I thought the theme of sex being forbidden in the future would suck, but with attractive characters, I'm sure this film is not going to disappoint. The pacing is rather poor, however. I haven't seen the first one so I don't really have a comparison.
5 Reviews
ANOTHER POOR SEQUEL
cbarfield23 March 2002
Considering the original Cafe Flesh is one of the most respected adult films by sources outside of the industry,Antonio Passolini has chosen a movie with a lot of admirers,in which to mark his return to directing. 15 years has elapsed and an epidemic has been wiping out the majority of the sex positives,those remaining humans who can still have sex. The club has passed hands to 'Violet Chinchilla' (played by Jeanna Fine) who has a male sex positive ready for work.Meanwhile Raylene has been trekking across the nuclear wastelands to cash in on her assets,and a sewage worker has stumbled upon a cryogenically stored female virgin (Stacy Valentine)called by Buffy. With the ingredients mixed and the return of the neon Cafe Flesh sign,its business as (un)usual.Rebecca Lord is the first performer,speaking in her native french tongue(and what a cunning linguist she proves to be),while 2 mime artists(Tony Tedeschi and John Decker)smear sticky white ...grease paint over her. Stacy dreams of losing her cherry to T.T.Boy,as he teaches her about what shes been missing out on and Raylene looks resplendent in a kimono/matador dress, while bullfighting with Billy Glide before she baits him to impale her. However it does not take long for the positives to realize that there is more money in performing at their own club and mutiny is at hand.
Unfortunately Passolini has failed in bringing back the magic from the original.The production is excellent,but the script fails in its potential,especially at the end which feels incomplete,with loose ends surrounding most of the cast.The first script was apparently 90 pages long,cut down to a mere 64,removing key elements such as Stacy being attacked by mutants at the end.It only makes me wonder if the end was written,just never filmed ? Another loss is the feel of the club environment,maybe there is not enough 'cutaways' to the audience,its uninspired narration before each performance or perhaps the acts themselves ar just not unorthodox enough. The worst crime though is the XXX scenes which are quite dull.Static camerawork and long takes only result in a major part of the film being lifeless. Cafe Flesh 2 is nothing short of disappointing,even cameos bu Kitten Natividad(star of Russ Meyer's films)and Veronica Hart seem wasted. All of this only proves Michael Ninn's true worth as the revolutionary adult film maker he is hailed as being. The DVD has a bio on the top stars and the transfer is of the same high quality that I have come to expect from VCA.
Unfortunately Passolini has failed in bringing back the magic from the original.The production is excellent,but the script fails in its potential,especially at the end which feels incomplete,with loose ends surrounding most of the cast.The first script was apparently 90 pages long,cut down to a mere 64,removing key elements such as Stacy being attacked by mutants at the end.It only makes me wonder if the end was written,just never filmed ? Another loss is the feel of the club environment,maybe there is not enough 'cutaways' to the audience,its uninspired narration before each performance or perhaps the acts themselves ar just not unorthodox enough. The worst crime though is the XXX scenes which are quite dull.Static camerawork and long takes only result in a major part of the film being lifeless. Cafe Flesh 2 is nothing short of disappointing,even cameos bu Kitten Natividad(star of Russ Meyer's films)and Veronica Hart seem wasted. All of this only proves Michael Ninn's true worth as the revolutionary adult film maker he is hailed as being. The DVD has a bio on the top stars and the transfer is of the same high quality that I have come to expect from VCA.
Purgatory
kosmasp21 July 2023
No pun intended - also not really a summary line I reckon. But the label that had this movie out on a DVD Magazine. I was surprised to say the least because it did look like a movie for ... well an adult movie. So a magazine, even one that is only sold to adults would have such a movie? A horror magazine nonetheless (DVD World, quite the interesting read back in the day). Anyway so I finally after 2 decades decided to give this a watch. And it is quite soft ... again no pun intended.
You do not see the stuff you'd see if you had gotten the real disc - or I reckon streamed it would be more appropriate nowadays, uncut that is. All that being said: there is still a lot of nudity - and you have to dig the hairdos and all that Science Fiction stuff the movie entails - or maybe you call it differently. Since the hard stuff is left out, the movie is shorter ... but it's not about size .. is it?
You do not see the stuff you'd see if you had gotten the real disc - or I reckon streamed it would be more appropriate nowadays, uncut that is. All that being said: there is still a lot of nudity - and you have to dig the hairdos and all that Science Fiction stuff the movie entails - or maybe you call it differently. Since the hard stuff is left out, the movie is shorter ... but it's not about size .. is it?
