DVD reviews!

The Suicide Girls are sort of an alternative erotica troupe, offering their own modern twist on the age old pastime of looking at pretty naked girls. They started out as a website, got a feature on HBO’s ‘Real Sex’ series, put together a stage show, and have now documented their first tour on this DVD. If you like classic fifties cheesecake and burlesque and also appreciate punk/goth girls, you’ll be in heaven watching this DVD.

There’s nothing crass or exploitative about what the Suicide Girls do. Only the most uptight prude or a feminist from the Andrea Dworkin branch would get upset over this. Basically, the disc is divided into chapters on individual girls, offering interviews, segments from their portion of the stage show, and a taped photo shoot for each. There’s also fun on the road segments in between. Everything is filmed well and the girls all appear to be having a good time, so what’s not to like?

About my only complaint is how what the Suicide Girls do is presented as being somehow different from traditional cheesecake stuff. Yeah, the girls are pierced and tattooed and some of them have funny hair colors, but otherwise this is pretty typical striptease erotica with a fetishistic bent. The girls are all in perfect physical shape, and for the most part white. I don’t want to sound like “Mr. Politically Correct”, but seeing as the Suicide Girls bill themselves as an alternative to mainstream erotica (and considering the wide variety of girls on the website), a little more diversity in this vid would have been nice. There is a black girl on tour who’s seen in some of the “on the road” footage, but she doesn’t get featured, so I can’t really count that.

My minor whining aside, this is a fun video for classy erotica enthusiasts. At an hour and 45 minutes, it’s perhaps a bit long, but I don’t know if I’d really call that a complaint. In addition to the feature film, the DVD also includes outtakes, behind the scenes footage, and a Probot video for the song “Shake Your Blood”. If this is your cup of tea, it’s well worth the money. (Bob Ignizio)