This 1997 from MRG Entertainment is unique among softcore films because it’s actually filmed on-location in Mexico City, where the action takes place. I’m sure more recent studios like Retromedia would have loved to have had that kind of budget available for any of their softcore films. Unfortunately, the location turns out to be the only really memorable thing about this film, as it’s otherwise just standard run-of-the-mill softcore. The tagline for the film is;

Three young women on vacation find men and trouble when one of the women accidentally grabs the wrong suitcase which is full of money.

Yet the particular plot of a money-filled suitcase doesn’t even get started until 50 minutes into this film (which is about an hour and 24 minutes long).

Written by Jalee Bailey and directed by Eric Gibson, the film stars Lara Nelms, Jill Tompkins, and softcore legend Gabriella Hall as the three young women, Valerie, Kelly, and Amanda. They’ve planned a short vacation in Mexico together. Kelly and Amanda are already in Mexico waiting for Jill to arrive when the film starts. When Jill arrives, Kelly and Amanda pick her up in a taxi, and it’s at this pick up where the driver mistakenly takes the suitcase of some other person who was waiting for a taxi and puts it in his trunk, while the other person (whose face we don’t see) accidentally takes Jill’s suitcase, thinking it’s his and walks away.

Ariane Pellicer plays Amanda’s cousin Christina, she lives in Mexico and the women are staying at her house. Christina has to leave for some important seminar the next day, but that night she plans to take the ladies out to her favorite local nightclub. When they arrive at the house, Valerie realizes that she left “her” suitcase in the taxi. Christina says she’ll help her contact the taxi company to find it the next day. But that night they all go out to party (with Valerie borrowing some clothes from the other women).

The film cuts to a scene of the mysterious man (still no face showing) in a hotel room opening what he thinks is his luggage and finding all of Valerie’s clothes in it, and he also finds her Organizer with all of her info in, takes that with him and leaves, presumably to track her down.

John McCafferty and Simon Page play Josh and Danny, a couple of American men who are also on a brief vacation in Mexico. They encountered the women earlier while trying to catch the taxi, and they happen to show up at that same nightclub, where Danny ends up hitting it off with Amanda, while Josh hits on Valerie, who dances with him but initially rebuffs his advances because she has a boyfriend back home. But while away she finds out via a phone call that her boyfriend is cheating on her, so now she’s ready to spend time with Josh. Also Kelly meets a man named Miguel (Juan Carlos Bonet) and after spending the night with him she thinks she’s in love with him and the next days she tells the other women that she’s leaving with him to go on a trip to Cancun.

There’s also a long scene of Amanda and Valeria going shopping all day. Following the long scenes in the nightclub, a whole lot of nothing has really happened, story-wise at that point. Which just makes the film feel like it’s dragging. That’s when they finally track down what they think is Valerie’s luggage, but are shocked when they take it back to Christina’s and open it and find a half a million dollars in cash in it. And as I said, that’s not 50 minutes into the film, in the last half hour they have to figure out who the money belongs to and what happened to Valerie’s real suitcase, and all I’ll say is that the resolution involves a couple of plot twists, all of which come out of nowhere and don’t make a damn bit of sense.

Gabriella Hall is the reason I watched this film, and she’s always great in everything, but even she can’t save this film. Jill Tompkins’ role is pretty non-consequential, and Lara Nelms is okay, but this is her first and, to date, only professional acting role, and her amateurishness showed every time she had to deliver dialog. She was attractive and willing to get naked on camera though, and will some more roles she may have improved, but we’ll never know.

There are seven full sex scenes, and two what I’ll call nude scenes. There’s a scene early on where Lara, Jill, Gabriella, and Ariana are getting ready for the club, so while music plays we get lots of shots of the women in various stages of undress, and Lara in the shower. There’s also a full shower scene with Gabriella Hall.
Then Gabriella has two full sex scenes with Simon Page, and then she and Simon have a third shorter sex scene, where it’s intercut with Lara and John McCafferty having sex in another room at the same time.
Lara also has a scene right in the beginning of the film with Eduardo De Gortari, who plays Valerie’s boyfriend Dave, as they have sex before she leaves for Mexico.
Jill Tompkins and Juan Carlos Bonet have a scene together, and so does Ariane Pellicer and Andrés García Jr., who plays an associate of Christina’s.

The scenes are all hot, especially Gabriella’s, but this is definitely a film you’d want to just fast forward through to get to each scene.

Chacebook rating: THREE STARS

Jason Majercik is selling the UNRATED DVD for $29.99. Email him at quinn_nash@hotmail.com for his softcore inventory list.