"Vice Girls" review

Vice Girls (2000)

Director: Richard Gabai
Writer: A. Michael Baldwin

Lana Clarkson ... Jan Cooper
Liat Goodson ... Edith Block
Kimberley Roberts ... Mindy Turner (as Kimberly Roberts)
Bart Muller ... John Russo
Warren Draper ... Captain Chandler
Richard Gabai ... Quentin / Hilowitz
A. Michael Baldwin ... Tralaine
Caroline Keenan ... Polly

Ari Bass... Man at Party
David Gohman... Man At Party
Jim Wynorski... Man with Top Popper

There's a serial killer on the loose in Hollywood. He likes videotaping himself while he kills teenage runaways. This fiend must be caught. Lana Clarkson and two other babe detectives need to hit the sleazy streets to see what they can find out. Their investigation takes them deep into the sordid underbelly of L.A. And when I say sordid underbelly, I really mean cheap movie sets. The killer's trail leads them to a host of scummy characters. Could the fat pornographer be behind the killings? What about the conceited director? How about the Quentin Tarantino wannabe filmmaker? The Vice Girls are on the hunt.

"Vice Girls" is a typical B-thriller. Actually, it's little lighter than I was hoping. I was in the mood for a sordid "Charlie's Angels" rip-off. The DVD cover has one of the Vice Girls, (Liat Goodson), in a skin tight leather skirt. I was hoping to see more of her but was denied. In fact, only one of the Vice Girls gets naked. Lana Clarkson gets topless in a quick sex scene in the bathroom. The other Vice Girls don't join the party. How sad that Lana had to carry the nudity burden for her whole squad.

Unfortunately, "Vice Girls" is just not as much fun as it should be. Lana Clarkson does what she can but the other two Vice Girls are non-entities. There was one scene where the tech advisor hinted that she knew the other Vice Girl back in San Francisco. I thought this was leading to a lesbian scene but was denied. Instead, they started beating each other up in a rather inept fight scene. Another scene had two teenage runaways talking about their latest shoplifting adventure in a stationary store. One girl turns to the other and says something like, "You're my only friend". I thought this was also going to lead to a lesbian scene but was denied again. Maybe I think every scene is going to lead to a lesbian scene. But when you have a movie called "Vice Girls" with the tagline "They're no Angels!" it's not too unreasonable to think that the girls will get some vice in their life.

But "Vice Girls" has some fun scenes as they look for the mad killer. One scene has the girls going undercover in the pornographer's store so that they can check out the lecherous creeps. They decide that they need a secret way to film the weirdos so they devise a brilliant solution. One Vice Girl starts dancing with a camera inserted on the nipples of her bra. They know where the guys will be staring. This is solid police work. Unfortunately this also means they can't take their camera bra off as they don't want pictures of the floor. I felt as let down as the wackos. We both felt swindled.

So where is the vice in "Vice Girls"? It's hard to find. Only Lana Clarkson knew what she was doing in this movie. She drags a guy into the bathroom to have sex. Twice! Thank you Lana for saving "Vice Girls". Lana gets topless and the movie is better for it. At least hard drinking, amazon woman Clarkson indulged in some much needed vice.

SCORE: 2 out of 4 vice girls

Side note: I was looking for a hot picture of Lana Clarkson to post but went with some real Vice Girls instead. If you do a Google search on Lana Clarkson you'll actually end up with more pictures of Phil Spector than Lana. Well, seeing Spector and his many fake wigs drained me of my Lana desire. RIP Lana.