Cultural WI: Classier Porn Films

Hendryk

Banned
TMI, good sir.
Aww, it's a fascinating topic. Allow me to quote a fellow enthusiast:
Ambitious to make a career for herself, Tani targeted the BDSM micro-genre. (For the wet-behind-the-ears among you: BDSM stands for "bondage, domination, sadism, masochism.") She almost immediately found an enthusiastic audience. In films with titles like "Bed of Violent Desires" and "Carnal Punishment," she became a huge national favorite.

It's easy to see why. Tani had lusher than average (for a Japanese woman) breasts; a melodramatic, diva-esque temperament alongside a hyper-responsive physicality; and a deep respect for what gave her audiences pleasure.

"Schoolgirl" may not have been in her range. But "mother" certainly was, as was "goddess" and "wife."

As was, especially, "bondage and torture object." Seldom has anyone looked so good wearing nothing but ropes, or maybe ropes and a half-ripped-off kimono. Suffering (and achieving ecstasy) on camera while being bound and sometimes beaten was Naomi Tani's metier, even her vocation, and she did it beautifully.

Her skills may or may not have come to her naturally, but it's certain that she also worked at them. "Naomi Tani" the screen queen was a consciously-created artifact. Tani deliberately kept herself out of the sun because she felt that pale skin shows off blushes and bruises more vividly than dark skin does. She kept a few extra pounds on her frame because she felt that slightly-plump flesh takes welts and rope-marks well, and because ropes bite into plump flesh so appetizingly.

One thing Naomi was known for was her ability to take actual physical punishment. In "Wife to be Sacrificed," a Tani movie directed by the very talented Masaru Konuma that The Wife and I enjoyed the other evening, Tani's tormentor binds her tight, strings her up, drags her through mud, and whacks her hard, over and over. Tani gasps, protests -- and keeps on delivering the beauty and the emotions. What a trouper.

Alongside the man dealing out the abuse, we're invited to observe Tani's desperate reactions in a quiet and transfixed state. Hey, doesn't much of movie history consist of directors putting actresses in highly-charged fictional circumstances and helping us to observe them as they feel their feelings? In fact, much of "Wife to be Sacrificed" comes across as a kind of grotty, '70s variation on poetic silent movies.
One should admire an actress who takes her job to heart :)
Why did this change happen?
I'm guessing the rise of straight-to-video movies, itself a byproduct of VHS technology.
 
I'm guessing the rise of straight-to-video movies, itself a byproduct of VHS technology.

Yes, but even in that case, you can at least try to have a cohesive plot, a clever script, etc.

Still, that does make it easier for cheap crap to wash away the better-made stuff--sheer numbers.
 
In conventional films, they're pretending. In porn films, it's real.

Does that seem like a good definition.
Actually, That's NOT True ...

While it's Rare in Feature Films, With Eyes Wide Shut Being a Notable Exception ...

It's Fairly Common in The Direct-to-Video Market; Shannon Tweed has been Known to Insist upon Realism in her Scenes, And in Another Production, an Actress was Incapable of Faking a Believable Orgasm, So, The Director had to Get down and Give her a Real One!

Yes, but even in that case, you can at least try to have a cohesive plot, a clever script, etc.

Still, that does make it easier for cheap crap to wash away the better-made stuff--sheer numbers.
Dude, you REALLY Need to Get out of The Red States Once in a While ...

Not Only does that Not Apply to Europe and Japan, it isn't Even True of Productions out of Las Vegas, Anymore ...

Also, I wouldn't Knock Gonzo Too Hard; While it Too is Probably an Acquired Taste, it's Currently Leading The Charge to Liberalize Prostitution Laws in New England!
 
