Taxi Dancer starts out on a daring, fever-pitch note. The very first image, even before the opening credits, is of two chesty beauties (Angelica Sinn and Tia Bella) already in steamy mid-grope in the starkly lit bowels of a seedy nightclub as some guy (Rich Handsome) looks on lasciviously, playing with himself. After a little mutual pussy probing, Bella is summoned elsewhere, leaving Sinn and Handsome to finish out a loud, sweaty, volcanic, hardware-enhanced fuck/sodomization that deserves a pre-nom for Best Couples Sex Scene.

Unfortunately, only one of the remaining five sex sequences -- a wicked, almost full-boil anal encounter between Herschel Savage, Liza Harper and Alexandra Silk -- can even come close to approximating that kind of heat. A few of them -- most notably a Savage/Carrera coupling -- suffer from what feels like Paul Thomas' overly-heavy directorial hand emphasizing style over spontaneity. And the remaining two are just plain pedestrian.

As with virtually every Thomas film, the script is intelligent and sophisticated, though it tends to overstay its welcome in the production's final act. Even so, the screenplay too should be at least considered for a pre-nom. It's a whodunit, told largely in flashback, concerning the murder of the title character, played by Carrera. Anchoring the story is an understated, nominatable lead performance by Mickey G. as the slightly sad, loner police detective trying to solve the slaying (though we could have done without that silly, ill-fitting thrift-rack raincoat he's made to wear throughout.)

One final pre-nom should go to cinematographer J.D. for his luscious camera work, which frequently features -- especially in the dance hall scenes -- a dazzling panoply of phosphorescent greens and purples.