User Reviews

Mary Ann Mobley is exquisite as a writer who comes to realize the violent nature of the her stories. By placing herself inside one of her stories as the heroine, she learns first-hand of the negative message she is conveying, and that it is neither entertaining nor spiritually uplifting. With Mr. Roarke as her mentor, the writer, Florence, undergoes a spiritual awakening which renews her creative drive and redirects her writing. Pandering to the audience, Florence had lost her way artistically and needed something to help her break out of the creative rut that was ruining her writing. By experiencing one of her own stories, she experienced the seediness of the characters she was creating while at the same time creating the opportunity for forming fulfilling emotional attachments. Ricardo Mantalban is excellent as the host who sets up the fantasy and gives Florence the opportunity to further grow and develop as an artist and as a person.

I'll admit that both stories boasted originality and solid plots, but the conclusions were lacking and too predictable, especially the lame final fight scene, which I'll get to in a bit. Many familiar faces include Mary Ann Mobley, who gives a good performance, Robert Loggia, Mako, James MacArthur, Shelley Fabares, and a plumper version of Cesare Danova. As usual, I won't get into much detail about either story, but mention some tidbits that stood out in a good or bad fashion. The "Heroine" segment started out on a high note, as a timid writer named Florence(Mobley)wishes to become one of the women in her popular romance novels; she ends up meeting a supposedly wealthy man named Brent(Danova), who drops too many one-liners on her, but she still falls for him. Loggia's character(Porter)was pretty evil, and there's a scene where he forcibly holds Florence on the bed ready to have his way with her against her will; soon after, he inexplicably faints or passes out on the bed in order for her to escape. I felt this action on his part was totally unrealistic, because only seconds before, he was very energetic. In any event, this is the better story. The other segment has Bob(MacArthur)wanting to fight a famous martial artist named Kwong, played solidly by Mako. Mr Rourke warns him that Kwong doesn't just fight other martial artists, but actually executes them. So know I'm thinking that we're in for a great fight...wrong! I knew Bob wasn't going to get killed, obviously, but you'd think the fight could've been a tad more realistic. I won't give any other details, but the ending here was disappointing, after what I considered a very original plot and fantasy.