Presaging by 3 decades both the current miniseries trend for streaming and the porn trend for individual sex vignettes running 30 to 60 minutes long each, Paul Thomas directed a set of 4 features each just an hour long for Vivid. This finale is serious, and humorous, and gently powerful, overall a terrific advancement of Adult Cinema. Perhaps today's all-sex pornographers could learn something constructive by spending an hour watching it.
For starters, they would learn how important it is to involve the viewer with the characters inhabiting a sex scene, in order to create eroticism rather than the millions of "XXX documentaries" that constitute video porn. Superstar Christy Canyon and talented Jennifer Stewart make a dynamite couple through this series, taking them from college roommates to maturity, in a full-circle spanning the four pictures.
With concise, confrontational dialogue by scenarist Ariel Hart, often suggesting one-act plays, this edition begins with a BDSM scene starring Jon Dough as master and Christy as his sex slave. She follows his orders dutifully and their sex scene is intense, with Christy pulling out all the stops right through to the cum shot.
At this point, she is angry that he didn't follow HER orders from before and humped her too soon. Her big line, duly quoted in IMDb, is unfortunately repeated in the following shot set-up, presumably an editing error preserved in the final print, taking some of the sting out of it. But the reveal that he's a gigolo and she just pays him to visit her weekly to service her in BDSM role-playing is powerful.
Next scene has pals Canyon and P. J. Sparxx encouraging Jennifer in her prepartions for her big date, as she's back in the dating pool a month after her divorce. The trio is lolling around their swimming pool looking sexy. Dinner date with Jerry Butler seems headed for disaster, as Jennifer is too shy and their fumbling around trying to have sex falters. Eventually they opt for mutual masturbation and ultimately do have sex successfully.
There follows a birthday party, with the three women reminiscing over photos (not shown to the viewer) about past loves, when a recurring character, the fantasy Dream Lover personified by Peter North, arrives on cue pretending to be a cop investigating a disturbance, but turns out obviously to be a stripper, hired by Sparxx to sexually service all of them. The 3 gals' very natural performances and reactions to North make this scene work, rising above its cliched conceit.
Movie ends with a lyrical outdoor scene on location with Jennifer and Christy walking by a lake, recalling the time they had a lesbian love tryst. This leads to them making love once more under a tree, a suitably hot scene including endless orgasm. The series ends with the couple lying in bed wondering if the Dream Lover is real, and as they fall asleep North appears carrying a candle and tucking them in, remarking directly to the audience a comment on their conversation: "Aren't we all strangers?".
It's a finale worthy of Bergman.