- Beef Stroganoff, TLA -
" Director Kazan does both his mentor and his country proud by delivering another must-see four-star stunner.
None of us here at our corporate office can quite fathom where on earth Lucas Kazan finds such stunningly beautiful Adonises, let alone how he gets them to strip and fuck and ignite such smoldering bonfires for him on camera. Needless to say, keep plenty of replenishing fluids handy.
Inspired by Giovanni Verga's play and scored with the meatier parts of Pietro Mascagni's opera, Signor Kazan's sex odyssey A Sicilian Tale is an exquisitely produced wet dream.
Filmed in Sicily and boasting nine of the most impossibly gorgeous and spectacularly hung studs ever to throw a mighty bone, this flick is bulging at the seams with perfectly sculpted and silky smooth man flesh, swinging with generously plump and tantalizingly uncut bones, and gushing with enough thick wads of ejaculated man lava to flow like a creamy river.
I can spend the rest of this review drooling over luscious dreamboat Sasha Byazrov, who gets it on sensuously with lucky hunk Lucas Foz in a colorfully decorated circus tent environment. Both pleasure each other with a versatile suck-and-fuck on and off a convenient stepladder, and both deliver their share of creamy hands-free eruptions.
And then there's this tall hunk of hotness Vilem Gage, who's every bit as lusciously dreamy as Sasha. After a brief three-man urinary spritz (into a trough, not onto each other), Vilem presides over a hearty outdoor three-way with his jealous lover and a muscular trick.
The threesome is intercut with a fierce foursome that takes place under the big top, with a fifth guy hiding in the shadows, espying much cocksucking, rim chewing, hole punching and goo spewing. In Sicilian, of course. Mangia!
All of this so far is lush, four-star stuff, sumptuously photographed and smoothly edited.
Would that a scene could be rated a five-star inferno, the climactic pairing of Luscious Dreamboat #1 Sasha Byazrov with Luscious Dreamboat #2 Vilem Gage would definitely be it. Determined cock swallowing gives way to a passionate round of cram-Vilem's-sausage-into-moaning-Sasha's-clench-box, both of 'em bathed in a pool of cool indigo lighting 'neath the circus tent. I'd say "big top" but Vilem's got ample claim to that already.
Mama Mia! We're talking cream of the creamiest crop here, in every way imaginable. A Sicilian Tale is a sinfully delicious feast of operatic and orgasmic proportions."
- Onan The Vulgarian, X FACTOR -
" Adapted from the story Cavalleria Rusticana, which inspired the opera of the same name, A Sicilian Tale is Kazan's most lyrical and passionate film to date, and can easily stand shoulder to shoulder with the best of Bjorn and Duroy. And in the matter of eliciting spontaneous ejaculations from his performers - something that is a hallmark of Kristen Bjorn's videos - A Sicilian Tale is now leader of the pack. "
Rating: scorching
- Out Publication -
" The scenes of Sicily are amazing. The locals are perfect, and perfection is also what comes to mind when you see star Federico Bulsara. Bulsara is a lovesick Italian who just happens to have a perfect butt and an inspiring knob. This gorgeous specimen is put through his paces by Lucas Foz in the first scene, which features full reciprocation, and a total of six amazing explosions.
The action soon moves to a great outdoors three-way, featuring the always wonderful Ivan Andros. Edited into this action is another four-way, a group scene that rivals anything ever seen in a Bjorn title. The finale features Byazrov again, this time matched with red-hot Vilem Cage, a dark haired stud almost as sultry as Bulsara. A Sicilian Tale offers one gorgeous man after another in a perfect two-hour adventure. It's an instant classic! "
Rating: 4 stars
- Matthew Cronin, GAY CHICAGO -
" Ah, La dolce vita! Director Lucas Kazan has based his latest offering on "Cavalleria Rusticana," the old Italian play by Giovanni Verga with the more popular 19th century opera with music by Pietro Mascagni. Updating the material to present-day Sicily, and switching the gender of several of the characters, A Sicilian Tale spins an oft-told tale of adultery and revenge. Since I posses a weakness for opera music and foreign born-men, I am pleased to report that both are abundantly employed in this well-made video. Fans of Kazan and his mentor Kristen Bjorn will appreciate the exquisite videography, the uniformly handsome and unclipped models, the multiple "no hands" cum shots and the exotic outdoor locations featured throughout. "
- J.C. Adams, AVN -
" How often does one come across a video adapted from Verga's Cavalleria Rusticana? It's a sure sign the ambitious writer/director Lucas Kazan is behind the camera. You don't have to be familiar with the beloved 19th century Italian opera to follow the story, although it would probably illuminate some of the melodramatic plot twists. In a nutshell, Turridu's (Vilem Cage) faithless lover Luca (Alexander Byazrov) has been fooling around with Alfio (Lucas Foz). On the rebound, Turridu falls in with Santo (Federico Bulsara) but a jealous Luca seduces Turridu back into his arms and cuckolds Santo.
