audio /Video Quality: The picture quality is excellent. I didn’t notice a single blur in the entire movie. The audio is very good, but there’s a spot or two that appears to be dubbed. There’s also a few spots where the audio seems hollow and echoes.

Music: The music is great. There’s a lot more music than in your average adult films and because of it someone walking in on it at the right times may actually think they’re watching a mainstream movie. They’re in for a big, but pleasant surprise.

FALSE ADVERTISING: The cover claims there’s a 60 minute "The Making of Flashpoint" featurette. It’s only 36 minutes long.

Review: Well, let’s get the obvious out of the way. Flashpoint is one hot movie. Jenna’s smoking! Somebody hose me down over here! Okay. I think that’s out of my system for the time being. For the few people who were in a coma the last few years and haven’t heard of Flashpoint , it’s pretty much an adult version of Backdraft or the old Emergency! TV series. Of course, neither Backdraft or Emergency! had nearly as good looking of a cast as Flashpoint does. There isn’t a bad looking person in this movie. It’s even got a plot that you can’t fly a DC-10 through. Okay, you probably could since the plot would be on a whole bunch of little pieces of paper and a DC-10 is a big plane, but that’s reality! This is porn! The wonderful world where you know that if you’re a person in that world, you’re probably going to bag a beautiful babe! If lucky, you’ll bag a bevy of beautiful bleached blonde big boobed babes in bikinis.

Flashpoint is the story about a crew of feisty female firefighters plus a few guy firefighters. It mostly revolves around Jenna, a firefighter who is apparently so afraid of water that she had huge personal flotation devices implanted into her chest. Either that or she thinks that if she gets in a bad fire, she can pop them and have enough saline to put out the fire and save herself.

From the start of Flashpoint it was pretty obvious that this wasn’t going to be your standard porno. Ten minutes into it and I wasn’t quite sure if I was watching a porno or not. There was already a small action sequence with a car fire and a death in the ranks followed by a decent funeral scene. There was even some character being set up. Ten minutes in and Flashpoint was already looking better than several B-movies I’ve seen. I was starting to expect Jesse “The Mind” Ventura (since he’s now a governor and well renowned for his, um, intellect) to walk on screen at any moment. It’s clear to see that Mr. Armstrong put quite a bit of thought into things and this is only ten minutes into the movie. Thankfully he continued to think as he wrote the rest of the movie. There’s even twists in the plot such as Jenna’s nametag being found at an arson scene when her unit wasn’t sent there as well as dead ends. Normally the only twists I expect in an adult film are during a handjob or blowjob, but Flashpoint has them when people are fully clothed! The dead ends are in the plot too, rather than having a dead end being a performer who’s let their figure go.

Thankfully, Wicked cared enough about Flashpoint to bring Adam & Eve in to help finance it so Flashpoint could be done as it deserves to be done. The biggest problem with the budget for Flashpoint is the special effects. Adult films are notorious for being low budget and that normally means the special effects are cut down. Fireman movies where people have a bunch of child-proof lighters jimmied so they stay on wherever a fire is needed just doesn’t work. Mainstream special effects people are needed and they’re put to great use here. The effects in the final scene are better than what you’ll see on some of the current syndicated TV shows. There’s exploding windows, the building falling in on itself, and firemen fighting with axes around electricity.

Well, all that plot and effects stuff is great, but this is still a porno, and that means naked people doing the nasty! Better yet, hot (no pun intended) naked people doing the nasty and Flashpoint has plenty of them. Wicked put as much effort into the cast as they did the plot and effects. There isn’t a single person in Flashpoint that I think of avoiding in a movie. Heck, most of the cast are people I’d put in my ideal adult film cast. Tina Tyler, Stacy Valentine, Serenity, and Kylie Ireland are about the only ones who are missing. The talent does their job well enough that there isn’t a bad performance in Flashpoint .

Jenna does her normal great job, and mixes it up pretty good, with the exception of not taking part in any group scenes. She has a very good scene with Mickey G. on the bench in the station as well as a great scene with T. T. Boy and one with Brittany Andrews. The scene with T. T. is a fantasy scene with Jenna in red PVC wearing a spiked collar in a warehouse with flames all around them. It’s a great scene and really shows why Jenna is such a stroke queen. The Brittany Andrews scene is also really good. There’s some great chemistry between them and I don’t know how they didn’t set off the smoke alarm in the bathroom. I think I’m going to have to pick up a copy of Jenna’s Built For Speed to watch these two in action some more.

Johnni Black is another of my current favorites. I haven’t seen her in a bad scene yet. Johnni always seems to put a lot of energy in her performances and seems to remain a real person at the same time. It’s kind of like Asia Carrera, only with a dirty blonde. Luckily she’s in two scenes here, both of which are group scenes with Jill Kelly, who needs nothing said about her and Steve Drake. The first has the three of them relaxing in the lounge at the station. There’s a great balance between Jill and Johnni in the scene that makes this a really great threesome.