The World Loves Love
Nodriesrespect17 February 2008
Warning: Spoilers
One of porn's most eagerly awaited sequels, CAFE FLESH 2 took its time to arrive. The original's creator, "Rinse Dream" (a/k/a Stephen Sayadian) mapped his own destiny by drifting back and forth between porn and the relatively mainstream. For industry giant VCA, who owned the video and subsequent DVD rights to CAFE FLESH, it was quite a coup that they were able to lure him back into the adult film fold as the '90s dawned. Almost immediately, rumors began about a substantially budgeted, 35mm follow-up to the apocalyptic classic. His shift to rival company Zane Entertainment Group and his ambitious, planned to run ten parts (but aborted after two) series UNTAMED COWGIRLS OF THE WILD WEST there probably sabotaged these prospects and it was rising star "Antonio Passolini" (a/k/a Anthony Lovett) who ended up rising to the occasion instead. Having started writing scripts for some of Gregory Dark's outrageous '80s flicks, he brought a healthy dose of warped humor to the project.
The basic situation should still be familiar from the first film. Following a nuclear war, the world population is now divided into a majority of Sex Negatives, who can no longer engage in sexual activity without getting violently ill, and a handful of Sex Positives who can and are legally forced to perform for the pathetic Negatives in sleazy places such as the titular Café. Now a few decades further down the line, the Pozzie Virus has wiped out most of the remaining Positives, forcing the establishment out of business. Memories of the one time hot spot live on however and the formidable Violet Chinchilla (Jeanna Fine, resplendent in psychedelic wardrobe and color-coordinated Day-Glo wigs) is hellbent on reopening the joint regardless of cost. In search of potential performers, professional cellar dweller Lionel Mandrake (big, burly Simon Delo who played the title role in Passolini's CAP'N MONGO'S PORNO PLAYHOUSE) strikes gold when he stumbles across the cryogenically frozen curves of '70s virgin débutante Buffy, superbly played by Stacy Valentine prior to sex super-stardom. Taunted by Mandrake into paying top dollar for this prize commodity, Violet goes to see loan shark and original emcee Max Melodramatic, now reduced to a talking brain in a heavily guarded fish tank, shades of Jeunet & Caro's CITY OF LOST CHILDREN. Further thickening an already labyrinthine plot, Max reveals himself as Violet's dad through in vitro fertilization. As a prime example of the writer/director's idiosyncratic brand of buffoonery, Buffy's first words upon rejoining the living consist of the chorus to crappy chart buster "Billy, Don't Be a Hero", marking her as the consummate '70s bird brain ! It takes a mismatched Positive/Negative pair (mirroring the original's Nick and Lana) to supply the movie with something resembling an emotional core. Mookie and Chappie (ravishing Raylene and handsome hunk Alec Metro respectively) are wastrels of the wasteland who learn of Violet's grand scheme from an errant leaflet. For the physically fully functional Mookie, this signifies a way out of poverty but her mate has misgivings about letting his partner play for pay in live sex shows for the impotent majority.
The sex here is quite different from the intentionally bored to the point of jaded encounters in the original, eschewing that film's satire in favor of more conventional South of the border thrills. Dirty movie devotees, myself included, will undoubtedly prefer it that way. Eight elaborate vignettes are crafted like perfectly formed mini movies with a tone and style of their own. The ferocious Fine, one of adult's shining beacons, all but explodes during an early highlight as Violet enjoys an "industrial strength" fantasy with welder Brian Surewood in his stylishly grimy workplace. Raylene really makes that too tight matador outfit work for her in the corrida performance piece with Billy Glide as her horny bull. The finale supplies what was conspicuously lacking from the original, an honest to goodness emotional pay-off as Chappie procures the last dose of mythical potion Passion 19 which restores his powers to make love to his mate on the Café's packed to capacity opening (slash wedding) night. Technical credits are as awesome as Passolini's previous collaboration with Michael Ninn (for whom he wrote LATEX and SHOCK) would suggest with the now to be expected computer-generated backgrounds and a really cool Pantisi Sera soundtrack with its array of odd sounds mixed and distorted to maximum effect. Designed as epic erotica for the upcoming new millennium, there's not a lot of food for thought here with everything to be taken pretty much at face value. Don't hold that against it though, because CAFE FLESH 2 (an even wilder third installment already in preparation as it premiered) supplies exquisite eye candy for the discerning dirty old man in all of us.
