Body Chemistry III: Point of Seduction
Three things I need to get off my chest:
1. I haven’t seen any of the other Body Chemistry movies, but they feature this psychologist named Claire Archer who is also a manipulative killer.
2. Yeah, Robert Forster is in this one too! I think I only own the erotic thrillers that Mr. Forster appears in (Look at my review of Cover Story and my upcoming review of The Banker for further proof!). I have just ordered the first two Body Chemistry films and all of the Night Eyes, none of which have Robert Forster, so hopefully that will balance itself out a bit!
3. If loving Body Chemistry III is wrong, I don’t want to be right!
Body Chemistry III starts out with Forster having a bit too much of the bubbly and going apeshit on some poor prostitutes in a house of ill repute. Enter Alan (Andrew Stevens), who is called in to bust up the potential mayhem. Looks like Alan might be a cop, but we soon find out that he’s a television movie producer and that Bob (Forster) is a network exec! I so want to work at that station! Then this alcoholic scientist turned screenwriter named Freddie (Chick Vennera) propositions Alan with a screenplay about one Claire Archer, psychologist by day, stalked “victim” by night. See, it seems Claire has had TWO men so obsessed with her she had no choice but to kill them (or if you’ve seen the first two Body Chemistry films or read the beginning of this review, you know she’s just a psycho). They all meet in a desolate area of California to negotiate a deal and Alan is forced to spend the night in the hotel because of a rainstorm. This is where he calls his actress wife Beth (Morgan Fairchild, who is by far the best thing in this film – sorry Robert!) to say he loves her and then proceeds to screw Claire. Normally, this wouldn’t bother me, but it takes NO swaying at all. It’s like his pants dropped the second she knocked on the door! So, now Alan is all caught up with Claire who may or may not have her life become the subject of a racy woman-in-peril network movie, which Beth is desperate to star in. Oh what a tangled web we weave! Alan keeps getting in deeper as he discovers that Claire’s murderous past may be the end of his future!
This movie is all over the map. Even without having seen the first two in the series, it’s pretty obvious that this Claire lady is loony tunes. It’s also blatantly clear that someone wanted to rip off Basic Instinct, which might be why Shari Shattuck replaced the original actress Lisa Pescia, who looks nothing like Stone (Basic Instinct predated this movie by two years). By the way, this movie is not listed on Shari Shattuck’s website. I wonder why…
There are some great moments in this movie, mostly revolving around Claire’s late night cable sex advice show which features women basically rubbing themselves and asking about painful sex. And I enjoyed the clever casting. I instantly laughed to myself when I realized that Andrew Stevens’ character was married to Morgan Fairchild. Older lovers of the erotic thriller will remember how he
stalked her to distraction in The Seduction (1982). Also look for Andrew’s mom Stella Stevens as Forster’s pretty wife. God, was she ever not fabulous? The actor who plays Freddie is kind of the erotic thriller’s answer to Dan Hedaya. This guy is in a lot of these thrillers and always plays the side character or fall guy. And he was on the Golden Girls (as two different characters on three episodes no less!), which isn’t particularly erotic, but totally awesome! But Body Chemistry III is mostly just a pastiche of so-bad-they’re-good bits featuring amateurish acting, clumsy sex scenes (Morgan’s scene is a hoot!) and crazy plot devices. I ended up enjoying this movie for all the wrong reasons and if bad sexy thrillers are your bag, then you will too.
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