I think the problem is that a lot of porn as a genre focuses on the basics - it is sort of like a drinking culture that counts alcohol content and speed of delivery as the fundamentals and flavour, colour and bouquet as secondary, negligible considerations. It might have something to do with coming from the low end of the market, with limited budgets and an artificially constrained market. Maybe if you could change the tradition early with some kind of double standard? It's been known to happen in art: A court strikes down an obscenity challenge against a high-end pornographic European or Japanese movie on grounds that it has artistic value, regardless of whether you can see the wiener. The US porn industry takes note, and costly and artsy productions succeed at breaking into the mainstream as 'adult entertainment' in the real sense. By the time VHS shakes up the market, the audience expects classy porn in the cinema and these productions continue. Hollywood might be involved more directly. there is a dumbed-down direct-to-video market, but it is regarded much as the action or comedy equivalents are, not as defining the genre.
 
In conventional films, they're pretending. In porn films, it's real.

Does that seem like a good definition.

My personal definition is based on the greek words, it includes some fully clothed pictures and excludes some nudes:

Pornography literally means "the art of sexual immorality", so I describe it as "any media that makes an attempt to sexually arouse the intended audience or promote extramarital sex".

SI swimsuit = a men's interest, therefore porn
Artistic nudes = intent is to exhalt the body, therefore not porn.
Picture of bikini clad girls (like the ones on facebook) = depends on intent, can be decided by the pose of the lady.
Female undergarment ads = intent to sell the product, therefore not porn. If they try and convince the lady that they will look "sexy" that it is porn.
 
Actually "adult films" were going towards mainstream in the US in the 70s. Deep Throat was actually a major blockbuster (giggity) that saw wide distribution (giggity) and high sales figures. Many famous people and A-list stars publicly went to see it.

It was the later Christian conservative backlash of the late 70s and 80s that forced porno back underground (and safely onto the WWW where it can't harm the children :p).

It's conceivable that with less of a backlash, or an earlier mainstream discrediting of the Moral Majority movement, that come the modern day (giggity) we could see regular theatrical release (giggity) of Adult Films including major-studio productions.
 
real sex in films are a really novel idea, and could be used to enhance the storyline, provided it is done the right way.

I am sick and tired of seeing gratuitise sex scenes, violence, and language, just for the ratings and shock values. A well placed sex scene will be a welcome change in the film industry. if a movie is anything higher than a PG-13 and has both a male and female character (and is of the correct genre) you KNOW there will be a sex scene in it.

I have seen a movie where for the specific scene, the actor insisted that his wife would be a body double for the character's "night together". there is something about pro-social values that draws viewers to the theatre.
 
I was looking around the local Blockbuster the other day and came across a pornographic film that was a parody of the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise.

(Blockbuster does not ordinarily stock full-blown porn films and I think this might have been unrated--I've seen Skinemax films at the store, but those were the R cuts. Rather odd.)
I remember reading in Wired a few months ago about this particular movie. It appears that its makers were so proud of their creation, as it were, that they made a second version without any pornographic content and released it as a mainstream movie. Apparently (having never seen it myself) it works very well this way as a parody of the PoTC franchise.

As usual it is a ameriwank,
In the quite literal sense of the word. :eek:
 
I remember reading in Wired a few months ago about this particular movie. It appears that its makers were so proud of their creation, as it were, that they made a second version without any pornographic content and released it as a mainstream movie. Apparently (having never seen it myself) it works very well this way as a parody of the PoTC franchise.


... :eek:

Now, that is an very interesting development in the context of the OP.

Perhaps if this were to be done earlier?

Maybe in a limited fashion with direct to Video movies, then ballooning with the DVD format.

Thus you get the porn market, but an added market as just a direct to video movie. Double up on expenses with some added scences and extra editting.

Quality gradually increases as more and more of the market is penetrated by the non-porn versions.

Legitamizing the stars and the movies themselves eventually.
 
