BY JERRY ROBERTS

October 6, 2002

I always say that there is nothing like a good sex comedy . . . and, believe me, Exit to Eden is nothing like a good sex comedy.

As a movie fan, it is hard to live through a time when the the current rash of movies is met with a collective sigh followed by "You know, they just don't make movies like they use to". Its easy to imagine in years to come, a movie like Exit to Eden will be a fiasco best-forgotten but it is refreshing to think that when the subject comes up it will most likely be met with "Exit to What"?

This may have been the exact words of Anne Rice who forked over the rights to her 1985 novel apparently not wanting to make public that she would rather have not had anything to do with it in the first place. Rice, you see, raised a storm over the casting of Tom Cruise in the lead of Interview With the Vampire (and later relented) but said nothing about this movie. Distancing herself from it was a wise move. That's hard to say for everyone else especially the man who chose to direct this train wreck, Garry Marshall.

Operating on the theory that one good movie clones another, the director who gave us a gem like Pretty Woman attempted to do for sadomasochism what his previous hit did for prostitution. The problem, Garry, is that prostitution is an unfortunate, everyday occurrence and Pretty Woman worked because of a good script and dynamic actors. S&M (for most of us) is an oddity, a vice best left to those who know something about it: psychologists, analysts, psychiatrists and British comedy writers.

Exit to Eden is a movie with it's intentions in reverse. It is an S&M fantasy welded to a nutty comedy. The problem is that the S&M fantasies are funny (unintentionally) and the comedy is pain-inducing.

The movie takes place on Eden, a resort island that caters to the rich and feeds the vice of those wishing to spend their vacation tied up and beaten with whips. The place is presided over by the head dominatrix Mistress Lisa, played (as unbelievable as this sounds) by Dana Delany. Yes, sweet and lovable Dana Delany best known as Lieutenant Colleen McMurphy on "China Beach" and probably the last person in the world who should be seen in this role (although the case could be made for Ruth Buzzi). Delany is so sweet even when forced to belt out lines like "After a hard day of smacking people, it's nice to cuddle".

Dear Mistress Lisa makes the mistake of falling in love with one of her subjects (Paul Mercurio) which, apparently, is expressed by tying him to the wall and beating him with a hairbrush. It also includes forcing him to stand on all fours while she disrobes and sits sidesaddle on his back. I'm not sure what this is suppose to prove but I'd like to introduce her to my Lay-Z-Boy salesman.

Those scenes are a mere pittance to the food fetish in which he puts butter and cinnamon on the her breasts, licks it off then bites into a croissant (Dude, the breast or the croissant - make up your mind). If the participants were smiling it would be one thing (actually it would be a French film), but the scene is played with soft romantic music and is suppose to win our hearts. Actually, it makes me shudder when I see the Pillsbury Doughboy.

Too timid to keep that pace up for an entire movie (and to kowtow to the MPAA), Garry Marshall tacks on a klutzy cops and robbers plot involving two crooks who have come to the island looking for a picture that Mercurio has taken of them. In hot pursuit are the film's headliners - Rosie O'Donnell and Dan Ackroyd. You know their work and you are realistic to the fact that these are not exactly the most attractive stars in the world. Therefore it pains the eyes when they have to go undercover in leather bondage gear - the less said about this the better.

Fair to say that Exit to Eden stinks, but of what? If I had to wager a guess, I would say that it stinks of aging executives who were resilient to the idea of a movie about S&Ms until it fit their market research and were perhaps were too nervous about losing their beloved sponsors. Should there be a movie about S&M fantasies? Well . . . I wouldn't go see it but I would like to see a movie the comes up with an idea and sticks with it, without the fear that "the widest possible audience" won't collectively demand their money back. I'm not saying that I embrace schadenfreude but in this case I was glad to see them pay for their sins. After all, these guys funded millions of dollars so that Rosie O'Donnell could belch such coarse lines as "Hey! No panting after 2am." Now that's punishment.