Sex und Spitzenhöschen

Nicholas Steele is a filmmaker who deserves top-rank recognition in Adult Cinema history, but is relegated to the faint praise coming with successful "porn-parody" assignments late in his career. After achieving fantastic artistic success with Ultimate Pictures/Adam & Eve at the turn of the century he independently made a dozen or so Romantic features (after A&E had turned to more conventional and all-sex oriented product) back in 2004 & 2005 including this fine, but ignored movie. They were later released (or dumped) en masse via his British venture with Paul Chaplin at Bluebird Films under a banner called Nicholas Steele Seductions.

Steele and a highly creative team take a simple, straightforward approach, telling slightly dramatic romantic stories that like his peer Paul Thomas, champion a glamorous, hedonistic life-style. I watched "Tales of Lace" right after news of the death of Playboy founder Hugh Hefner, and realized this style of pornography owes much to Hef's self- centered promotion of the good life in the form of a hedonistic, well- healed and self-indulgent male.

Lezley Zen stars as a lingerie fashion designer, unfortunately given to too much boozing. Her pal Julian gives her a big break, to work on a tight one-week deadline and deliver a needed lingerie line to big-time lingerie boutiques owner Steven St. Croix, his brand named Tales of Lace.

The acting scenes are well-done if hardly riveting, and the story kept direct and believable. Eventual fashion show for the buyer Steven is so brief (and just a couple of pretty models shown, uncredited) that Steele can be faulted for not making a bigger production out of this material.

Casting of Dee as Lezley's one-time lesbian lover was a brilliant stroke, with a classic scene in flashback of them doing their Sapphic thing in a shower -terrifically lit and wonderful matching of their deep skin tones. Both are bisexual characters, with Lezley bedding star Julian at the climax of the film, and Dee making love outdoors by the pool with Zen's real-life partner Trevor Zen.

Dominica Leoni lends her beauty to a functional role of Julian's lover who he treats callously, and August is effective as St. Croix's hen- pecker of a wife (whose reconciliation with him makes for a happy romantic ending).

What is notable about this undiscovered film is the technical quality of Steele's work: wonderful lighting, set decoration and compositions throughout even though the production values are hardly extravagant (and the shooting schedule was likely in the 2 day range). I was especially struck by a merely functional cutaway shot of Julian on the phone that was a boldly chartreuse-lit scene in a corridor indicating that even for a throwaway moment Steele & his talented cinematographer Jon Noz Muka take care to produce something beautiful.