DVD Review: “Asia Carrera 4 on 1”

This box set of four movies is a hit or miss collection that nevertheless captures Asia Carrera and her generation of porn talent in the crazy late 90's when, coincidentally, Toyota's RAV 4 was first becoming popular.

Carrera shares the long-leggedy exotic look of current stars Tera Patrick and Sophia Santi, but Carrera was a little softer, too, and in several of the movies in this collection she shows off some formidable (considering the competition) acting chops.

Read our review of "Asia Carrera 4 on 1" after the gap. - GP

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Asia Carrera 4 on 1

Studio: VCA

Director: Bud Lee, Henry Pachard, Justin Sterling, Nic Cramer, Wesley Emerson, others

Cast: Asia Carrera, Joel Lawrence, Steve Hatcher, Jonathan Morgan, Gwen Summers, Bridgette Kerkove, Alexandra Silk, Christi Lake, Crystal Gold, Brian Surewood, others

Review by Gram Ponante<

The first movie, "Hollywood Hookers", is really a Christi Lake movie with an Asia Carrera scene in it. That's OK, because we get to see the sassy Crystal Gold and Lake tooling around in a DeLorean and Brian Surewood before he became a pirate. Carrera's scene amongst the desert rocks is very tasty, but the collection doesn't kick into high gear until ...

... the second movie, "Betrayal". This film, directed by Bud Lee and shot this week exactly ten years ago, is reason enough why Lee, once Carrera's husband, is considered one of the great porn directors. Filmed from a smart and efficient script by Dow Jones and George "Fozzi" Kaplan, "Betrayed" stars Carrera as a woman whose husband won't pay attention to her until she fakes breast cancer.

While it is strange to see what was to become a masturbation scene begin with a breast lump exam, the movie features believable performances from Joel Lawrence (now the owner of Goldstar Modeling, an adult talent agency, and Steve Hatcher, who in this movie looks like Nick Drake, had he lived.

The dialogue is thoughtful ("Maybe I should be sick all the time," Carrera says as she takes advantage of her sickness to lay her girlfriends, the carpenter, and Hatcher's best buddy, played by current Wicked director Jonathan Morgan), and the only thing that took away from an otherwise exemplary porn feature experience was the lite classics soundtrack.

Though possessing a less-tight script than "Betrayal", the final movie of the set, "Asia Is in Too Deep", written and directed by Wesley Emerson, features the best performances and the most eye candy. The only movie of the four with a moral (Be careful what you wish for), "Deep" tackles the issue of husbands wanting to see their wives with other women and what happens when the wives like the other women better.

Featuring juicy performances by Gwen Summers, Allysin Chanes, Bridgette Kerkove, and Ava Vincent, as well as solid acting from Herschel Savage, this movie pushes Asia off to the side a little. By this point in her career, she had developed a strange Gillian Anderson method of elocution that involved a lot of teeth.

Still, though, it was a pleasure watching these features, and there is no doubt why the beautiful Carrera was a star, eclipsing the fame of the Hollywood celeb (Tia) she took her porn name from. Top that, Britney Rears; Carrera is one of the stars in the porn firmament.

Though I enjoyed "Hollywood Hookers", the real gems in this collection are "Betrayal" and "Asia Is in Too Deep". But Carrera is the type of person you could watch fold laundry and it would still be worthwhile.

· Asia Carrera (asiacarrera.com)

· Hustler (hustler.com)

· Buy "Asia Carrera 4 on 1" (gamelink.com)