Win a Date with Sofia Blake

I was looking forward to this Wicked Pictures release, as it sports very attractive stills of star Olivia Austin and represented a rare leading role for the blonde MILF.

But writer-director Stormy Daniels delivered a half-hearted feature to Wicked as part of her long-term contract with the label, and a cheapie at that. Its chintziness is rather alarming, perhaps a harbinger of drastic cost-cutting by the once-mighty distributor now that DVDs are out of favor (especially ones with story lines).

The lame script premise has movie star Sofia's team deciding that after a DUI scandal drummed up by the tabloids puts her career in jeopardy they will stage a charity raffle to win back public approval for her. Texan hayseed Ryan McLane wins the raffle and there is very little else in Stormy's screenplay to merit a feature film being created from it.

Perhaps not possessed of the acting chops to carry a starring role, Austin is curiously flat, though of course her curvy figure helps deliver the requisite XXX content. McLane is annoying as usual, and both his performance and the script fail miserably in supplying any credibility to his playing "hard to get" once he is alone with the sexy and voluptuous superstar. Of course, the rom-com genre requires that they get it on in the final reel, leading to a soggy, unsatisfying crypto-happy ending.

Bianca Breeze is not up to her usual acting prowess as part of Sofia's brain trust, and her extraneous sex scene with McLane's best pal Jake Jace is dull -Jace brings nothing to the screen as a recent addition to Porn Central Casting. Both Mia Li and Charlotte Cross fare better in their sex scenes.

Apparently to keep the budget (and shooting schedule) tight, several scenes are poorly staged. A press conference announcing the raffle results has no audience or extras, just the principals on stage, while a big movie premiere similarly has only sound to represent a crowd, no visuals. Several scenes taking place in cars or limos have the rear and side windows opaque so that no attempt to create an illusion of a car in real life need be done. Worse yet, other than a soft-core shower scene showing off Austin's impressive body there is only minimal non-sex footage available for a Showtime pay-cable soft-X version of the film, limiting its potential exposure compared to other Wicked Passsions releases from Stormy.