8MM 2 (2005)

The story is nice, but the main couple (Johnathon Schaech and Lori Heuring) is so irritating! Indeed, the beginning of the movie (before Zita Görög in the pool) is one of the worst I have ever seen in a film, with bad acting and poor dialogues. It gets better, as the thriller has an entertaining story, until the end, but all the long dialog scenes do annoy throughout the movie (differently for the more action-oriented ones). Other actors do a good job, particularly those whose characters are involved in sex industry, such as the pornographic photographer and the brothel mobster owner. As a matter of fact, all the red-light underworld scenes are very nice. Some of the most famous hardcore stars from Hungary have (nude) cameos or minor roles.

I have to admit that I'm a huge fan of the original "8 MM". I didn't expect this sequel to be equally good or even half as decent as the original, but I decided to give it a chance because I read it's plot here in IMDb.The truth is that I ended up liking it big time mainly because it deals with topics that are very interesting for me: politics, sex, promiscuity, threesomes, Europe, guns, and mobs.Everything gets screwed up for a couple that travels to Europe and after having a steamy visit to a night club and participate in a threesome with a super hot European beauty; they're taped during their threesome and later getting blackmailed by unknown criminals. This leads to a very interesting and bloody investigation.Some situations include murders, visiting dark places that include prostitution, drugs, and more.The political point of view is pretty interesting mainly because it deals with labor aspirations, laws, and we can see how corruption works at all levels.Lori Heuring is extremely sexy and I enjoyed her sex scene. I mean, I enjoyed every single moment she was on screen. ;) The direction is just regular and the cinematography does it's work pretty well. I mean, I always cheer up for the combination of darkness used in colorful settings.After the ending I thought to myself: "Man, this was a solid entertaining, dark and violent flick, I enjoyed it".Give it a chance but don't think about the dark masterpiece from 1999.

B-movie darling Johnathan Schaech stars in 8MM 2, which has absolutely nothing to do with the nasty Nic Cage horror film. Someone simply bought the rights to the title. Schaech and his fiancée (Lori Huering) are secretly filmed having sex with a prostitute in a Budapest hotel room, and subsequently blackmailed. They try to uncover the blackmailer before images from the film are put on the Internet for all to see. The problem is that Schaech's fiancée is the daughter of a very important and wealthy man (Bruce Davison, in what amounts to little more than a cameo). Obviously shot on the cheap in Hungary, the film goes nowhere. The sex scene featuring the threesome, which might have made the movie worthwhile, is not particularly titillating. I can see better on an episode of NIP/TUCK. And the ending has a twist any astute viewer will have figured out 10 minutes into the movie.

First off, the first thing that came to my mind after I finished this film last night was "Why the title of 8MM 2?", because I saw the first one obviously, and what did this have to do with the first movie's plot? The only thing that was similar was the fact that the couple had to go into the porno industry and that wasn't even needed in the plot, because after you see the ending that I will not spoil, it just didn't make any sense.A diplomat and his fiancée are in Hungary and notice a woman who is swimming naked in the pool area, she's very attractive, so when they see her at a club, they decide to have a little fun and have a steamy threesome. But things get extremely intense when the diplomat is mailed pictures of them all having the affair, fearing that it might go public and jeopardize his career, they pay off the guy who sent the pictures, the diplomat freaks out and "kills" the guy, leading into a murder case. He and his fiacee decide to find the girl they had the affair with, but things just get deeper and darker as they go further into what they got themselves into.What could have been an alright thriller, turned into an unexplained and not well thought out movie, which was sad. Like I said, the title really has nothing to do with the first one, so don't fall for it. It's just a sexual thriller that makes no sense, but it's good for those nights alone, because quite frankly this is one of those films where it's so close to porn that it might as well be labeled as soft core.4/10