Stylish but barely mediocre overall

Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

I am only giving this movie a 1 for the great cast, though I can't imagine what any of them were thinking. This movie was horrible

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

If my memory is correct, when this movie was released it came across as something of a comedy - a funny look at the adult entertainment industry. If that's what it's supposed to be, it doesn't really work. It just isn't that funny. Setting that rather significant (since this is called a comedy!) failure aside, since I have no personal knowledge of the subject matter, I'll avoid comment about the authenticity of the story - which deals with the goings on behind the scenes in a Toronto massage parlour, except to say that - if this is true - the life is pretty dull. For over an hour, this movie really doesn't give us much of anything except some background knowledge of the main characters. Conrad is the newly hired manager of the massage parlour whose basic job apparently is to make sure the girls aren't giving "full service" - a euphemism for actual sex. As for the girls themselves, Betty's goal is to buy a parlour of her own so that she can run her own business, Cindy is an illegal immigrant to Canada working to support her family back home and Leah is - well, Leah is a somewhat strange, undefined character with a nipple fetish - true - who seems to be in the business because - well, because she's in it! I have no idea what her character was about. Those three may well be fairly reasonable composite characters who accurately represent the motivations of the women who get involved in this business.The movie meanders about and doesn't offer much until the "twist" reveals Conrad to be the bad guy. We should have gotten to that point sooner. The only thing truly interesting here was that part of the story - Conrad's secret plan and the revenge plotted against him by the girls. That plan for revenge was pretty good, and you're grateful when it comes out because basically up to that point you're wondering why you wasted your time with this. Had the story been more focused on the revenge, this might have actually been a fairly funny movie.The performances from the 4 leads were all OK, although I didn't think anyone came across as outstanding. All four characters were a bit shallow. Cindy was a sympathetic character, and so was Conrad for a while, although he turns out to be the bad guy of the movie. Given the subject matter, there's surprisingly little nudity (and what there is is restricted to one scene.) In fact, there's even a certain air of innocence around a lot of this. As for the overall quality of the movie, it's a low-budget effort, which shows, although you expect a certain griminess, I suppose, of a movie set in the context of a body rub parlour, so that's forgivable. It certainly says something, though, that this was released 8 years ago now and is still the only credit on writer-director Soo Lyu's resume and - given the normal lack of depth in the Canadian film industry - that it wasn't even deemed worthy of being nominated for any Genie Awards - the Canadian version of the Oscars. 4/10 - and I'm being a bit generous with that.

RUB & TUG writer\director Soo Lyu was not against nudity in her flick per se--witness Susanne Sutchy's boobishness in her bit part as the "new girl" April. However, though the three leads are constantly talking about taking off their tops, whenever they actually do the viewer is left with a bareback tease; that's it. In Soo Lyu's showing-it-like-it-is spirit, here's some suggestions for other projects dying to be made: 1)ALMOST SAVING PRIVATE RYAN--A crack rescue team storms Normandy Beach on D-Day to save the lone surviving son from a quartet of brothers. But when they notice there's no blood anywhere, they decide to throw back a few brews with Papa Hemingway in Paris instead. 2)THE BAAING OF THE LAMBS--A farm girl joins the FBI after watching every episode of X-FILES seven times. But the crime rate has fallen so low under the new administration that the highlight of her first five years is a case of sheep rustling. She quits the bureau to research gene modification, in a quest to equip ewes with better self-defense mechanisms. 3)BREATH OF A SALESMAN--The economy is in the pits, millions are out of a job, and even working girls cannot afford pricey lingerie. Brassiere salesman Hoot Erst hasn't made his sales goal in five years, and suddenly realizes his family's last asset is his life insurance policy. But while he's in the hardware store buying a hose to run his exhaust into his car, scrappers steal his catalytic converter. He ends up back at square one. If these projects strike you as safe but boring, you're ready to enroll in the Soo Lyu School of Film-making.

Spoilers herein.Folded film: the performance of the movie and the performance of the girls in the movie. A simple fold, typical of a film school project. It ends with another fold, an additional performance.Another project that has an intelligent idea behind it, but without the skills to make it happen. Nice try. But should have switched it around so that Lindy was the redhead.Ted's Evaluation -- 1 of 3: You can find something better to do with this part of your life.

Rub & Tug is promoting itself as a real account of life in the seedy body rub parlors of Toronto. Director and co-screenwriter Soo Lyu spent a year researching the project, but there is none of the grit you would expect from a movie that explores the underbelly of the sex trade. Instead Rub & Tug is a starkly clean, sanitized look at three women who work in that hazy area between masseuse and prostitute - a sexual sitcom. There have been steamier episodes of Three's Company. Don McKellar as the conniving parlor manager acquits himself with his usual bumbling charm, although isn't given enough to do. The same goes for parlor employees Lindy Booth, Tara Spencer-Nairn and Kira Clavell, who fumble through the predictable material. Lyu imbues the script with the concept that sex workers aren't victims, and we shouldn't pity them. The trouble is we don't really care about these characters, so the whole thing falls flat.