Verdict
Summary
Stripshow is the “better” title here, but both films might not win any new fans to this type of genre. Tane McClure deserved better material. It’s still nice to have these on a single DVD. The quality of the transfers is merely adequate.
Target for Seduction Plot:
A woman’s fantasies turn deadly when her stalker turns up the heat to a maximum threat level.
Review:
Samantha (Betsy Boyle), a reader for a publishing house that specializes in pulp romance and sex novels constantly slips in and out of hot fantasies as she reads the manuscripts that come through her office, and she goes home every day alone and unable to land a man (which seems impossible because she’s a knockout). Her roommate is a struggling bikini model named Lauren (Tane McClure) whose career seems to be slipping down the slope, and she stoops so far as to model for nudie magazines for extra cash. Despite Lauren’s decline in standards, her love life is hotter than Samantha’s, and when Lauren brings home guys to sleep with, it’s Samantha who takes a peek through the cracked open bedroom door. Meanwhile, back at the office, Samantha has a secret admirer who begins leaving (at first) flattering notes, and then creepy ones like “I’m watching you,” and then “I’m going to kill you” alongside a candid polaroid of her. Samantha is sure it’s her skeezy coworker Zach (a thankless role played by Michael Albala), but when detectives pick Zach up after one of Samantha’s friends is murdered in the shower, all signs point to someone else, and you’ll never guess who.
A bottom of the barrel erotic-lite shot on video endurance test, Target For Seduction feels very much like a shot-on-the-fly made-for-late-night-cable piece of product, but there’s virtually nothing here to recommend aside from an effortless performance by Tane McClure who deserved better material than this. McClure should’ve had a better, stronger, and more exemplary career as an erotic thriller starlet. She has a forceful, commanding presence, and with her face and sculpted body she should have conquered the genre, but instead she starred in trash like this and Sexual Roulette. This was from director Ralph E. Portillo.
Stripshow Plot:
A stripper comes into two million in cash, which changes everything for her.
Review:
Las Vegas stripper Raquel (Tane McClure) has been working the poles extra hard lately, and a regular customer, a rich old codger who takes a shine to her, has a heart attack and dies right there in the strip club after Raquel gives him a lap dance. Before anyone realizes it, Raquel has slinked off with the man’s briefcase, which she is dumbfounded has two million in cash in it, and she hightails it to the desert where she reconnects with her on-again-off-again boyfriend Cowboy (Steven Tietsort) who has never gotten over resenting Raquel for being a stripper and borderline prostitute. Knowing that it might go a long way to roping him back into their tumultuous relationship, she hands him 10K in cash to help settle his debts, and that’s enough to keep him in her clutches for a day and night as they sequester themselves in a dumpy motel room in the middle of nowhere. While there, Raquel befriends a drifter named Kara (Monique Parent) who is on the run from her abusive boyfriend, and because she’s bored and feels like it, Raquel takes Kara under her wing and teaches her how to become a stripper … and a hooker. Playing mind games with this young drifter, Raquel shells out almost a hundred grand to the girl to dance for her, stripping her of her dignity and her honor as she pushes Kara’s limits to their breaking point as she all but forces her to have sex with Cowboy, who is faced with his own guilt when the deed is done. When the dust settles, Raquel will have alienated everyone around her as she faces a crisis of conscience in this godforsaken wasteland.
A more or less satisfying drama with a compelling and alluring McClure at the center, Stripshow feels like a lark of a film, with a cast of less than a half a dozen, two basic locations, and some nice photography. Sex scenes and nudity are sprinkled throughout, but it’s McClure who is the real reason to watch it as she really does give the trite material her all. From director Gary Dean Orona.
Aptly paired together, these two long lost Tane McClure cable TV films aren’t upgraded to high definition or widescreen for this double feature DVD release from Skinmax, but it’s nice to have them, especially if you’re a fan of McClure. The films won’t really bring her new fans, per se, but there is an art to making a halfway decent erotic film, and while neither of these are very special, they’re bound to make someone happy.