The basic situation should still be familiar from the first film. Following a nuclear war, the world population is now divided into a majority of Sex Negatives, who can no longer engage in sexual activity without getting violently ill, and a handful of Sex Positives who can and are legally forced to perform for the pathetic Negatives in sleazy places such as the titular Café. Now a few decades further down the line, the Pozzie Virus has wiped out most of the remaining Positives, forcing the establishment out of business. Memories of the one time hot spot live on however and the formidable Violet Chinchilla (Jeanna Fine, resplendent in psychedelic wardrobe and color-coordinated Day-Glo wigs) is hellbent on reopening the joint regardless of cost. In search of potential performers, professional cellar dweller Lionel Mandrake (big, burly Simon Delo who played the title role in Passolini's CAP'N MONGO'S PORNO PLAYHOUSE) strikes gold when he stumbles across the cryogenically frozen curves of '70s virgin débutante Buffy, superbly played by Stacy Valentine prior to sex super-stardom. Taunted by Mandrake into paying top dollar for this prize commodity, Violet goes to see loan shark and original emcee Max Melodramatic, now reduced to a talking brain in a heavily guarded fish tank, shades of Jeunet & Caro's CITY OF LOST CHILDREN. Further thickening an already labyrinthine plot, Max reveals himself as Violet's dad through in vitro fertilization. As a prime example of the writer/director's idiosyncratic brand of buffoonery, Buffy's first words upon rejoining the living consist of the chorus to crappy chart buster "Billy, Don't Be a Hero", marking her as the consummate '70s bird brain ! It takes a mismatched Positive/Negative pair (mirroring the original's Nick and Lana) to supply the movie with something resembling an emotional core. Mookie and Chappie (ravishing Raylene and handsome hunk Alec Metro respectively) are wastrels of the wasteland who learn of Violet's grand scheme from an errant leaflet. For the physically fully functional Mookie, this signifies a way out of poverty but her mate has misgivings about letting his partner play for pay in live sex shows for the impotent majority.
The sex here is quite different from the intentionally bored to the point of jaded encounters in the original, eschewing that film's satire in favor of more conventional South of the border thrills. Dirty movie devotees, myself included, will undoubtedly prefer it that way. Eight elaborate vignettes are crafted like perfectly formed mini movies with a tone and style of their own. The ferocious Fine, one of adult's shining beacons, all but explodes during an early highlight as Violet enjoys an "industrial strength" fantasy with welder Brian Surewood in his stylishly grimy workplace. Raylene really makes that too tight matador outfit work for her in the corrida performance piece with Billy Glide as her horny bull. The finale supplies what was conspicuously lacking from the original, an honest to goodness emotional pay-off as Chappie procures the last dose of mythical potion Passion 19 which restores his powers to make love to his mate on the Café's packed to capacity opening (slash wedding) night. Technical credits are as awesome as Passolini's previous collaboration with Michael Ninn (for whom he wrote LATEX and SHOCK) would suggest with the now to be expected computer-generated backgrounds and a really cool Pantisi Sera soundtrack with its array of odd sounds mixed and distorted to maximum effect. Designed as epic erotica for the upcoming new millennium, there's not a lot of food for thought here with everything to be taken pretty much at face value. Don't hold that against it though, because CAFE FLESH 2 (an even wilder third installment already in preparation as it premiered) supplies exquisite eye candy for the discerning dirty old man in all of us.
Scores in terms of sex content and style, but muffs the storytelling
lor_24 December 2019
Pretentious writer-director Antonio Passolini/Anthony Lovett loads this sequel to a famous (and influential) Adult movie with endless popular culture references, but otherwise his self-consciously "hip" script adds little to the sci-fi dystopia premise of the original.
Veronica Hart is a "saver", arriving late in the film with her nonpareil acting chops, playing the aged owner of the Cafe Flesh, which is no more thanks to the post-Nuclear War world losing its libido, even to the extent of the voyeurism that made the club popular.
Jeanna Fine is out to resurrect Cafe Flesh, and is fortunate enough to buy a frozen lady (superstar Stacy Valentine) from our humble narrator (well-played by scruffy Simon Delo), who found her in his job working in the city's sewers. She's a well-preserved virgin, intact and able to have sex on stage for Fine's floorshow.
Very strange costumes and sets, plus an array of pastel wigs, complement the campy approach here, and Raylene, Rebecca Lord and Sally Layd all put on hot sex shows at the club, including flashbacks of the glory days of Cafe Flesh of old. Even the famous porno makeup artist May Balleen is impressive as a topless go-go dancer during the end credits.
But the story, including the plight of sexually Positive Raylene and her forlorn Negative lover Alec Metro, is weak and poorly resolved in a rushed ending.
Veronica Hart is a "saver", arriving late in the film with her nonpareil acting chops, playing the aged owner of the Cafe Flesh, which is no more thanks to the post-Nuclear War world losing its libido, even to the extent of the voyeurism that made the club popular.
Jeanna Fine is out to resurrect Cafe Flesh, and is fortunate enough to buy a frozen lady (superstar Stacy Valentine) from our humble narrator (well-played by scruffy Simon Delo), who found her in his job working in the city's sewers. She's a well-preserved virgin, intact and able to have sex on stage for Fine's floorshow.
Very strange costumes and sets, plus an array of pastel wigs, complement the campy approach here, and Raylene, Rebecca Lord and Sally Layd all put on hot sex shows at the club, including flashbacks of the glory days of Cafe Flesh of old. Even the famous porno makeup artist May Balleen is impressive as a topless go-go dancer during the end credits.
But the story, including the plight of sexually Positive Raylene and her forlorn Negative lover Alec Metro, is weak and poorly resolved in a rushed ending.
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