Dawn

Sin City Ultra

Genre: Feature

Director: Francois Clousot

Cast: Shay Sweet, Steven St. Croix, Taylor Rain, Billy Glide, Scott Styles, Kelly Kline, Richard Raymond, Sophia, Talon, Ashley Long, Evan Stone

Length: 98 minutes

Date of Production: 7/1/2004

Extra's: Like most of the Sin City Ultra line, Dawn had a lot of solid extras. My favorite was the 10.5 minute long Behind the Scenes feature by Jason Silver as it had a combination of sex, silliness, and off the record material for fans. Next up was the limited audio commentary by the director (why do Sin City directors not take full advantage of the commentaries?). I listen to them in order to find out more about the movie, the stars and funny little anecdotes but all too often; the ones on Sin City titles seem like the commentators were forced to do it and paid a penalty for every word they uttered. There were also eleven short biographies (if the men had pictures too, I'd like them even more) and interviews with the gals (fairly short interviews but the more the merrier from my point of view). Some of you enjoy the pop shot compilation and photogallery material (certainly more than I do) but the 5.5 minutes of bloopers were far more entertaining (especially with Evan mugging for the cameras). Lastly, there were trailers and spam to round out the value added stuff.

Condoms: Yes

Audio/Video Quality: The picture was presented in non-anamorphic widescreen color with an aspect ratio of 1.85:1. It looked very crisp and clear in almost every scene with some attention paid to detail this time. The colors were accurate and the fleshtones solid with few problems other than a bit of compression noise on rare occasion. I've seen far worse from Sin City but I doubt I've seen much better lately so I hope they maintain this new sense of high end production values on future releases. The audio was presented in stereo English with a bit of separation between the channels and some reasonably good dynamic range. In all, the picture looked better than the audio sounded but both were better than average.

Body of Review: Feature porn has long borne the brunt of critics that pointed out every flaw in acting, every negative nuance in the limited ability of most porn directors to tell a story, and focused on all the worst elements presented since by and large; feature porn is made for a different audience then them. Being a fan of the genre who accepts that the limited budgets and acting talents (as opposed to performing talents) hasn't been easy but there's obviously a market for this kind of thing or companies such as Wicked Pictures, Vivid, and VCA would've gone out of business years ago. One of the newer companies to features is Sin City and their multitude of attempts to provide quality entertainment hasn't gone unnoticed by me. Their latest releases is a little feature called Dawn, a feature that dealt with a gal, Ashley Long (not the contract star Shay Sweet on the front cover), trying to make sense of her romantic life with several guys chasing her. The plot was minimal and the cast looked great so if you're still interested, read the following breakdown of scenes by cast and action:

Scene One: Shay, the very attractive blonde on the front DVD cover, and porn veteran Steven, had the first scene on a bed after she seduced him. As she rubbed herself, he went down on her (even sucking her feet a little) in an okay manner but her oral to him was warmer. She deep throated him and then they screwed in several positions before the pop shot on her face and all over the bed. I think she's one of the hottest looking gals in porn but the scene was kind of tepid in terms of heat and energy so your mileage will vary as to whether it was a well done piece of stroke material.

Scene Two: Taylor, a crazy little brunette with a smoking hot body, was up next with Billy in bed. They made out for a moment and she took care of his massive (to her) penis orally with an amount of enthusiasm reviewers like me enjoy seeing. While I've long thought she'd too lean for my tastes, I think most fans will adore the way her lithe young body worked him over after the oral. The sloppy oral, the heated and passionate vaginal and the decent anal all combined to make this a great scene for this type of movie. Fans of ATM (ass to mouth) will appreciate this one as will facial fans although she didn't swallow at the end.

Scene Three: Shay, looking even better from behind, was next up in another bedroom scene but this time with Scott, a guy that reminded me a lot of a younger Peter North. The two looked good together as she slobbed his knob; this time with more energy than the last (leading me to believe there was more chemistry between them). She still didn't look like she enjoyed getting as much as receiving but she did ride him with more passion than Steven and that made it more fun to watch for me. It ended when she jerked him off onto her abdomen.

Scene Four: Kelly, one of the cutest gals to enter porn in the last year or so, and her real life husband Richard were up next in a bathtub scene. I liked how she warmed up alone and the candlelight made the action more romantic but as much as I think they're super nice in real life; they simply don't look good together onscreen. Her oral wasn't bad this time as she left streamers trailing to her face but it ended with her jerking him off and no penetration. If the action is going to be that limited, special steps are going to be needed to make the oral only scene great and that wasn't done here. Admittedly, she looked good but lacked the kind of energy that would make her a star.

Scene Five: Sophia, a curvy cutey with wild hair, had the next scene with studly Talon in a smoky room. I liked how it looked compared to some of the other, more generic, scenes and her level of passion was among the best of the show as she inhaled his penis in the stylish lighting provided. They did the usual vaginal before the anal and I think each had some amount of attraction towards the other. If the weaker scenes had this much energy and chemistry, I think the movie would've rocked but even the worse scene was pretty fun to watch at least once. The only thing to make this one better (besides making it last longer) would've been for her to finish him off rather than let him jerk out his own load.

Scene Six: Ashley, the actual lead of the movie and a pretty talented sex performer to boot, put her long legs and slinky physique to work with Evan in the final scene. A friend of mine tells me that Evan "cleans up well" which loosely translates to she thinks he's a hotty when he's put in dress up clothes (only to come out of them moments later). The two spent some time with the foreplay; something far too often lost in modern porn, but soon found one another to be as sexually skilled as they've ever met. They weren't the most extreme couple of the movie (forgoing anal for a change) but the sweat rolling off their bodies and level of passion they displayed made it fun to watch more than once for me.

Summary: Dawn had a lot of potential for me to enjoy since I liked the cast, the general types of sex shown, and the high end production values but the chemistry and heat lacked too often for me to give it anything higher than a rating of Rent It (even though I wanted to give it more). Some of you will hate that condoms were used, others that the sex wasn't extreme enough, and still others that the cookie cutter sex scenes didn't show enough variety with such a talented cast but in the end it was the lack of passion that most bothered me and the few good scenes couldn't make up for the weaker scenes surrounding them. It also bugged me that the lead of the movie was cast aside in order to favor the contract star (I like Shay just fine and think she could've been the lead here to solve this problem) on the cover, a reality of porn but something that's still wrong to do for the consumer. If you like the cast a lot and want to see them in action, you could do worst though so check it out if you get the chance.

Note: You can see recent candid shots of several of these performers by visiting: My Photo's and read about their antics at 2004 AEE Show.