Be still, my beating heart!
It happens sometimes. I think I know more than I do – I can catalogue most of Passion Cove, put the Confessions films in order, list each of the films in the Emmanuelle series GIVE THE 2024 ONE A UK RELEASE YOU ABSOLUTE COWARDS – and then something blindsides me at the last minute.
Featuring Joe Estevez (brother of Martin Sheen), Don Swayze (brother of Patrick) and Joey Travolta (brother of John) – and bonus Jackie Stallone, Burt Ward, Nikki Fritz and C.C. Costigan – Beach Babes from Beyond is one such thing. I’m genuinely surprised, thinking I knew everything Surrender put out in their entire catalogue… and then I find this!
It even won an AVN Award – I mean…!
Appearance: Beach Babes from Beyond (1993)
Characters: Dave & Xena
Plot-wise, this one follows the standard formula: intergalactic babe Xena (Roxanne Blaze) “borrows” her dad’s ship to go… somewhere… with her two pals Sola (Nicole Posey) and Luna (Tamara Landry) but they run out of fuel, crash-landing in California. Into the mix come three guys (wouldn’t you know it? Three! How fortunate!), Dave, Jerry and Ziggy (Michael Todd Davis, Ken Steadman and Michael Roddy). Sex happens Stuff happens.
There’s some more stuff – Uncle Bud is about to lose his beach house; the beach babes enter the bikini contest to win repair money; the evil fashion designer will stop at nothing to win – but it’s mostly salad dressing. It gives you a plot to cling to (I will admit “we crashed so let’s fuck” is a little flimsy, even for Surrender). Consider, however, that a total of 08:75 – over 11% of this film’s 79:44 runtime – is given over to Baywatch-style bikini-clad beach montages… not to mention the 06:03 bikini contest routine towards the end, and it’s fairly clear somebody thought that whatever they filmed needed a little padding.
In any case, the sex
Although the sequel (yes, there’s a sequel) indicates that all three girls lost their virginity to the guys during the events of this one, you wouldn’t know it. The cut-between-sex montage featuring Jerry, Ziggy, Sola and Luna depicts those beach babes as particularly well-versed in exactly what to do in bed with an Earthling. Maybe it’s Xena who was a virgin. Let’s find out.
Her sex scene with Mike doesn’t actually start too badly. It’s actually fairly romantic, in a way (a “terrible sound design but the dialogue is all right” way): a hissy Xena doesn’t want to leave Mike, but a hissy Mike is insistent that they’ll find a way – quite an LDR, two galaxies away, but maybe they can use Zoom or something.
In any case, their kiss is quite sweet and WHAT THE FUCK JUMP CUT?
This was in full colour with some unobtrusive music! Why is it suddenly blue? Where did their clothes go? Why did somebody suddenly overlay the exact same music from Tales of the Saddle Tramps?
Where even are they, anyway? This isn’t Uncle Bud’s beach hut. Have they suddenly checked into a hotel? What happened to Xena having to get back to her planet before her parents find out she nicked their ship? EXPLAIN, MOVIE! EXPLAIN!!!
All right, so can I make out what’s happening through all the teal tint? After the necessary breast licking, which is definitely the way to go according to every softcore movie ever, we get a fair amount of oral sex. Fair play here: with the exception of Bedtime Stories, not a lot of soft porn attempts to show cunnilingus, but this one dwells on it for quite a while. We have to put up with Davis’ bum, but I’ll let that one go.
What’s less explainable, if one can see at all through the Oxford overlay, is that the scene then mixes to a standard softcore blowjob, with hair getting in the way. Fair enough that Xena may want to be giving a blowjob as she is still a virgin – I’m sure lots of people do, my first girlfriend certainly did – but, unless she is preternaturally talented, shouldn’t it be a little more awkward and experimental than this? Has she been practising on space dildos or something?
You were saying?
Oh yeah, the scene. Well, we do then get missionary penetrative sex through the azure ambience. It starts with a close-up (in which you can genuinely see the sweat on Davis’ back), pulls out to a full-body wide shot and then mixes back, a slow pan to facilitate arse-grabbing. Another mix throws us into doggy style (presumably; it’s very dark and very blue so it’s difficult to see), also shown through a few close-up shots, then sitting up, then riding…
…and we end with a kiss, which would be erotic if I could see the bloody thing!
JUMP CUT WHAT THE FUCK FULL COLOUR? My eyes already hurt enough! What is this, The Krypton Factor?
In any case, that’s the end of the scene. Eighteen more minutes of pissing about on the beach and then they leave Earth. Fantastic.
Why haven’t you made a Xena: Warrior Princess joke yet?
Because I’ve only ever seen one episode. Anyway, yes.
Have I been a bit critical here? Possibly. Full disclosure: all the other sex scenes in Beach Babes from Beyond are a little dark (and in some unspecified location), but this is the only one that’s the colour of my teenage bedroom. It’s a bit of a shame you can’t see much, because Xena is genuinely attractive and Dave is… well, he’s a generic ’90s idiot, but at least a believable ’90s idiot. I remember the ’90s, we all had hair like that.
There’s also a bit of a missed opportunity here. This could be a great scene and something I’d have an orgasm to if there was a better colour scheme to it. It’s got everything I like in it, and even if the music is over-familiar, at least it’s music that works. Neither Xena nor Dave has had any form of full nudity earlier, either, so it’s nice that they finally get to DO IT!
However, the loud music, the cerulean cinematography, and the fact that a jump cut takes us both into and out of the whole shebang does make it all seem a little incongruous. If they’re going to have sex, why not do it outside? California’s certainly warm enough. Why not on the beach, since that’s in the movie’s title? The balcony outside Bud’s hut? Hell, why not Xena’s ship? It’s just sitting there not doing anything!
But the one thing I can’t get past (and this genuinely is just me, but it’s my blog, so…) is how smooth the sex is! The sequel clearly states that this was Xena’s first time! My first time was a few minutes of clumsy cowgirl after it took me ages to get it up! How is she suddenly able to do everything, including three different sex positions, when all she had to get her going was thirty seconds of foreplay?
I call intergalactic bullshit!