Studio: Digital Playground
Director: Robby D.
Cast: Alexis Silver, Sophia Santi, Michelle Maylene, Jelena Jensen, Flower Tucci, Brooke Haven, Chris Charming, Scott Nails, "Jerry"

There's actually not a subtitle, don't bother writing in to correct me. While we're at it, if you're not in the mood for "sharp witted, hilarious, acid tongue, tasteless, mean spirited humor"--um, whatever, Robby--surf on, surfer. I'd try to write a review as tired and stupid as this installment of Jack's Playground, but a couple of things just won't permit it.

It's the Same Old Shit save for the God-given natural bounty on delicious display in the forms of Jalena Jensen and Sophia Santi. They're the reason you picked up this DVD in the first place, undoubtedly. Like me, you probably turned the thing over and over in your hands, looking for proof of airbrushing, unabashedly awe-struck in the adult aisle as you ogled Jensen's and Santi's comicbook heroine proportions. These women are unreal, with firm, bouyant pillows of flesh lofting above and below waspish waists, supported by flowerstem legs and providing the bubblewrap around what Santi calls, in her wild kitten way, her "little baby yami". "People have told me they have trouble finding it, it's so small." Dude. Hit mute and just watch these Eighth Wonders in solo scenes over and over again, because the asshole holding the camera won't shut the fuck up, and his single-minded goal seems to be interfering with whatever brief moments of heat he manages to commit to HD.

I don't know what it is about the gonzo persona that makes a guy start to think the popularity of a series is tantamount to viewer interest in him. Porn gets produced "in the bubble", I guess, and it actually might not cross D's mind that the last fucking thing I want to see is his hammy, mottled hand roaming like a bloated, leprous rat over the angelically firm, young flesh of 18-year-old newcomer Michelle Maylene. Jesus. Could somebody get ahold of girls like this and tell them they should hang on until something better comes along? The 18-year-olds in this industry should be auctioned off like Brooke Shields in Pretty Baby. At least Maylene's paired with someone almost as pretty for the sex: This would be "Jerry". Why is Jack's Playground populated by so many Eurostuds? you might ask. Maybe it's because they don't understand enough of what D's saying to hate him.

Sadly, I do. I remember thinking Robby D. was going to save porn, and now he's the same guy I used to think porn needed saving from. Happily for Digital Playground, the quality of the series remains high, with excellent production value and jerkable if by-the-numbers sex. It's impossible not to recommend the visual tribute to truly amazing physical beauty ensconced in Volume 32, perhaps even a Collector's Edition for those who want to memorialize in particular the divine pulchritude of Santi. Here's hoping D grows out of his self-lovathon and starts making masturbation material for the rest of us.

- Eugenie Brown

Studio: Ninn Worx
Director: Michael Ninn
Cast: Heather Vuur, Nick Manning, Jassie, Jean Val Jean, Dee, Brooke, Monica Mayhem, Nevaeh, Scott Nails, Sledge Hammer

While we will leave it to scholars to decide whether the death of a child is a fitting setting for a porn movie, Michael Ninn's Sacred Sin really makes a case for the existence of a couples market. A heartbroken couples market.

Shot on the Hollywood Hills estate of Eddie Van Halen and featuring compositions by the landlord, this movie is a far cry from "Jamie's Cryin'", but thoughtful couples may want to reach down between their legs and ease the seat back.

I listened to a little bit of the director's commentary on this deluxe set, and it appears Ninn anticipated a mixed reaction to his work, but ultimately took full responsibility. The cast is leonine and beautiful to a person, and great care was taken in setting up the shots. The music is simple and piano-based (save for a Van Hagar-period rock'n number), and the house and grounds were appropriate to the period aspect of this drama.

So why does Ninn worry about the critics several times in the commentary? Probably because, as Sacred Sin co-writer L.E. Smith says, "Gonzo is killing romance."

This may be true, but nothing kills romance more than a dead kid.

Heather Vuur grieves at the death of her child, and when husband Jean Val Jean seeks solace in Jassie, she kills them both, then herself. She returns in spirit form to the present day, where she torments Nick Manning, who himself has fallen from the grace of God. At least I think that's what happened.

Sacred Sin deals sexily with the popular porn tropes of losing faith in God and coming to terms with Christianity. We meet hard-boiled detective Sean (Manning), who lost his family to a man he'd put away. Vuur leads him astray, giving him back a blissful moment in his life with lovely wife Brooke Banner to further crush his spirit.

We flash back and forth to aspects of Sean's grief and Vuur's past. There is a scene, as you can imagine, involving a demon. The demon gets some.

Sacred Sin is a lovely movie to watch, and absent from it is the harsh contextual misogyny of Ninn's Catherine. I did find myself frustrated throughout the movie with its endless repeated shots that seemed to have less to do with moving the story along than they did with accompanying the soundtrack.

In cases like this, art is distracting. "Get on with it," I thought, wishing for more demon semen.

Great for couples and C-student theologians, Sacred Sin is clearly a work of love, but when Ninn in the commentary talks of "the adult gendre" (sic) and studying a body "like the Magruder film" (sic), I couldn't help wondering if his considerable talents as a filmmaker might shine through more brightly if he didn't think so much.