Poison Ivy 2: Lily (1996)

hyped garbage

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

They ripped off the title from an earlier successful trashy movie, "Poison Ivy" with the all-grown-up Drew Barrymore as one of those seductive babysitters, and they ripped off the story from an earlier successful trashy movie, "Embrace of the Vampire" with the exuberantly nubile Alyssa Milano herself.That will give you an idea of how much creative effort went into the making of this film, which is to say, none that you'd notice.Here's the shamelessly permuted plot. Alyssa Milano, nice virginal girl, goes to a Bohemian art school, has an affair with an equally Bohemian guy, starts reading somebody else's diary, takes on some of the traits of the diarist, develops a crush on the sensitive but happily married guru in her painting class, begins to dress Goth, cuts her hair to a wicked length, begins to smoke (gasp!), treats her loving boyfriend recklessly, shuns her art teacher when he finally begins to put moves on her after she's practically thrown herself on him, bosom first, drives art instructor mad, destroys instructor's family, is discovered in flagrante delicto by the wife, throws her black girl friend out of her room, .... zzzzzzzz.The only conceivable reason to see this piece of atrocious offal is to see Alyssa Milano take off her clothes and/or simulate intercourse, which she doesn't do nearly often enough in my opinion as expert on art schools, the perils of wearing black garments, erotic cinema, and the contours of Milano's bosom.This is pretty crummy stuff we're dealing with here. Milano looks fine. How could she look otherwise? But her acting skills are modest, to put it kindly. Nice performance by her insane art instructor, though. Another plus for the androgyne who plays a soothing cello so that our ears are given a respite from the relentless WHANG of the score.I mean, look at this. After a wild party, her alarm wakes her for an early class with her mad art teacher. She rolls out of the bed she's occupying with her boy friend. While she's performing her morning ablutions off screen, her lover begins to complain that she's changing. She's becoming weird. "You're not yourself anymore. I don't know who I'm talking to. I don't know who I'm making love to." Should he really CARE? Whoever he's making love to, the face and body resemble that of Allysa Milano. And let's face facts == no man would ever organize that sort of statement, nor would any man even know what the words mean. "I don't know who I'm talking to"? A WOMAN would say it, but a man? And then, to top it all off, while they're having this faux conversation, she's slinking around the room apparently wearing his jockey shorts, the kind with the fly and double fabric in front so you can't see through them. Has such perfidy ever been shown on screen? Don't miss this if you can.

Bad, bad idea for a follow-up to the original. Like "Highlander 2," this one is best forgotten.The only link to the original is the name, and a reference to a former college student named Ivy...at an art college, of all places.Alyssa Milano tried to pull off the good girl to bad girl to good girl transition, but it just wasn't that convincing. And to try and boost her career by having multiple sex scenes was a sorry way to do it. Really, who thinks of this film when they hear her name? I gave it an extra star just because I liked her as a child star on "Who's the Boss?" Unlike the original, there's not a lot of suspense via cinematography. Instead, they opted for multiple nude / sex scenes. Honestly, if that's what you want in a film, you're better off renting a porno...the acting will be better.If it wasn't for the fact that I like to keep things in sets, I'd give this DVD away. If all you want is to see Alyssa Milano naked, then you'll enjoy this film. Otherwise...

Having very little to do with the original Drew Barrymore starring vehicle, this sequel that ups the titillation and seaminess factor, has Alyssa Milano as Lily, an art major who recently went off to college in California. Like many 'innocent', 'wholesome' girls that go off to college in that state, it isn't long before she becomes a man hungry raving slut. Her transformation starts when she finds the diary of the deceased man hungry slut who lived in her dorm room before her. She lusts for this one guy in particular while her elderly art instructor lusts after her. The first film in the series was mediocre at best, so to say that this one gave me some trepidation over whether I should even watch it is a pretty accurate statement. But when I saw that it reunited Milano with Director Anne Goursaud, whom she last teamed up with for a little B-movie soft-core gem "Embrace of the Vampire', I decided to give the film a try. Well sadly lightning rarely ever strikes twice and the poor acting, lack of involving story, and most importantly not as much nude Alyssa as compared to the earlier Embrace, all turned me off and I found myself bored to tears long before the movies predictable final reel.Eye Candy: Tara Ellison, Victoria Hass & Kate Rodger get topless; Alyssa Milano shows off T&A My Grade: D- Where I saw it: @ Max

Lily is an art student who has moved away from home to start at a new collage, but also she's having trouble trying to fit in with her other pupils and flat mates. That's until she discovers a box in her closest that has some items that belong to a girl named Ivy. From what she gathered from these items that ranged from sexy clothing, her artwork and to diary, she was one fearless and raunchy girl who liked to play games and tease to get what she wants. So, now Lily strings along her guy who she's seeing and that of her married art teacher who slowly has became infatuated with her.Alyssa Milano… there's no shadow of a doubt that she's best reason for watching this extremely tacky picture; really that's it. When Milano makes her first appearance she looks reasonably daggy, but she sure does look fine either way. The first film, which starred Drew Barrymore and Tom Skeritt I thought, was somewhat dull and rather ordinary. Again this one is no better, but since I'm a sucker for anything that involves Milano, it had me clicked in! This treads the same path of the first flick by presenting a adult thriller that oozes with steamy erotica, so if you like your trashy melodrama, bare flesh and soft core sex, well then this should tickle your fancy. One thing that I thought that the original had over this pointless sequel other then an actual story, was that it had such a heavily grim edge to it. But nuff said about the first film, in-retrospect this one is far more sexy and more steamier than the first. Although the one redeeming factor of the film, of course Milano, can't help that it seems to loose steam soon after it eventually begins. It's hard to put in words, but not much did happen, really. No plot behind the convoluted mess, but to rehash what we've seen before with moments that try to outdo each other, pointless flashbacks of Ivy (not from the first film) and some sequences that miss the point. Even when Milano's character starts acting out the desirable ways of Ivy from her diary it's slightly hypnotic, but that's more to her tempting presence and desirable actions than that of the material. The film's unpleasant ending is one of the things that go beyond the call of nature, but then at least it had some energy going for it, but still it was a bit overwrought. The pacing is at a snails pace and because of that boredom quickly moves in.Since its set amongst an art environment, the whole artiness of it got a bit too shallow for its own sake and it could have destroyed the overall mood, that's if it even had one. But this is what you expect from your run-of-the-mill low budget film that would go straight-to-video without a whimper. Alyssa Milano silky presence evokes such an allurement, but she doesn't just get by with her looks as her performance is definitely above average and Xander Berkeley dished out a more then decent performance. It's just too bad they had to work with such undeveloped characters and a stiff script that was filled with something corny amongst every few lines. Sometimes I thought it was too thick and they had too much to say when it probably would have worked out better with less or none at times. The soundtrack had some sustainable tunes from the easy listening, rock and Gothic… but sometimes it was just too overwhelming in a very cheesy way. I most likely saw the cut version, which I watched off TV, but that's not what really bother me, it was that there were too many ad breaks which made the film drag even more. It's a real long shot to call this schematic flick good, but for the undemanding its light entertainment.Only for those who enjoyed the original or have a soft spot for Alyssa Milano. Obviously, I'll be going with latter.