When the contents of a tape fail to live up to a boxcover's lively and arousing premise, you start looking for culprits to pin the blame on.

In the case of Babes Illustrated (a presumed take-off on the making of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition) the usual list of suspects range from audio control to the imponderable • decision to leave all the sex scenes indoors — delicate, polite and brief as they are.

Lynn LeMay and Dyanna Lauren are lensing an outdoor bikini layout as a part of their magazine's annual bikini contest. It's a contest fraught with politics and favoritism with LeMay and Lauren seemingly playing their own version of two ends against the middle.

Did someone say bikinis? Wouldn't that kind of pave the way for a passel of pulsating T&A and lots of luscious outdoor sex scenes by a pool? Naturally, a concept like that would be too simple and way too obvious in a feature where sunbathing and gratuitous nudity get treated like a federal offense.

VixXxen straps it on to give Felecia some doggie action on a bed. LeMay and Tiffany Mynx contribute the best scene in the feature as they interlock to form a kind of human rocking chair in their mutual pussy pleasure (a possible All-Girl Sex Scene nominee, by the way).

However, the Dyanna Lauren/Kim Chambers; and the Kim Chambers/Lesilie Lixx scenes need an IV-injection of Drano to get the blood circulating, and the finale with LeMay and Lauren (some foot play makes it interesting) suggests that both girls are getting their learner's permits in lesbianism.

LeMay and Lauren in bikinis give the boxcover a fetching, mainstream look, but the bulk of the action certainly finds itself swimming against the tide.