Subject: Retrospective: Virtual Seduction (1995)

From: Justin Felix <[email-masked]>
Date: 26 Apr 1998 18:18:38 GMT

VIRTUAL SEDUCTION (1995)
A "Turkey of the Week" film review by Justin Felix.  
Copyright 1998 Justin Felix.  

Rating:  ** (out of five)

Story by Michelle Gamble-Risley and William Widmaier.  
Screenplay by Michelle Gamble-Risley, William Widmaier, and Paul Ziller.  
Directed by Paul Ziller.  
Starring Jeff Fahey, Ami Dolenz, Carrie Genzel, Meshach Taylor.  
Rated R (contains nudity, violence, and profanity)  89 mins.

Synopsis:  A man whose lover, Paris, was murdered agrees to test out an
experimental virtual reality home unit system.  The subject escapes from
the real world and his current girlfriend, Laura, and becomes addicted to
virtual reality, which, due to a design flaw in his unit, recreates the
dead Paris.  

Comments:  VIRTUAL SEDUCTION, executive produced by Roger Corman and Lance
H. Robbins, serves as a cheaply-made precursor to STRANGE DAYS, a far
superior film.  Both movies deal with desperate men who have trouble
relating to their current lovers because they are (ab)using technology to
be with former lovers (in STRANGE DAYS, the technology utilized recorded
dreams rather than virtual reality).  Interestingly, both films also take
place a couple of years from now during the turn of the new millenium,
though STRANGE DAYS uses the setting far more effectively.  This
exemplifies the problem with VIRTUAL SEDUCTION.  It's not bad for what it
is: low-budget science fiction concerning the psychological dangers of
virtual reality.  Unfortunately, it's been done before and since in much
better films, a fact which ultimately leaves the sci-fi fan bored by this
movie.  

VIRTUAL SEDUCTION has many faults (one of them is the fact that the video
inexplicably has its own trailer before it begins).  The film's script
explores the possibilities of virtual reality interestingly at first, but
its treatment of the subject matter gets heavy-handed and wooden as the
movie progresses.  Many important scenes seem too dark; the lighting could
have been improved significantly.  The cast, a collection of veteran
B-movie actors and sitcom regulars, do only a mediocre job in their roles.
Jeff Fahey, of the original LAWNMOWER MAN, convincingly, though
unenergetically, plays the lead character.  Carrie Genzel plays Paris, the
VR lover, but Ami Dolenz, as the current love interest, seems like a much
more interesting and attractive character with a caring personality, which
doesn't lend credence to the film's premise.  Meschach Taylor, of the once
popular DESIGNING WOMEN sitcom, adequately plays a scientist working on the
project, but his performance isn't something to write home about either.  

VIRTUAL SEDUCTION is one of those harmless movies to which you could do
some light manual labor and not mind having it on in the background.  In
other words, one could fold laundry while glancing up at it every now and
then, but it's rather boring to just sit and watch.  The movie is
surprisingly not as violent as one expects from B-movies in this genre, but
it is still an adult R-rated film due to sexual situations and a suicide
attempt.  This turkey, ultimately, isn't awful, but it's not particularly
interesting or unique either.  Don't be seduced into watching this movie
unless you've got several loads of laundry and nothing else to watch.