Tower, The Review

Running Time: 126 min.

Production Date: 1995 (Cover states 7 / 2000, but I think that’s the DVD production date)

Director: Pierre Woodman

Cast: Aliza, Shayse Manhattan, Channone, Monikat, Andrea< Bernadette, Barbara, Franck Versace, David Perry, Richard Langrin, Yves LeCastel, and Stalinas Piotr

Initial Expectations: This is only my second Private title, but I have high expectations for it.

Initial Reaction: Another great job from Private. It’s not a perfect release, but it’s close.

Audio /Video Quality: Except for about thirty seconds the picture quality is great. There are a few night shots of Paris that are very grainy. Except for those scenes, the picture is almost perfect. The audio is noticeably dubbed, but it is a foreign release. I would have been happier if the French language would have matched up better with the video, but both it and the English plot summaries are very clear.

Music: The music ranges from Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata to your normal high quality porn music. It sits very nicely in the background and there were times I had to consciously listen for it to know it was there.

Review: The Tower starts out with some nice suspense and mystery. There’s a few grainy shots of Paris at night and many shots of a surveillance video. On the surveillance camera we see Barbara giving David Perry a blowjob on a balcony. She goes to sit on the edge and he pushes her off. The entire scene is watched by an unseen man who appears throughout the movie. He has cameras throughout the building and can see almost everything that happens there.

Aliza is an attractive blonde with a small black streak in her long hair. She had to pull a few strings, but she thinks she can get the job opening left by Barbara’s sidewalk dive. She only has to ‘convince’ one guy, and she does her best on what appears to be the same balcony that Barbara and David were on. It’s a pretty good scene and doesn’t have any of the problems normally associated with outdoor scenes. With Aliza’s performance here, something would be wrong if she didn’t get the job.

The next week, Andrea, a very attractive auburn haired lady, is forced into a room as she leaves her car in the garage. The surveillance guy questions her about some videotapes and then forcefully makes her undress and rapes her. Andrea resists a little during the scene, but he talks to her and then she continues. The rape is handled fairly tastefully, which I don’t know if I like or not. I’m glad that it’s fairly respectful to the woman, but it’s not something I want to see gratified. Throughout the scene, the surveillance guy’s face is never shown.

Meanwhile, Aliza goes home and takes a bubble bath. Of course she can’t keep her hands off herself and has a nice little masturbation scene in the tub. It’s very tasteful and is probably the tamest scene in the movie. It’s done very well and makes good use of the mirrors on the wall above the corner tub she’s soaking in. The music helps the mood of the scene very well and starts out with Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata . As she soaks in the tub, the security guard in the building finds Andrea in the garage dumpster.

Bernadette, one of Aliza’s girlfriends, shows up and interrupts Aliza’s bath. They don’t talk long before Bernadette heads back downstairs where her husband and one of his friends are talking on the couch. Of course, she takes both of them on and never leaves either of them having to take matters into their own hands. This scene shows why Private is thought of so highly for their threesomes. Bernadette is amazing and seems to be enjoying her work quite a bit. One of the guys had a really good pop shot on her and the other was really poor. I was in awe watching this scene and the only fault is the weak cum shot from the one guy.

Aliza shows up late for work after telling us how she’s always late and her boss is always looking for her. She doesn’t really care about showing up on time since she’s keeping the big boss satisfied in her spare time. When she finally arrives, her friend Shayse goes into her office to show her the new garter belt and panties she’s wearing. Their boss interrupts and comes on to Aliza, who pushes him away. He leaves and takes Shayse into his office where he makes her strip for him. Shayse did an amazing job that just about had me waving dollar bills at my TV. Thankfully it doesn’t stop there and Shayse is as good at fucking as she is at stripping. This is a really hot scene and the best one on one scene in The Tower .

Aliza tells how her neighbor lives with two beautiful women (Channone and Monikat), but never has sex with them. Two men (who appear to be cops but since the dialogue isn’t translated I’m not positive) come over and ask him some questions. After they finish with him he grabs his coat and leaves so the guys can question the girls. I’m guessing the questions were something like “Aren’t you glad you don’t have to do this with Dick Nasty (the European Randy West)?” and other questions of that sort. The girls don’t answer questions for long before they notice that there’s two of them and two guys. Rather than playing Euchre, they decide that hot sex where the girls can get all their holes filled would be much more fitting. It’s a hot scene and one of the best group scenes I’ve seen in a while

Wanting to keep up her hot body, Aliza goes jogging. She doesn’t like it that much, but keeping a body looking that hot isn’t easy. The guys who see her jogging are always very supportive, for some reason, and always seem to want to finish their training with her. She normally turns them down, but this day she goes home with one of the guys. Neither of them notice the guy in the black jacket who’s watching them from behind the trees. Aliza and the guy kiss in the elevator and then things take off (and of course, come off) when they reach his apartment. This is a really hot scene and doesn’t disappoint. It’s a great scene to finish off The Tower .

Afterwards, Aliza and the guy sit and drink champagne in the bed. Aliza thinks things are a little too perfect and realizes the guy is really in love with her. Things are still a little unpredictable as he tells her he has a secret and shows her a secret room in his apartment. It’s the surveillance room that we’ve seen in the other scenes. As Aliza looks around the room.... it’s to be continued.

The Tower seems to set things up very well. There isn’t a lot of plot here, but there appears to be a lot of groundwork laid (no pun intended) from what appears to be coming up in the rest of the series. Unfortunately, this is another Private release where they don’t dub in the entire English language track. Instead you just get little summaries here and there. I’m guessing that maybe 5% of the dialogue is given here and the rest you have to guess on. The summaries aren’t horrible, so you have a pretty good idea what’s going on, but it’s still annoying. At the very least, subtitles would be nice, as they seem to include all the dialogue. If you can understand French or can read one of the languages with the subtitles, I’m guessing you could probably add about a full point to both the plot / acting and overall ratings.

Extras: As usual, Private does a very good job with their extras also. As with most releases, there’s a photo gallery and a bio, or cast section. The photo gallery is manual and very will done with about 33 pictures. It also includes some pictures that weren’t from The Tower , but I assume came from one or both of the sequels. The cast section is great. Every girl in the feature is shown, so you actually know who’s who. A small bio and a little personal information is also included as well as a list of some of their other works.

Both a behind the scenes featurette as well as a few pages of notes on the feature are also included on the DVD. The notes include a little bit about the story (as a whole) as well as some behind the scenes and technical stuff. The featurette lasts almost six minutes and has things from all three of The Tower films. There’s stuff from the scenes which were shot in both Paris and London and it finishes with a short interview with Aliza. It’s nothing spectacular, but it’s worth watching for the six minutes it takes.

Finally, there’s trailers. Can’t have a real DVD without a few trailers. This DVD includes trailers for Cumshot Deluxe 2, Apocalypse Climax, Fashion, Bride Wore Black, and Dangerous Things .

Themes: Straight, lesbian, group, anal, DP, spanking, voyeurism, masturbation, and rape

Raincoat Factor: Very high.

Overall: Currently, The Tower can be found online for between $25 and $30 with most stores offering it for under $27. It's well worth the money, but you're going to want to pick up the others in the series as soon as you finish it.

Note to Private: Some of us really like to know all of what's going on. Please either complete the dubbing for the other language tracks or give us the options of subtitles too. You would have gotten a higher rating if I would have known all of what was going on.

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