Tricks Review

The gist: Eric Masterson acquires a pair of Ava Vincent's panties from the laundry room of the building where they both live. He has a spell book that allows him to manipulate her pussy from afar via the panties, in a sort of voodoo-doll manner. This trick also ends up being used against him and Briana Banks.

The play-by-play: The movie opens with Vincent accidentally leaving her panties for Masterson to find. There's nothing like doing some laundry to get a gal horny, so when she gets upstairs, she and Cheyne Collins get at it.

I love Ava Vincent. She has a very expressive face during sex, and director David Stanley is wise to focus on it. Her scenes are light on gyrations and visually striking positions -- just a little spoon, a little mish, and some might even accuse her of just lying there -- but I like it. She still conveys a satisfaction and pleasure in the sex that I don't get from the contortions or yowling of other performers. They finish with a belly pop.

Afterward, while she's sorting through her clothes, she gets inexplicably aroused as Masterson licks and jerks off with her panties in his apartment. Vincent acts out being invisi-fucked nicely.

Later that night, Masterson has sex with Sunrise Adams, who is wearing a silly black wig with dark red highlights, and black nail polish to make her into some kind of gothling magic groupie, I suppose. She's still looking nice, pre-implants, and tries some of those more uncomfortable positions with enthusiasm.

After Masterson pops on that distinctive chin, he considerately wipes up the jizz with the magic panties, and Vincent wakes up in her apartment with warm semen in her crotch. She's not as happy about that as you might think.

Masterson visits Briana Banks at a massage parlor, where she jerks him off with the panties. This causes Vincent great embarrassment at a job interview with Sharon Kane. Maybe I'm just gaga for Ava, but I find her reluctant arousal pretty hot, even though it contradicts what I just said above about the yowling. There's another nice fake orgasm and a very, very bad punchline, which we all remember being deployed properly in another movie.

Vincent runs to see her friend, Banks. They figure out the how and who of what's going on, but locating Masterson requires a sacrifice on Banks' part. To get his address from her boss at the massage parlor, Banks has to do the boss' idiot son, Bobby Vitale, who's about to join the army.

Now is as good a time as any to ask this: What the hell happened to Briana Banks' voice? It seems as if it's dropped an octave since I last saw her, maybe a year ago. Maybe she had a sore throat during shooting, but she was closing in on Bea Arthur territory.

Vitale sounds even worse. His portrayal of a retard hick is annoying as a motherfucker. There is some value in the actual sex, though. They start with some of that hang-your-head-upside-down-over-the-edge-of-a-table head, then go straight to anal. It's pretty energetic.

So Vincent and Banks break into Masterson's apartment to steal back the panties and take the spell book. They turn the tables, then negotiate a truce. But after a "Six months later..." title card, we find Collins cheating on Vincent with bony Briana. Insane.

And stupid, as they leave a thong behind for Vincent to discover. Vincent goes to Masterson to cast the spell again, which appears to distract Banks into a fatal car accident, in a bit of a dark twist. Vincent celebrates by fucking Masterson, spoon and mish again. He pops on her feet for no given reason. I don't know, I say if you're going to do a fetish pop, at some point one of the characters needs to declare that specific desire. It just comes out of nowhere.

The movie closes with another bad punchline on Vincent's magical revenge on Collins. The End.

Other random observations: For most of the movie, there's no music during the sex scenes, a choice I'm almost always in favor of. The sex just sounds like sex. I like it. The last two scenes, however, do have a little background music. It's not too intrusive, but I liked it better with none.

Boy, they didn't work too hard on the sets.

There's not much variety in the cast, with only three women in sex roles. Sharon Kane is asked to handle two non-sex roles for no good reason.

Vincent is the star of this movie, but Banks, as the contract girl, is on the cover and is the focus of the bonus scenes on the disc. I know why it has to be that way, but it seems weird. And it's not as if you couldn't have just had them switch roles. Doing it this way just acknowledges that you clearly agree that Vincent is a better actress than your contract star.

Condoms are used, but it's the clear/pink ones that are pretty unobtrusive for the most part.

The disc: Once again, Vivid makes you FF through five different titles worth of ads, notices, and logos -- ranging from 25 seconds to 4 minutes -- before you get to the menu. Pain in the ass.

My rental disc had some kind of glitch. Several times a transparent blue bar popped up on the top of the screen for a few seconds. It covered maybe 5 percent, no more than 10 percent of the screen. It wasn't a disaster, but it's not good.

Extras: Bonus scenes -- Briana Banks, Chennin Blanc and Cheyne Collins from Caught Stealing; Briana Banks and Eric Masterson from Flick; Briana and Eric again from Happily Never After; August and Steven French from Extreme Close Up: Sunrise; Ataria Starling and Eric Masterson from Matchplay. There are photo galleries of Briana and Sunrise Adams, a "positions menu", and a couple of trailers.

There's a seven-minute behind-the-scenes reel. We get a story of how the BTS guy got fired from another set for capturing an illicit off-screen BJ, a little of Briana posing for pictures, a little chitchat, nothing great. Briana says she's gained 10 pounds, which is pretty scary considering what a pencil she is when she's saying it.

Summing up: This movie has relatively little going for it outside of Ava Vincent's face, so make the call based on how big a fan of her you are. That was enough to make it a worthwhile rental for me, but not a purchase.

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