The video runs two hours and contains four impeccably shot and edited scenes. There simply isn't room to describe all of the luscious action. In the first coupling, Byazrov and Foz kiss passionately, explore one another's finely muscled bodies, trade blowjobs and cum before they start to fuck (a Bjorn/Sarava trademark). Each remains rock-hard as they fuck, and Byazrov contributes a terrific no-hands pop shot. Each of the remaining scenes follows this same passionate pattern.
Although hunky Bulsara, gorgeous Byazrov and handsome Foz are the stars, scene three's muscular, floppy-haired blond Tiziano Cortese virtually defines male beauty. Scored to the actual opera and passionately melodramatic, Kazan's latest is a must-see for porn fans hungry for plot and production values with their sex. Strong pre-nom possibilities for Best Foreign Release, Direction, Editing and Videography. "
Rating: AAAA
-ADAM GAY VIDEO DIRECTORY -
" This may be the most beautiful gay porno video ever made, surpassing even Kazan's previous efforts. As for the cast, we doubt that a more attractive collection of Europeans has ever been assembled in a video. Not to be missed! "
Rating: five stars
- Bo Champion, ManNet -
" If one can accuse a director who bases a gay porn flick on one of the most beloved of all Italian operas as toying with conceit, then when the director pulls it off (excuse the innuendo), a reviewer not only has the obligation to bow to his brilliance, but also to lead the chorus of "Bravos!" from the balcony. Lucas Kazan has made what may very well be the most beautiful, erotic and perfectly cast "based on other material" gay porn flick I have ever seen. That Kazan earns these kudos after having already conceived and directed such masterpieces as Hotel Italia, American Holidays, and Out in Tuscany, as well as the operatic adaptation of L'Elisir D'Amore is really no surprise. He has been moving toward this kind of achievement with every new twist on what has become his underlying theme: Put handsome, big-dicked, horny men who like to fuck other men in any part of Italy, and you are likely to get heat equal to eruptions of Vesuvius and Etna combined. Under the auspices of the legendary Kristen Bjorn's Sarava Productions, Kazan has produced a volcanic epic.
The conceit here is Pietro Mascagni's "Cavalleria Rusticana" (1890), a tale of love and intrigue in Sicily, an island with a culture of love and intrigue -- and more than a bit of violence. The plot is astonishingly simple, and it has been trans-gendered by Kazan with several brilliant strokes, including a cast which reflects the wide diversity of the Sicilian people, who can trace their ancestries to not only Italy but also Spain, the Holy Roman Empire (Germany-Austria-Hungary), Morocco and Greece. Here is how the opera's plot is briefly described, edited to reflect how Kazan has changed the women into men:
Turiddu had been in love with Lola (Luca in this version), but he went into the army, and by the time he returned, Lola (Luca) had married (taken up with) Alfio. Turiddu took up with Santuzza (Santo) on the rebound, who fell deeply in love with him. But Lola (Luca) was jealous and seduced Turiddu away, leaving Santuzza (Santo) without love and without honor. Get it? Oh, you will, just by watching how Kazan uses the camera, faces and the score of the opera, to tell a tale that's so timeless, and yet so suspenseful, because, after all, this is a gay skin flick and you want to know who's going to end up fucking whom.
Kazan introduces the main characters as a plot device, identifying each actor as well. The movie is done in brief flashback, opening with Santo (Federico Bulsara, an Italian) running through an old hill town looking for his lover Turiddu (Vilem Cage, a Czech), whom he spies making love to Turiddu's former lover, Luca (Alexander Byazrov, a Russian). This is followed by Luca's current lover, Alfio (Lucas Foz, a Spaniard), who has followed them all to discover Luca's betrayal of him.
