MetaChat - Just Wonderin':

are we only talking about video? or do stills count too?

posted by jonmc 14 November | 14:16

Good question, but IMO, it's not the cameras and editing equipment that could benefit the most from some improvement in most pr0n.

posted by pieisexactlythree 14 November | 14:20

if we're including stills, I'd say that abbywinters.com (mentioned in the other thread, and no I don't work for them) have produced some high quality, artistic-minded but not arty, porn. Hot stuff, too.

posted by jonmc 14 November | 14:21

The movie Pirates had a $1 million+ budget and supposedly some decent production.

posted by mullacc 14 November | 14:24

The pirate motif is a mistake since their fake boobies would not sway with the gently rocking motion of the boat in high seas, thus revealing them as frauds.

posted by jonmc 14 November | 14:27

pie: what I was thinking was that the costs now saved behind the camera could switch to higher production values before the camera, like actual writing and acting. Perhaps this is just wishful thinking.

posted by mischief 14 November | 14:27

Hmm, Pirates was made for a bit over US$1million?! Hell, I can probably raise that kind of cash here in Vegas for such an enterprise. Anybody got a 70-minute script?

posted by mischief 14 November | 14:33

Regrettably, it's true, standards have fallen in adult entertainment. It's video, Dude. Now that we're competing with the amateurs, we can't
afford to invest those little extras..story, production value, feelings.

posted by jonmc 14 November | 14:34

Mischief, my guess is it would lead to more porn, not better porn. Which is really a shame. There must be a market for entertaining erotic film, or so one would think.

jonmc, yup, they've got some nummy stuff. There's not much hotter than women who actually look happy. After all, sex is supposed to be a joyful experience, and if you're looking at nudie pics, wouldn't you want the people in those images to reflect that feeling?

posted by pieisexactlythree 14 November | 14:37

I love the fact that there's a plot/spoiler warning on the Wikipedia Pirates thread.

posted by TheDonF 14 November | 14:40

I am inordinately fond of Pirates and I think it's the best filmed porn (with plot, special effects, and a real sailing ship) I've ever seen. Plus, Evan Stone is a hottie and the AU-me would have sex with him any day of the week.

Having said that, I've got a female friend of mine who's going to be writing some porn soon and she's a damn good writer of erotica. I'll see if I can find the name of the production company.

posted by TrishaLynn 14 November | 14:42

Pie: it certainly has led to more porn, but for me, it has all become a flesh-toned blur.

I'm tired of the amateur and semi-pro crap, as well as those 'stylish' productions from Playboy and even Hustler.

I'm thinking something more along the lines of Friday the 13th (at one end of the spectrum) or Dogville (at the other end).

posted by mischief 14 November | 14:42

I can't believe none of you geeks got the joke of my last comment.

posted by jonmc 14 November | 14:44

The movie Pirates had a $1 million+ budget and supposedly some decent production.

My friend told me it's still crap as a movie, though it does have some well produced scenes for porn. He particularly liked Janine's first one, but then he's kind of old school.

posted by PinkStainlessTail 14 November | 14:45

I hear K-Fed (ala new moniker Fed-Ex) is marketing a four hour epic of honeymoon artistic porn.....

posted by funmonkey1 14 November | 14:45

I can't believe none of you geeks got the joke of my last comment.
Now that we're competing with the amateurs...
Are you saying you're a pro?

posted by pieisexactlythree 14 November | 14:47

Jackie Treehorn, man! From the Movie.

(there is absolutely nothing in life that cannot be further elucidated by the Dictators, Richard Price or, in this case, The Big Lebowski)

posted by jonmc 14 November | 14:50

*rolls eyes jon-ward*

Anyway, I found the website of the production company my friend is in talks with: Wasteland, which is definitely NSFW

posted by TrishaLynn 14 November | 14:58

...in this case, The Big Lebowski
Logjammin' was a work of art!

posted by pieisexactlythree 14 November | 15:00

*fixes the cable*

posted by jonmc 14 November | 15:08

Anybody got a 70-minute script?

I could totally write you a script. The Apocalypse Came And All I Lost Was My Lousy Virginity would be set shortly after World War III killed off the world's human population, the only survivors are one nerdy virgin boy and one nerdy virgin girl. After they awkwardly come to the conclusion that they need to re-populate the earth, and being horny 19 year olds of course, they do it all the goddamn time. In the rubble strewn streets, on the chaotic floors of major department store chains, in caves, on the fucking White House lawn (well, I mean, there would only be a crater there, being a first strike target and all, but you get my point). The most poignent scene would be when they're goin' at it at the base of the slightly charred Statue of Liberty. When Nerdy No Longer Virgin Girl climaxes she chokes out "For freedom!" Hell, right there we'd get major play in some demographics. We're talking a Quiet Earth meets Earth Abides meets closeup shots of ejaculation kind of thing.