Thought of this tread reading this.

http://reason.com/blog/show/132873.html
Marilyn Chambers, RIP



Jesse Walker | April 13, 2009, 3:55pm
ivorysnow.jpg
In 1972, a movie called Behind the Green Door proved that ordinary Americans would sit through a feature-length experimental art film with vague intimations of the occult, if it meant they got to watch Marilyn Chambers having sex. This was back when the porn industry was in effect cross-subsidizing the avant-garde film community, thus demonstrating its redeeming artistic merit and staying—sometimes—on the tolerant side of the law. In this case, the results were memorably strange: Chambers' picture was based on a piece of folklore, but—as with the street poem that inspired another classic of lowbrow '70s surrealism, Dolemite—it wasn't the sort of folktale that ordinarily appeared on a movie screen.

Before that career-defining role, Chambers was best known as the model on the Ivory Snow soap box (advertised as "99 & 44/100 percent pure"). She went on to appear in David Cronenberg's cult horror picture Rabid and a host of X-rated movies, and in 2004 she ran for vice president on the Personal Choice ticket, a spinoff of sorts from the Libertarian Party. She was later involved in the Boston Tea Party, another Libertarian offshoot, and in some states she served last year as the BTP's vice-presidential candidate.

This past weekend she died of causes unknown, a week shy of her 57th birthday. She was, in her way, one of the cultural icons of 1970s America, and I hope she rests in peace.
http://reason.com/blog/show/132873.html
 
Versions of the film Pirates and its sequel (which predated POtC, MerryPrankster) were released both in pornographic and R-rated versions. The R-rated version (according to an adult industry insider) was intended mostly to recoup the inevitable losses of a large-budget porn film. AFAIK, Pirates and Pirates 2 lost money.
 
If porn were to become a "classier" art form in the US, I would think that in general, our enforced cultural mores about sexual intercourse would have to relax a bit. Perhaps the counterculture's attitudes about sexuality percolate through society because they dodged the veneral disease bullet, and it's leaders go on to become respected statesmen in American society. But that' opens up a whole can of worms I don't want to even begin to think about.

One thing you may want to consider is that if porn becomes viewed as a legitimate art form, with a exemplars of a certain level of "class", then the distinction between normal films and porn films would break down, and we'd probably stop thinking of them as two discrete categories.
 
Versions of the film Pirates and its sequel (which predated POtC, MerryPrankster) were released both in pornographic and R-rated versions. The R-rated version (according to an adult industry insider) was intended mostly to recoup the inevitable losses of a large-budget porn film. AFAIK, Pirates and Pirates 2 lost money.

The second one appears to be a parody of the second or third POTC films, complete with a guy returning from the dead.

Did they try to tie them in later?
 
Sorry for the necromancy, but something like this could be FH...

Recently, there has been a lot of talk about The Girlfriend Experience , which could potentially set a precedence for pornographic actresses moving on to mainstream movies (albeit non big-budget, experimental ones). In a future, we could see the adult film industry as a stepping stone for Hollywood, especially those Adult Film Studios that make movies like Pirates, which have a plot, and require some acting abilities.

This might result in a crossover where we get mainstream movies with unsimulated sex in it, featuring "crossover" performers, which might be seen as "classier porno" by a lot of people, even though they are meant to be real movies.

The Girlfriend Experience, as far as I can tell is getting good reviews. It need not become a blockbuster, all it needs to be is an arthouse favourite or a cult film.
 

RealityX

Banned
Maybe if the porn industry had to continue funding the independent and avant-garde film industry in order to get their real sex scenes to an audience possibly because the law views artistic erotica with deep pscological/intellectual storylines as warranting expression under the constitution in contrast to the typical 'American guy with big dick fucks two teen german sisters.' This would be interesting to say the least, having porn fund high culture and art would lead to a bloom in the amount and quality of independent films.
 
Hmmm...pR0n comes* to the rescue of the dying sophisticated high-culture/art cinema in America? Oh, the irony... :D


* (giggity)
 
I was looking around the local Blockbuster the other day and came across a pornographic film that was a parody of the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise.

Are you sure you don't mean Robinson Crusoe on Sin Island? That one was rather... well-funded as far as jack-off material goes.

In the interest of being less Americo-centric, perhaps I should amend the OP to say "In America."

The word I prefer is "Americentric".


Say it one more time, geek-boy, I dare you!
 
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