Joe Sarno gets behind the camera to direct again after a two-decade absence with this feature produced by Seduction Cinema. While it’s a low budget affair and it’s shot on video rather than on film, Sarno proves that he’s lost none of his penchant for clever dialogue, interesting characters, and steamy sex scenes. 

The film follows Laura (Isdora Edison), an attractive woman who makes her living in New York City as an ‘art model.’ When she learns that her Aunt Cynthia (Tina Tyler) is having a torrid love affair with one of her ex-boyfriends, Nelson, she figures now would be a good time to take some time off from in front of the camera to head back to her hometown to see just what exactly is going on and why. 

When Laura returns home she finds that the small town she left behind has become ripe with steamy happenings. In fact, Laura’s sister, Winifred (Chelsea Mundae), employs a woman named Louise (A. J. Khan) as her secretary who knows just exactly what everyone is up to and who everyone is in bed with. Louise decides that there’s enough steamy material here that she can cash in on it if she plays her cards right, and so she decides to write a tell all book. Laura’s unexpected arrival cause things to get even more complicated as she gets reacquainted with old friends and acquainted with some brand new ones for the first time. Complicating things further are the schemes of Nelson’s sister, Judith, who will stop at nothing to break up her brother’s romance. 

Playing out very much like an explicit soap opera, Sarno’s ode to randy suburbanites is fairly engrossing stuff. The plot plays out nicely and if it’s a little overlong in spots, keep in mind that much of the running time is actually made up of some skillfully shot and genuinely erotic scenes of folks gettin’ it on. The film doesn’t move quickly but the tension does build fairly effectively and Sarno shows that no one can stage a softcore scene with quite as much class or intensity as he. 

In terms of the performances, however, the film is wildly uneven. While Isadora Edison proves perfectly capable of carrying the film, Chelsea Mundae is completely uninspired in her performance and delivers her lines with all the enthusiasm of a lump of coal. A.J. Khan falls somewhere in the middle, she smolders during the appropriate moments and doesn’t do a bad job with her part, really she’s memorable more for what she does when not actually acting – wink, wink. Tina Tyler’s not half bad, and she shows she has some genuine talent as well as good looks. 

In the end, Suburban Secrets isn’t Sarno’s best work but it’s certainly a very good film for those who appreciate his unique brand of sexy melodrama. The script is intelligent and interesting, and the plentiful scenes of copulation are well shot and kinky enough to have impact. The film has style to spare despite the low budget production values evident in a few scenes and for the most part, things work really well here. Hopefully Sarno’s got a few more in him yet…