Overcoming any apprehension in this plotting is the casting. In Vilem Cage, we have the quintessential European cad, a man who is so irresistible to everyone that all he has to do is raise his eyebrow a mere millimeter and someone is on their knees eating away at his beautiful cock. Cage, who gained stardom in director Jan Novak's Studio 2000 release "The Back Room," has appeared in several Kazan productions since then. He gives the finest performance of his career here because it is so much more nuanced and filled with what can only be described as lust. Often the object of desire in his roles, and therefore somewhat controlling and distant, here he uses that quality to seduce and then ravage his lovers with pure pleasure reeking out of every pore. Even though he does not bottom here, you get the distinct impression that he wanted to, and that's a huge plus for this flick. Byazrov, whose pouty lips and lusty mane make him look more and more like a younger Josh Brolin, son of Hollywood actor James Brolin, is extraordinarily versatile here, a walking sexual time bomb whose cock seems to want to push through his jeans even as he is strolling hand in hand through the fishmonger's market with his lover of the moment. Bulsara, who is as beautiful as he is stereotypically Italianate, spends a great deal of the movie "weeping and gnashing teeth" -- and gets away with it because he can, indeed, act as well as make love, suck cock and take it up the ass. And Foz, whose role is multi-dimensional and requires energy and acting ability, as well as sexual prowess, reveals himself as a demi-god of lust in a role into which he immerses himself, rivaling Cage for the honor of stealing the whole video.
The real action begins with a flashback of Luca and Alfio walking and romping along the waterfront, surrounded by fishmongers and boats, in a brilliantly edited and scored prelude to a scene of incredible passion in a circus tent, which becomes a central venue for the movie's love scenes. Here they hold and kiss each other against a ladder, undressing each other slowly, piece by piece (the clothes in the video are carefully chosen to reveal just enough before revealing all). Alfio descends on Luca's crotch to admire an already stiffening, thick, bulbous cock, jutting out from a naturally large bush of hair, ready for sucking, which Alfio does with inspiration. Foz, as Alfio, is a great cocksucker here, and keeps Byazrov, as Luca, quietly gasping as he holds his arms up and over the ladder -- piano and violin music accentuating slight licking noises, which heighten when the two begin kissing again. Alfio turns Luca around to hold onto the ladder as he finger-fucks, then licks, the beautiful boy's butt, bringing his lover to spurt cum in a no-hands explosion. This inspires Alfio to move up the ladder to position his dark uncut cock even with Luca's hungry mouth, and after an extensive bit of licking and sliding up and down the side of the shaft, Luca pulls Alfio's cock right down his throat, bringing deep gasps of pleasure from his lover as the cock pulsates upwards, then spurts into a torrent of very thick, very white cum. With the music seeming to inspire more passion, Luca turns Alfio around, bends him over, helps him lift his right leg onto a rung, and sends his now rock-hard pole up his lover's waiting ass. Excellent camera angles through Alfio's legs, with his semi-erect uncut cock swinging from his hairy crotch, are scored with his encouragement in Spanish before, now rock-hard, he descends on Luca's cock for a back-to-front sit-fuck that brings him to another climax, Luca spurting white gobs below him as well. Still hard, Alfio places Luca doggy-style on a circus stand and slips his pole up his willing hole before flipping him over and finishing him off missionary -- Luca has a no-hands cum-shot while Alfio gently pumps his ass, and then Alfio spills another great gob all over his lover's crotch. A three-peat!
Another couple of lovers, however, are about to have a different type of encounter -- passion out of jealousy, Sicilian style -- and it's set up and played brilliantly as Santo (Bulsara) pursues Turiddu (Cage) to an outdoor bar where he berates him, questioning where he was the night before. Turiddu has been cruising Jorge Del Toro, an exotic bull of a man who is shirtless, and ready to fuck, at the bar, where bartender Marco and bystander Ettore Tosi watch questioningly. With Santo hanging all over him, Turridu leads Jorge to a picnic area where they start to make love, the three of them whipping out cocks and kissing each other. Santo must have his Turiddu, even if he has to share him, and it is here that Cage, as Turridu, shows us the first indication of how he has evolved. With his lover behind him groping his cock, Turridu remains fixated on the bull, pulling his cock out, pumping it, and then in a clever head-on shot, is the first one to eat cock. He is so consumed by his appetite that his lover is forced to move to the picnic table, stand on it, and feed his cock to Jorge, who shows a mad desire for cock, taking Santo's down to the pubes while Turridu does the same to his fat uncut porker. In due course, the three reposition themselves on another bench, with Santo feeding Turridu and Jorge feasts on Turiddu's hot cock.