The second scene with Jill, Johnni, and Steve is the fire truck scene. It occurs as part of Mickey G.’s dream after taking a few painkillers. The timing of the scene is slowed just enough to give the scene a slightly choppy, dreamlike feel. It’s not a style I particularly care for, but it works great in this instance. Sindee Coxx joins the girls on the fire truck as well as Brad, Mike, and of course Mickey. Something would be wrong with Mickey if he didn’t involve himself with this scene. This is one of the best orgy scenes I’ve seen. Brad does a great job of balancing everybody so that nobody overpowers anybody else in the scene. At the same time he gives enough of each coupling that the scene maintains its heat.

There’s a few great ladies left. At the time Flashpoint was made, Sydnee Steele was still pretty new, rather than one of the leading ladies of porn today. Her scene with Asia, who’s one of the greatest actresses in adult films, Jonathan Morgan, and Eric Price is very good. There’s a little switching around but not much lesbian action. Asia has all the charm in the world, as she normally does, and also does a great job. I suppose one should have seen it as a great sign that at this point of Sydnee’s career she was already working with talent like Asia.

Finally, there’s Missy. I’m not sure, but this might have been the year Missy won starlet of the year. If not, it’s close to the time and she shows why she earned the award. This scene with Jonathan Morgan also puts the fire truck to good use, and Missy adds a little extra twist by bringing a video camera along. I always enjoy watching Missy. She has a great animalistic feel to her sex scenes, and there are times I think she’s going to grind her partner’s cock right off.

Flashpoint is still considered one of the top adult films of recent times and there’s a reason for it. There’s an amazing cast, great sex, and attention paid to things like the plot and technical aspects. If Wicked didn’t do a great enough job with the movie, there’s also some amazing extras.

Extras: As usual with Wicked’s Brad Armstrong DVDs, there’s a commentary by Brad Armstrong. He talks about some of the changes in the adult film industry that were just starting to occur at the time, such as mandatory condom usage. He also talks some about tattoos. It was really interesting hearing about the fire station where most of the movie was shot, which was built in 1912 and is now a historic landmark. Of course, there’s also quite a bit of information on the stars. I think this might be the best commentary I’ve heard from Brad. Part of it is probably because it didn’t seem as bound by lawyers as some of the current commentaries.

The interview with Brad Armstrong lasts about seven and a half minutes. Brad gives more information on several things he briefly mentioned in the commentary, such as the involvement of real firefighters and the special effects. He goes from the idea and financing of Flashpoint to putting things together for the DVD. It’s kind of neat because you can tell that this is an early DVD and everybody’s really into all of the extra things they can do on a DVD. Perhaps the most interesting thing is when he talks about Adam & Eve and their participation with the movie. It’s nice to hear about studios who respect each other and do what they can to work together to make a great product rather than staging publicity stunts as some other studios do.

The “Making of Flashpoint ” featurette gives a very good look at the behind the scenes aspects of Flashpoint . It lasts about 36 minutes and is broke into day by day sections. It’s kind of interesting seeing how some of the things are done as well as getting a look at the personalities of the stars. The worst thing about the featurette is the picture is really bad. It’s comparable to about a third or fourth generation VHS copy.

Of course there’s a photo gallery. It lasts about three and a half minutes with about nine seconds per screen. Unlike most current photo galleries, Flashpoint’s phot gallery is normally a split screen showing two pictures at once. There are very few full screen stills. Although my first reaction was ‘What the heck is with this split-screen crap?’ I have to admit that by about the third screen I really liked it. Smaller stills gave a better quality picture and there were plenty of them. I’d really like to see more of this style photo gallery in the future.

There’s also audio bios for Jenna, Brad, Missy, Asia, Jill, Jonathan, Johnni, Mickey, Brittany, Sindee, and Sydnee. Whoa. I almost went into Cubby and Annette there. I think they’re about the only ones left out. There are a few stills with the audio bio and a list of the performer’s other Wicked movies. This is one of the early audio bio formats and it doesn’t have the link to the performer’s scene (also because almost all of the extras are on the B-side of the DVD).

In addition to the audio bios and photo gallery the other common extras for DVDs here as well. There are trailers for Flashpoint, Conquest, Crazed, and Satyr . The web link is also there for those who can’t find Wicked’s web site.

Themes: Straight, lesbian, group, anal, rimming (female > female, and trash talking

Raincoat Factor: Medium high.

Overall: Currently, Flashpoint can be found online for between $20 and $30 with several retailers offering it for under $25. Don’t even consider renting Flashpoint . It’s earned a place on your shelf with a great movie, great transfer, and a ton of extras.

Note to Wicked: Please change your covers so in the future you have correct information on them. You’ve been a high quality and extremely reliable company in the past. Please don’t do stupid things like making false claims about the extras that can ruin your reputation.

If you have any questions or comments, please e- mail me .