The "plot" of the movie is about three old friends who reunite for a weekend at the beach to celebrate Val's (Christina Carlisi) divorce from her two-timing husband. Val's friends include Maureen (Carolyn Hennesy), a straight attorney, and Sam (out lesbian comic Georgia Ragsdale), a lesbian who sleeps with anything female that moves. During the weekend they encounter old beach buddies and Val's ex-husband and his new trophy girlfriend, and the three women reminisce about old times and discuss the challenges and rewards of turning 40.

The best word to describe Wave Babes, which is written and produced by Ragsdale and directed Lisa Knox-Nervig, is "uneven." It has some truly funny lines, like Sam's anecdote about one of her girlfriends hearing an Indigo girls song at a party and getting back together with her ex, and Sam's assertion that lesbian community is so small "it's like there's only ten lesbians in the world and it's all done with mirrors." But there are some cringingly bad ones, as well, like when Maureen says "there's nothing to be ashamed of--I look like a woman my age. Hear me fucking roar!" followed by an actual lion's roar.

Similarly, there are moments when the lead characters' acting is understated and believable, but these are usually followed by moments of extreme overacting. The pool boy Brock (Troy Casey), who serves as the boy toy of the weekend, is so dumb he's barely more than a two-dimensional, but then that's kind of the point: he's supposed to be the "dumb jock" stereotype come to life, the male equivalent of the "dumb blonds" that usually populate beach movies. Unfortunately, after a few minutes, he's just as annoying.

Most of the characters, in fact, embody some kind of stereotype or another. This was probably done intentionally, in order to spoof the stereotypes themselves, but this tactic is only moderately successful since it's hard to tell when they're making fun of these stereotypes and when they're just embodying them.

The special effects are deliberately low-tech, and the soundtrack is full of reworded versions of popular songs ("Catch a Babe" instead of the Beach Boy's "Catch a Wave," "Come to My Bedroom" instead of Melissa Etheridge's "Come to my Window" etc.). Most of the time this quirkiness works for the film, but sometimes--like in the interspersed scenes of the three women doing the "Walk Like an Egyptian" dance--it's just plain annoying.

But in the end, most of these flaws are forgiven because the filmmakers and cast clearly don't take the film--or themselves--too seriously, either. From the laughably fake-looking shark in the opening moments of the film, to the name of the film's four DVD chapters ("The Setup," "Chick Fight," "Love Scene," and "Surprise Ending"), to the statement after the closing credits that warns "No actors actually surfed during the making of Wave Babes," this film is supposed to make you laugh both at and with the film, and at this Wave Babes definitely succeeds.

Although Wave Babes has some of the same elements that characterize bad lesbian movies like Bar Girls and Claire of the Moon, the crucial difference is that Wave Babes isn't actually trying to be a serious movie. And this is what makes Wave Babes ultimately worth watching.

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