Suddenly, Kazan departs from the park back to the circus tent where Ettore Tosi wanders in on a four-way featuring the splendid blond muscle boy Tiziano Cortese, the internationally versatile Ivan Andros, and the diminutively exotic Mario Lopez and Milton Abdalla are doing all sorts of wonderful things with each other's cocks. It's a bit of a jolt, but one supposes that this is a sly play on Kazan's part to a central section of the original opera in which the crowd goes off to pray at mass, around which their lives revolve. Well, in this Sicilian town, it's cock, and men sucking cock, which is central to life, and we now have a series of cuts between the four-way in the tent and the three-way in the picnic area. Abdalla holds the fort in the first part of the four-way, on his knees sucking each cock presented to him until they all spurt (shot from below -- these men are hung!). There are only sounds of sex here, as there are when we return to the picnic table which has Turiddu fucking Santo doggy while Jorge fills Santo's mouth with fat cock -- until the dominants switch positions on Santo who quickly brings Turiddu to a climax while spilling his own no-hands seed as Jorge continues to fuck him from behind. Back in the circus tent, the boys have paired off with Abdalla fucking Andros missionary until they both cum while Cortese plows Lopez doggy until the blond spills -- both on the same couch. At the picnic grounds, Turiddu is sucking Jorge while sit-fucking Santo front-to-back. This is the best cum scene in the movie as Santo does another no-hander (his slightly bent-down, uncut cock is a fountain to behold), Jorge splatters Turiddu as the latter pumps his cock, and Santo pumping Turiddu's monster to throw the movie's biggest load all over his legs, crotch and balls. But, we're not done at the circus. Lopez is now riding Cortese's cock in a face-to-face sit-fuck while Abdalla rides Andros close by, back-to-front. They finish off with Cortese pumping himself to cumming, and Lopez and Abdalla fucking Andros missionary on the circus table.
Walking through town afterwards, hand in hand, Santo keeps pleading with Turiddu to stay true to him, but when Luca passes by -- both realize it's all over. He takes out his cellphone and calls Alfio to tell him, in typical Sicilian style, what his boyfriend is doing. What follows is a beautifully edited series of love making vignettes with Santo and Turiddu, then Turiddu and Luca, followed by Santo careening lovesick and brokenhearted alone, with the opera's main love theme echoing in the soundtrack. It's simply sensational, and leads to an extended, lust filled finale in a blue room with Turiddu and Luca coming together for their major scene.
It is time to switch to their real names to make the point: Naked, Byazrov, as Luca, kisses and licks Cage, as Turiddu, who is clad only in briefs, working his way down to his new lover's crotch, where he pulls out the shaft of love -- strong, upturned, thick and ready for love. Like he did in the first scene with Alfio (Foz), Byazrov spends an enormous amount of time licking and kissing Cage's cock, balls and crotch before taking it in his mouth. This drives Cage, who appears to be in adoration of his new lover, absolutely crazy, so that when Byazrov finally brings him off with into a thick, cascading stream of sticky cum which runs down his shaft and over the younger man's cheeks, Cage reverts to English -- "Yes! Yes! Yes!" he cries, and spent, brings Byazrov up to kiss him, and then drops to his own knees to return the favor. There comes a point in each porn star's career where he turns a corner, and in this instant, it's Vilem Cage's turn. Being a Czech, he has some shoes to fill, and some habits to overcome. Herein, he puts to lie the canard that Czech male stars are tippy-tipsters when it comes to sucking cock -- throughout this movie, and in this scene, he makes love to cock, going as deep as he can, pumping the member and paying attention to what his partner wants, until his lover's cock spills out a load down his shaft, over Cage's fist. He then rises, and attacks Byazrov's lips with passionate kisses, bringing a palpable, pleased smile from him before bending him over and sticking his hot Czech sausage up the Russian's pliable asshole. He fucks him deep and long, then slides the two of them into a sidesaddle position, where the camera gives us great pleasure from several angles, all of which is accented by the pleasure both of them appear to be having from this fabulously choreographed fuck which lasts forever, but which we hope never ends. But it does, with Cage spilling yet another fine load on the other man's balls.
Later, Alfio, still smarting from Santo's phone call, makes a beeline for a courtyard, where Turiddu has to enter in order to get home. They see each other, and instant lust overcomes Turiddu once again -- this time, he'll be fucking the man from whom he took Luca. But, we know better. Before Turiddu arrived, Alfio had tucked a switchblade into his jeans. While embracing Alfio in a passionate kiss, Turiddu's world ends, with the last line from the opera ringing across the screen and in the subtitles -- you'll have to see the movie to find out. It's perfect.
This movie works on every level, but I think it might be most remembered a few years from now as the one which brought Vilem Cage to the forefront of the charismatic, macho Czech male porn stars, on the same level as Lukas Ridgeston, Jan Dvorak and the little-used Ladislav Pekar (he actually looks like the love child of the latter two). The fact that he has yet to bottom on screen only adds to the sense of anticipation for his next effort. In this movie, he moves well beyond trade, however, to become an actor, and a consummate cocksman. Combined with an extraordinary orchestration by Lukas Kazan of an enormously talented cast and crew, and with musicians Andrea Ruscelli on piano and Sebastiano Severi Conti on cello playing some of the world's most romantic music, A Sicilian Tale is a movie you simply cannot refuse. "
Rating: *** Highly, Highly Recommended ***