Desperate (2005 Video) User Reviews

What has happened to Tera Patrick?

[rootbeerafloat · 3/10 · 25 January 2006]

A few years ago, just the thought of a movie featuring a scene with Tera Patrick and Shy Love teaming up to take on some guy in hardcore action would have been enough to send any Tera fan into fits of pure ecstasy. But, that was a few years ago. Tera has since decided to augment her once naturally fantastic 36D breasts, and the end result is less than stellar. In every film since then, she's also decided to cake on far too much bad makeup, completely masking the natural beauty that was one of the main catalysts in her ascent to stardom. It's not nearly as bad in this movie as most her recent ones, but it's still too much.

Tera has also decided that the only man she'll perform with is her husband, Biohazard bassist/Oz actor Evan Seinfeld, better known in the porn world by the moniker "Spider Jonez". It would be one thing if Mr. Jonez was a stud of Erik Everhard caliber, but, sadly, he's fat and bald, with disgusting tattoos plastered on most parts of his body. Compared to most guys in the industry, he's also lacking in other areas.

While there's obviously other scenes in this movie, they're all your standard fare; none are really worth talking about. The aforementioned scene with semi-new star Shy Love is the real draw here. Even with two of my favorites teaming up, it's an overall disappointment. The main reason being Spider Jonez himself, the others being wretched dialog and bad direction. I know, I know, "Who cares about dialog in pornography." But with horrible fake "sounds" and hilarious dirty talk, it's really distracting. I don't want my porn to make me laugh. Unlike in the beginning of her career, Tera sounds amazingly forced and clichéd, which is odd, because you'd think she wouldn't have to fake it for the person she married. Spider actually manages to produce an impressive "finale." However, thanks to poor direction/editing, we only get to marvel at his handiwork very briefly before the scene fades out, sadly before the two ladies can even share their new gift with each other. A completely wasted opportunity for a potentially classic Tera scene.

I keep watching these new Tera movies, hoping to see something resembling the performer she once was. Sadly, I've yet to see it. I'm about to give up on her all together. I'd tell any fellow Tera fan to leave this garbage on the shelf and find some classic Ms. Patrick to enjoy.

Paul Thomas stumbles; his sloppiest video

[lor_ · 24 October 2016]

Hundreds of Vivid releases made by Paul Thomas bear phony names he's used, ranging from Chuck Lords to Judy Blue. He signed "Desperate" as writer and director, and PT should have stayed in bed instead.

The characters' actions lack any justification, and the potboiler story of scam artists who pose as cops to fleece johns caught with prostitutes is beyond corny. Faced with a disastrous project, PT seems to have slipped into the most common trap for pornographers - believing the Industry Wisdom that all that matters is individually hot sex scenes, suitable for excerpting (in compilations) or now streaming or downloading as separate entities, the entire feature be damned.

Right from the opening this is a phony enterprise. Superstar Tera Patrick, carrying a book and note pad as if she were a student, makes a big, spontaneous play for Spyder Jonez (her real-life mate) at a diner. Covered in tattoos the unlikely anti- hero rebuffs Tera in such an arrogant way as to immediately turn off the viewer, as well as represent an impossibly fake character, somehow immune to Tera's unique beauty.

Yet Tera attaches herself to the big lug as almost a stalker, and manages to inveigle her way into his minor gang, consisting of fellow cop impersonator Tommy Gunn and two beauties (Shay Love and obscure actress Syvette Wimberly) who play their decoy roles as whores so convincingly they must be whores for real.

The ups and downs of Tera and Spyder's uncertain relationship are poorly and arbitrarily shown, with him banishing her one minute and humping her the next. Film's best scene is Tera having sex with roommate Monique Alexander, one of PT's all-time best actresses, who gets to wield a mighty strap-on applied to Tera.

There's one brief exposition scene I watched repeatedly in the vain hope of making sense of it: a static long, long-shot of a couple in a diner, with Tommy and Tera voicing over issues regarding whether she should stay with Spyder - he calls her Mary in this scene, but the sloppy video has her constantly called either Teri or Tera by the other characters throughout the show. Similarly, folks call our creepy male lead Spyder, but end credits call him Adam.

Worst faux pas, completely ignored in the pointless BTS short subject, is a very sexy scene in which a busty blonde Trixie is interviewed by Tommy to join the band of criminals. Her audition seduction of him is terrific, yet she goes uncredited both in the opening credits and the end credit crawl; fortunately a web search identified her as Brooke Haven, more than Vivid chose to do.

Because they're a couple, Spyder and Tera's sex scenes don't use a condom. His casting, as hanger-on stipulated by the superstar, killed this awful project from the get-go, and in surveying PT's career I hope not to encounter any more titles this poor.