The Oppressed blog

D.E.B.S.

started out as an 11-minute short, which is also where it should have stopped. But the concept of nubile crime-fighters in skimpy Catholic-schoolgirl outfits no doubt inspired visions of dancing dollar signs and cash registers ka-chinging. So now it's been expanded into a leaden concoction that understandably feels like an amusing short padded with 80 minutes of undistinguished jibber-jabber better left on the editing-room floor.

Combining the visceral excitement of a low-budget indie romance with all the depth, character development, and gravity usually associated with comedies about foxy female crime-fighters, the film casts Sara Foster as an esteemed agent of D.E.B.S., a scantily clad secret organization devoted to fighting crime and turning the public on. Jordana Brewster co-stars as a notorious, neurotic super-villain who falls for Foster and her short, short skirts, a development that sounds clever and even mildly subversive in theory. But onscreen, it plays out as something else entirely. It doesn't help that writer-director Angela Robinson never finds a consistent tone?

D.E.B.S.

oscillates between the glib camp smirkiness of its half-hearted action send-up and the thudding earnestness of its romance?or that its lovers display all the sizzling sexual chemistry of John Travolta and Lily Tomlin in

Moment By Moment

. Even more damning is the fact that

D.E.B.S.

' skid-row production values, combined with its suggestive title, guy-friendly lipstick lesbianism, and mildly naughty premise make it feel like a tongue-in-cheek porn film with all the sex scenes edited out.

In the end,

D.E.B.S.

is an incorrigible tease. It baits its audience with the promise of fluffy, light-footed cotton-candy fare, but delivers a clumsy, talky, indifferently filmed lesbian romance. Then again,

D.E.B.S.

has already succeeded in its function as a glorified calling card, netting Robinson a studio gig helming the regrettably but amusingly titled

Herbie: Fully Loaded.

If Robinson follows her

D.E.B.S.

template of 95 percent talk to 5 percent action,

Herbie

should consist mainly of Lindsay Lohan discussing the complications and challenges of her relationship with the wacky, sentient automobile with everyone in earshot.