Wild Orchid Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		1.5
Video		3.5
Audio		3.5
Extras		0.0
Overall		1.5

Wild Orchid Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman March 5, 2015

Zalman King may be a name that is familiar only to those who scour the nooks and crannies of various credits in films (and television), but it’s notable that his New York Times obituary summed up this actor, director, producer and writer by stating “Zalman King, Creator of Soft- Porn Films, Dies at 70.” Despite having an at least moderately promising acting career in the 1960s and 1970s, including starring in the short- lived Aaron Spelling drama The Young Lawyers, King found his greatest success, as well as his greatest infamy, in bringing sexually charged films like 9½ Weeks to the screen. Wild Orchid served as King’s follow up to the Kim Basinger-Mickey Rourke film, and in fact Rourke is back again in Wild Orchid, this time as the supposedly horribly traumatized James, a guy who was abandoned as a kid and can’t stand to be touched.

Wild Orchid’s florid plot revolves around the acquisition and hopeful sale of a hotel, as completely odd as that may sound. Eager young Emily Reed (Carre Otis) is hired by high powered Claudia Dennis (Jacqueline Bisset) to aid in the real estate deal, and is whisked away to exotic Rio de Janeiro seemingly within seconds of her job interview. When Claudia can’t stick around (in one of many too convenient plot points), Emily is left to deal with James, a man with whom Claudia evidently has both a personal and professional history. In what often plays like a low rent version of Eyes Wide Shut or even (heaven forfend) Fifty Shades of Grey, James encourages Emily to loosen her inhibitions and begin experimenting, even if he’s averse to having physical contact. There’s a lot of lip service paid throughout the film to various psychological issues (James’ abandonment, Emily’s repressions), but it’s obvious King basically wants to create a context for supposedly scorchingly hot sex scenes. Unfortunately, the intimacy in this film wilts rather than sizzles.

Wild Orchid Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Wild Orchid is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Olive Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.85:1. From a damage persective, the elements utilized for this transfer are in surprisingly good shape, with only very minor damage and speckling showing up. King and his DP Gale Tattersall favor diffuse lighting conditions, giving the overall look of this film a rather soft ambience. That said, close-ups can reveal very good to excellent levels of detail. Grain is natural looking but tends to swarm a bit in some of the mistier sequences (see screenshot 4). Colors generally look natural, but are not overly saturated.

Wild Orchid Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Wild Orchid features a lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mix that has some occasional balance issues, but which presents the film's source cue saturated score and dialogue cleanly, if not always supremely well prioritized. Fidelity is very good and there is no damage of any kind to report.

Wild Orchid Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

There are no supplements on this Blu-ray disc.

Wild Orchid Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Wild Orchid is frankly a piece of unmitigated dreck. Even that might have been forgivable, at least relatively speaking, had the film offered any spark in its supposedly "hot" sex scenes. Instead we're forced to endure some spectacularly unsexy coupling (despite rumors at the time that Otis and Rourke weren't "faking it") in what is already a turgid, overheated piece of fluff with pretensions at offering some sort of psychobabble subtext for its wounded characters.