Anyway, the movie ends when a mountain lion mauls and eats them because they were too busy fucking to pay attention to the dangerous new world they live in. Kind of a morality tale for a new generation or some shit.

The market we're going after here is totally underserved. Lemme know.

posted by cmonkey 14 November | 15:08

Pirates is pretty good. I haven't watched most of the plot parts, though.

posted by matildaben 14 November | 15:10

After they awkwardly come to the conclusion that they need to re-populate the earth

it'd be world full of nerds. NERDS!

≡ Click to see image ≡

posted by jonmc 14 November | 15:12

cmonkey, that's actually a pretty good idea, except for the snuff bit. I'd watch it.

posted by pieisexactlythree 14 November | 15:17

It sounds like arthouse movies with fucking would be closer to what you're after than porn industry-produced stuff, and there's tons of them about nowadays (Shortbus and 9 Songs being the most easily available, but it seems like every major film festival has had one big film with hardcore sex in it for the last three or four years).

posted by jack_mo 14 November | 15:28

The problem is that the arthouse movies with explicit fucking all seem to overcompensate for the hardcore by being dismal and unarousing, like they're ashamed of it or something.

posted by PinkStainlessTail 14 November | 15:52

The problem is that the arthouse movies with explicit fucking all seem to overcompensate for the hardcore by being dismal and unarousing, like they're ashamed of it or something.

My theory is that they are. ashamed of it. to admit they like watching people fucking would force arthouse patrons to admit that they have base lusts and desires just like the people at the MegaCinePlex down the street, and their i'm-a-special-snowflake glands couldn't take the shock.

Me, I'll just stick to looking at people through their windows.

posted by jonmc 14 November | 15:58

So... why this is a question about porn, specifically?

The only difference between porn and any other kind of cinematography is distribution, audience, and, I would imagine, certain production values the crew would have to be aware of in terms of the close-up filming of certain body parts.

But everything else would be pretty much the same, right? Scripts either suck, or don't, awful sound is always awful, bad lighting is always bad, etc.

Same with actors - they either suck, or don't, except in porn, where this may have a different and important meaning. But... really, how is it different from the rest of the industry in terms of this question?

posted by taz 14 November | 16:02

cmonkey, that's actually a pretty good idea, except for the snuff bit. I'd watch it.

Ok, yeah, that would be a downer. And it wouldn't leave room for sequels TACAAILWMLV 12: Hey Let's Make A Raft And Get Busy In The Ruins Of Taihiti.

Now if only I could get funding...

posted by cmonkey 14 November | 16:04

Taz, in porn (film at least), it seems like the suck-to-suck ratio is just about 1:1.

posted by pieisexactlythree 14 November | 16:11

Taz, in porn (film at least), it seems like the suck-to-suck ratio is just about 1:1.

*rimshot*

posted by cmonkey 14 November | 16:15

taz: mainly because hardcore sex rarely gets an actual cinematic treatment. The only example off the top of my head is Caligula but Guccione fucked that up by taking over the editing.

Although today's porn is magnitudes better in terms of visual clarity, it has become a contest for cumshots per minute.

posted by mischief 14 November | 16:37

So, porn producers have been making it only for the quick and easy money, and you're thinking that maybe now some people who have (or have access to people with) industry standard skills might start making better adult films?

It sounds interesting... I'm just not sure why that would happen. Or, at least why that would happen in any different proportion to other outsider cinema.

posted by taz 14 November | 16:48

... porn with a great story and other superlative production values?
Why?

posted by dg 14 November | 17:03

I recently saw a four part Japanese series that was basically a very spoogy romantic comedy, and guess what, it was actually kind of hot. The premise is that two young newlyweds are both shy and inexperienced, so they don't know much about how to please each other, but they really want to. This leads to all sorts of comedic situations and embarrassing goofs and matters become worse when friends, coworkers and siblings attempt to give the couple advice. Good acting and a couple of characters who actually really care about each other made it enough of a novelty to sit through eighty minutes or so of this thing.

posted by pieisexactlythree 14 November | 17:19

It's not super recent (1998) but I thought Flashpoint was good. It had an interesting story (kind of an X-rated version of Backdraft) and was more hot than snarkworthy.

posted by sisterhavana 14 November | 17:24

The problem with the thesis of "artistic porn" is that porn is generally purchased for its "zipless fuck" value (to use Erica Jong's term). Men buy the vast majority of porn, and they don't want to wait through a ton of character development and plot for the "action." Hence the big numbers done by all the "cut" compilations, like the Cream Pies series, where everything but the money shots are stripped out. No faces, no plot, no music just ejaculation after ejaculation, in 60 to 90 second jump cuts.

