Jacky St. James scored a well-timed hit with her BDSM-themed SUBMISSION OF EMMA MARX, and this entertaining sequel covers the same ground adequately. The opportunity to develop new themes and improve on the first feature's structure was sidestepped, unfortunately.
Looking different (as a porn star she had shifted to a familiar redhead style by the time this followup was shot in November 2014), Penny Pax returns as Emma Marx 3 years later, with auteur Jacky again (and wrong again in my opinion) narrating as Emma's voice-over voice. Feature opens at the table with sis Riley Reid and her husband Van Wylde, discussing Emma's BDSM tinged lifestyle.
Riley concludes it wouldn't hurt her marriage to inject some of sister's bondage elements into her own bedroom play, so the film's first sex vignette has her blindfolded as hubby Van does a job on her. (Behind the Scenes short subject on the DVD was interesting in that Riley admits giddily that shooting this scene was her first experience of blindfolded sex ever.)
Riley's fetish outfit, with cut out bra and long black gloves highlights this very tame in terms of kink but satisfying sex scene.
For the sequel, Penny signs a new contract with boss Richie Calhoun (now he has short hair 3 years later), changing the rules of their BDSM arrangement and the boundaries of what she will let him do with her. Later on when their relationship suffers its ups and downs, he reduces Emma from full-time to sort of his part-time slave (that reminds me of the title of a classic New German Cinema film by Alexander Kluge starring his sister Alexandra, but I doubt if Jacky was going for that film-buff reference).
Key change in the "permissible" acts of their union is adding sex with other people (i.e., threesomes) to the mix. Penny balks at this, but of course Richie convinces her to agree. He insists that she masturbate and think of a real person she would like to have sex with at the same time as being with him - she picks Logan Pierce, a new guy working in the office with her at Calhoun's company. She picks him because "he's so innocent, just dying to be corrupted".
When the sisters exercise at a gym together, sister Nadia (Riley) makes a lot of sense when she contends that men pretend that it's all about the woman in order to get what they want. Her notion of what submission is really all about was a lot more convincing than Jacky's (and these films) doggerel about "submission provides safety in the power of letting go" and other such nonsense.
Emma, however, goes with Richie's flow, forced to give Logan a series of off- color mash notes indicating she wants to hump him. Before the desired threesome can be consummated, a fly in the ointment appears in the form of sexy Sara Luvv (a fine actress who conceivably could have had the Emma Marx role instead of Pax in the first place, given the close facial resemblance -except for the nose - of Luvv to Reid). She comes to the office to see Richie, and Emma knows she was Calhoun's #1 sub before they split prior to Emma's era.
There is a very brief montage of fleeting images of Luvv having sex with Richie, including being ball-gagged. However, Jacky only dangles this guest star in front of the viewer -she has no real sex scene in the movie and her entire role is over in seconds not minutes. Structurally, the film would have benefited from inclusion of a full-length sex vignette of Sara & Richie (the 20-minute variety), which I'm certain the fans would have enjoyed, but no such luck.
Instead, Richie gives Penny the silent treatment and she becomes depressed. Matters aren't helped when sister Riley becomes pregnant, and the straight- world's life style seems mighty appealing compared to her fears of being summarily dumped by her lord and master.
It turns out that her assumption that Richie has taken up again with Luvv proves unfounded -Luvv's role was merely a red herring in the script. Instead Richie starts punishing Penny more and more, chaining her spread-eagled to a wall. The whole notion of punishment, part & parcel of the B&D, S&M, role-playing regime, is particularly nonsensical and contradictory here - as the sub Emma wants to be punished and gets off on it, instead of following the dom's rules she starts to disobey in order to be punished, leaving the master with a Catch-22 situation: dishing out punishment is actually a reward. That's why if you're like me, who hasn't drunk the cult's kool aid, it's hard to swallow the psychology and even simple motivations presented here -it makes no sense.
Of course this all leads to troilism sex in a hotel room, quite disappointing because the usually reliable Logan just goes through the mechanical motions. The script is building to a d.p., but there is none, making Logan's and Richie's cum shots on Penny's ample breasts an anti-climax.
Jacky's pithy narration ends the film with more comparison of the sister's choices and states: "For some people, life isn't about being comfortable, it's about being free": jump-cut to a close-up of handcuffs clanging shut as a shock ending. The obvious disconnect, even visually between handcuffs and being free is just another example of the nutsy mystical underpinnings of this particular lifestyle.
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