The (Kirsten) Price Of Adultery: “Dinner At Frankie’s”

April 21, 2010
LANK

There are some outlandish things in "Dinner at Frankie's" (for example, Alektra Blue wears clothes during some of it), but, by and large, it is a refreshingly believable porn movie and worth your time. We also approve the alcohol consumption.

Dinner at Frankie's

Studio: Wicked
Director: Michael Raven, from a screenplay by Jennifer Allison
Starring: Kirsten Price, Alektra Blue, Kaylani Lei, Randy Spears, Barrett Bladse, Rocco Reed, Danny Mountain

review by Gram Ponante

"Dinner at Frankie's" is just about the perfect porn movie for 2010. Not booting to the curb any male fantasy of its bread and butter audience (it even adds one), the movie nevertheless is a fine and balanced example of straight porn for women, too.

Frankie (Kirsten Price) is stuck in a loveless marriage with Mark (Randy Spears), and her adulterous relationship with Jeff (Rocco Reed) is in danger of being found out.

"Mark and I had been together for four years," gripes Frankie in a voiceover. Writing/directing team Michael Raven and Jennifer Allison have perfected the judicious use of voiceovers in their movies, both to move the story along but also to cut down on extensive retakes. Instead, we can hear this line over a wide shot of the unhappy couple sitting miles apart on a couch.

The trouble with many couples' films is that they can aim too high, choking the porn with unnecessary dialogue, or they can present inaccessibly porny setups, unrealistic to the non-coastal stragglers who still pay for porn.

That "Dinner at Frankie's" puts the cast around a dinner table (Frankie's college pals, Mandy and Tiffany, are played as sweet and bitchy by Kaylani Lei and Alektra Blue, respectively) and uses sex-scene flashbacks to happier times would be enough for most movies, but Allison's screenplay keeps raising the stakes. There is a discovery, there is legitimate fear of a breakup, and the redemption at the end is sweeter because of it.

While many porn parodies or couples' films (or both) are either cynical or half-assed (or both), "Dinner at Frankie's" keeps offering pleasant surprises while staying within its boundaries. I instantly liked nice-girl Mandy when she announced that not only did she bring the one bottle for the table, but she also had two more in the car, just in case. I liked that the group got drunk. I liked when one of them got mean - because it was believable. I like that someone throws up. I liked that Tiffany's fed-up boyfriend, Russell (Barrett Blade), got to act fed-up. I like that they eat real food.

I like that there are consequences.

What wasn't believable, of course, was the condoms, but porn isn't entirely a fantasyland.

But of all the three-ways and open relationships and funbags and alcohol, the one extra-erotic thing about "Dinner at Frankie's" was that someone was wrong and said sorry. That's almost hotter than twins.

· Wicked (wicked.com)
· Buy "Dinner at Frankie's" (gamelink.com)