It's crude, but it's cheap to produce, and it sells. Against a dependable, risk free market for such stuff, persons expecting "higher class material" with "good production values" want distributors to take what is for them significant financial risk to put in content items and production values which will just be areas of criticism for many potential buyers. If the high brows would buy Pirates like it was going out of style, that'd be one thing, and might convince some of the bigger porn houses to take a serious financial flyer on Hollywood style movie making. But, mostly, the high brows just rent Pirates with other porn, and so long as that's the income stream for it, I wouldn't look for a lot more of the same. Deep Throat and Behind the Green Door succeeded as low budget movies mainly on the strength of theatrical release dollars, and that's a dodo for the current porn industry. Direct-to-DVD is all about low risk, low units, and turn, and the average porn flick is still doing well if it measures its run in tens of thousands of copies, not millions.

posted by paulsc 14 November | 18:11

if the ultimate goal of pron is to aid the viewer in achieving orgasm, then what exactly is the purpose of trying to make it "artistic" or "cinematic" or whatever? it reminds of the following exchange in gta: vice city where tommy vercetti (ray liotta) is talking with pron director steve scott (dennis hopper) at the porn studio...

STEVE: Anyway, hey, tomorrow we're going on location to shoot the boat scenes.
TOMMY: Boat scenes?! What boat scenes?
STEVE: The fishermen are in the throes of passion...
STEVE: ...when this giant shark comes in -
TOMMY: What'd I say about the giant shark?
TOMMY: I said, 'NO GIANT SHARK', alright?
TOMMY: Just keep the cameras pointed at the poontang!

posted by Wedge 14 November | 18:46

if the ultimate goal of pron is to aid the viewer in achieving orgasm

A ha! What if, and granted, this is a big leap, what if, somebody wanted erotic film for some other, slightly more abstract purpose? I suppose by definition, it would cease to be pr0n. But this as yet unnamed entity, would people want it? I don't see why not. Making it a viable investment however, would take some creativity. The way something like that could potentially take off is with amateur or semi-pro productions on some kind of adult youtube.

posted by pieisexactlythree 14 November | 19:15

Metachat: No faces, no plot, no music, just ejaculation after ejaculation.

posted by pieisexactlythree 14 November | 19:20

Flashpoint was one of a handful of Jenna Jameson flicks that attempted to be more story-oriented. Conquest was another one. I haven't seen them, can't say if they are actually any good.

Andrew Blake is well known for movies that are beautifully-shot and tend to be almost softcore compared to the gonzo stuff that is so popular these days. I don't know that I have ever seen one of his flicks either. I think Pirates is generally accepted as the biggest or at least one of the biggest attempts at doing something beyond the typical porn-with-a-plot flick, but there are actually a lot of story-driven flicks out there from the less gonzo studios.

Use Google and search rec.arts.movies.erotica and you might find something more useful. I am too lazy to do it.

posted by weretable and the undead chairs 14 November | 19:29

I think mischief's onto something here. I remember seeing a report somewhere about women, especially, preferring porn with more of a story line and better cinematography (not to say men can't have their sensitive sides). Men who'd like their ladies to watch more porn with them for the turn-on value might go for the higher production value, too. (A Bull Durham style movie with real sex scenes would be fantastic.) I definitely see a market. (This is a generalization, mind you; sometimes it's the ladies who like the cut-to-the-chase style. ; )

(On preview: Oooo.... adult YouTube.... great idea.)

posted by Pips 14 November | 19:31

What, like Pornotube?

posted by box 14 November | 20:07

porn is generally purchased for its "zipless fuck" value

The key word is "generally", and that implies at least one other market exists.

However, this afternoon I realized that with the existence of bittorrent and youtube, profits are dependent on a secure plan for distribution. IOW, forget about it.

posted by mischief 15 November | 00:09

I just remembered art hardcore pretty much means crap like Peter Greenaway, so never mind that track.

Oh well, at least I found someone who also likes roleplay as much as foreplay.

posted by mischief 15 November | 00:18

*rolls 12 sided dice*

posted by pieisexactlythree 15 November | 12:12

After they awkwardly come to the conclusion that they need to re-populate the earth

it'd be world full of nerds. NERDS!

The geeks shall inheirit the earth!

The problem is that the arthouse movies with explicit fucking all seem to overcompensate for the hardcore by being dismal and unarousing, like they're ashamed of it or something.

Shortbus wasn't dismal! It was very sweet and positive.

posted by jason's_planet 15 November | 23:16

14 November 2006