Cold Sweat (1992) from Johnny Web

Cold Sweat centers around Dave Thomas. No, not the hamburger guy, but the former head writer for SCTV. Now this could be promising in a comedy. Dave is a funny guy and a gifted mimic. But this is a humorless soft core erotic thriller. Go figure. Dave is no studmuffin. Thankfully, Dave doesn't do any sex scenes, but he does take a shower, and it's not a pretty sight.

Actually, they had a promising idea. They filmed a movie that they thought to be strong enough to stand on its own without sex scenes. They sold that to basic cable. Then they reshot some sections to add hot sex scenes and baths, and peddled the harder version. The net result should have been a really top quality erotic thriller.

Thomas plays a sleazebag businessman whose wife has two lovers. One is his partner, the other is his dope dealer. Things really get complicated when he uses the dope dealer as an intermediary to hire a contract killer to ice the partner. (For business reasons, of course. He doesn't really pay attention to his wife's sex life. No time for that.)

The best thing about the movie is the hit man. Played by Ben Cross, he's the only likeable character in the film. He maintains a sweet suburban family, and nobody suspects daddy is a contract killer. But daddy has a conscience, and he had to kill an innocent bystander on his last hit. The woman he killed haunts him throughout the movie, like a palpable ghost with whom he has conversations.

You probably think all of that doesn't sound too bad, and might have some promise, and that it's especially intriguing that they went to such elaborate depth for an erotic thriller.

Yes, you're right in that it had some promise, but it was never realized. The whole thing is basically amateur hour except for Ben Cross. Shame, because you get the feeling if they filled out the script a bit and hired a real cast and director, this might have been a terrific bit of sexy fun, ala Basic Instinct. But they didn't, and it isn't.

TRIVIA: Back in 1992 or 1993, the video was released with a promotional gimmick. If you watched it and answered some questions correctly, you were eligible to win a "night on the town" with Shannon Tweed! Shannon explains it all (tastefully, darn it) before the feature begins.

The nudity came from Maria Del Mar (brief topless), Shannon Tweed (full), and Lenore Zann (breasts).

IMDB summary: 3.2 out of 10. I don't think it's that bad. That's down there with "Glen or Glenda". The Ben Cross character was actually pretty good, and Ben did a pretty good job with it. The rating should probably be about 4.5 or something like that.

VHS info from Amazon. Not available on DVD, and my copy of the VHS is terrible quality. But it doesn't matter, because you don't want to see it.