I’m going to do something that some may deem unfair, but I hope it will ultimately prove a point about shot-on-video features. I watched Sex Star Competition back-to-back with another L.A. Video feature, Rock Hard.  Sex Star Competition represents what is wrong with direct-to-video features; Rock Hard represents a lot of what is right.

For example, Sex Star Competition suffers from shoddy lighting, with very bad shadows during the outdoor scene at the beginning and a dim view of most of the sex scenes.  Rock Hard is crisp and clear, with excellent lighting and video quality.  With the exception of a hot scene with Peter North and blonde nymph Bunny Bleu (who’s the only reason to even look at this tape), the sex in Sex Star Competition suffers miserably, with a typical orgy scene, a segment shot in a plain bed against a plain white wall and two scenes with Dick (16”) Rambone that exploits the man’s oversized thing in a cruel way. I mean, it’s reverse sexism here, with Rambone being referred to as an “it” rather than a person.

In addition, the minimal story, something (and I mean, who knows what?) to do with the casting of a film (they throw around phrases like “model release”), is ever so slightly developed by phone calls.  How cheap can a producer be?  But the dialogue is very poor and the title has nothing to do with what we see on screen (I guess the word “Competition” spells success; who knows?)

I have no doubt that video consumers and store owners would choose something like Sex Star Competition over Rock Hard (or vice versa) because of a nice box cover.  But it takes a careful buyer to realize the difference between something like Sex Star Competition and its unattractive female cast (except for Bunny Bleu) and a quality, higher-budgeted story like Rock Hard.  Will somebody please start putting the production budget on the packaging?