The bane of most low-budget features isn’t so much the few, cramped sets, the minimal production value or rushed performances – it’s dialogue that engenders the action to take place off-screen while the characters set around and recap what “happened.”  And as much as AVN’s praises, and tries to foster, plot-oriented videos, Double Down is a big bust in this respect.

As a pro gambler out to smash the Vegas casinos, Mike Horner whispers raspily while making snake eyes, and his joker partner Tony Martino couldn’t convincingly count to twenty-one without both his pants and shoes off.  With their “army of card counters,” (Rebecca Bardoux and Isis Nile) they descend on the lest-populated house of cards you’re ever likely to see; as endless cutaway shots to the blazing neon main strip simply reinforce how claustrophobic the interiors actually are.

What’s going for it (despite the flat, muted videography) are a few highly charged, if highly improbable sex scenes.  Blackjack dealer Steve Drake shows a few excellent hands: First playing two-card stud with Horner as they flush Bardoux’s royal rectum with a wild d.p.; later with Bionca, nibbling her dice-hard nipples, receiving a breathtaking blowjob, and finally breaking her backdoor bank.  Slipping his ace in the hole of Debi Diamond, Gaming Commissioner Steven St. Croix fingers her quivering butthole and unloads a jizz flood on her face.  Though Double Down’s dramatic pretentions are a big bluff, it stacks the deck with decent sex.