Bound & Gagged: A Love Story [DVD] [1993]

In this strange but ambitious gender-bending road movie, Elizabeth (Elizabeth Saltarrelli) and Leslie (Ginger Lynn Allen) are bisexual lovers who also have other relationships. To Leslie's chagrin, Elizabeth can't keep herself from running off with a good-looking guy every once in a while, but Leslie is the one with real problems. Her husband Steve (Chris Mulkey) is a brutal thug who beats her, treats her like dirt, and whose idea of sex would better suit most people's idea of rape. Leslie claims that she loves Steve and is too dependent on him to leave him. When Steve discovers that Leslie is involved with Elizabeth, he forces her to break off her affair, but Elizabeth decides that Leslie needs to get away from Steve, not her. Enlisting the help of her friend Cliff (Chris Denton), who has been on the verge of suicide since he discovered his wife is cheating on him, Elizabeth kidnaps Leslie and takes her to a combination dude ranch, deprogramming center, and rehab facility run by Carla (Karen Black), where they hope to wean Leslie away from Steve and get her on a healthier path with Elizabeth. This film was Ginger Lynn Allen's bid for mainstream respectability after a stint in adult films and a long string of exploitation movies.~Mark Deming