Dark Angels 2 (2005)

Diminutive girl-next-door porn star Sunny Lane is the ultimate subject of the old "what's a nice girl like you doing in this business?" line. For fans of her arousing XXX work, DARK ANGELS 2: BLOODLINE is nirvana.

I caught the film in a quality "Halloween"-themed DVD 3-pack, accompanied by the original 2000 video DARK ANGELS and a superior 1999 graphic novel-styled porno named BLOODRITE. It's a dynamite package.

Dillon Day (variously credited in these videos as just Dillon or Dillion) returns as Jack Cross, an ex-cop single-mindedly hunting down the vampires left over from the last video. Four years have passed, and he's so one-track he hasn't had any pussy in all that time (not to worry, Sunny Lane will rectify that shortfall, after several reels of coyness in the approved "Castle" or "Bones" style of romantic tease).

Like its previous video, this effort boasts excellent visual effects, and even some monster makeup that is worthy of a genre film, and pretty darn rare in porn circles. No surprise that director Nic Andrews won some awards, and for once they weren't phony accolades.

The overly tongue-in-cheek ending detracts from a generally suspenseful horror exercise, and Evan Stone's usual hamminess (plus his exaggerated makeup) is also a minus. Ron Jeremy pops up in a non-sex cameo as Lane's mean boss, as she works as a mousy looking girl in a local diner before joining up with Dillon to kick some vampire ass.

When Dillon & Sunny finally get it on (I was a bit annoyed that Nic fumbled the prelude-to-sex scene, but he can be forgiven based on what followed) it's a classic porn scene as he humps her every which way but loose atop the hood of his cherry black Mustang. This is delivering the XXX goods, in spades.

Like the fans who post comments and queries on Lane's IMDb board, I am taken aback by how such a peaches & cream, all-American young beauty could turn out to be a top porn actress. She is genuinely affecting and totally believable as an innocent young girl throughout much of DARK ANGELS 2, but suddenly, after a teaser naked shower scene, she lets all inhibitions go and gets it on with Dillon -wow!

It doesn't hurt that Dillon is styled as a nearly-exact forerunner of Stephen Lang's memorably macho military villain in AVATAR. Once again, it makes we wonder if the leading mainstream directors, like Cameron and Nolan, check out the best of porn -it wouldn't completely surprise me if they did.

This is one case where instead of my usual knee-jerk reaction of "I gotta buy a cart-load of Sunny Lane videos", instead I will simply savor this terrific exploitation of her talents. (Example: Sunny starring recently as ALICE but it turned out to be a punked-out piece of junk that even made Tim Burton look good.)