Tuesday, October 25, 2005
The Plot Thickens
I've been thinking about my Titles post and exploring why I like older stroke-flicks better than newer ones. I watch a lot of amateur porn, both straight and gay, and I like it a lot. I have to admit though, I really love porn movies with strong plots, and as films have come to be more and more shot on video, plots generally seem to have disappeared.
Yes, there are occasional wackers today with plots, but they're getting harder and harder to find, especially in straight porn. It's so easy to throw two or three people in a room or by a pool or under a tree or in the back seat of a moderately sized car and have them go at it. Even the scant situational set-up is becoming extinct, like the Hot Young Pizza Boy knocking on the Nearly Naked Older Lady's door and inquiring, "Did you order the sausage?" Scenes begin now with everybody naked, hard, wet, and fucking.
Now, the level of acting in porn is a topic for an entirely different post, and maybe producers decided to do away with story lines because, let's face it, these actors aren't exactly Kevin Spacey or Dame Judi Dench. Sure, they all know who Ron Jeremy is, but few of them have ever even heard of Stanislavski.
And there certainly were plotless porn flicks shot on 35mm, but they were very rare. Movies today are meant to be purchased, taken home and watched over three or four sessions, so there are three or four points in those films intended to get you off. Pre-VCR movies wanted to keep you sitting (and stroking) in your theatre seat for the duration of the running time, and so the sexual situations were doled out in a slower progression.
Aye, there's the rub! I find that slower untangling of the story sexier. I like the fact that in pre-1985 movies the two featured protagonists would meet and there would be sexual tension, but, at that first meeting, that's all it was, a first meeting. Later they would get together, and after some necking and feeling each other up, maybe undress slowly; we see her seductively playing with her still bra covered nipples, we see him with a hard-on in his underwear. That hard-on is then slowly exposed, flipping up out of his shorts, a droplet of pre-cum flying onto her face. Then a blow-job, a pussy licking and ... he cums! They didn't necessarily fuck in that scene, that was saved for another upcoming segment.
That's hot to me. That's hotter to me than the couple instantly naked and fucking in the first scene, and, an even greater crime in my opinion, doing the same routine of sex acts in exactly the same order as everyone else in every other scene of the film. Like comedy, eroticism depends on surprise, and if I know what's going to happen before it happens, well, that's not sexy (or funny).
So I often go back to the classic porn films of my youth, both straight and gay, many of which, thankfully, have been preserved on DVD. The performers are hotter, it's easier to project myself into the situation, and the sex somehow just seems naughtier. Come to think of it, maybe I'm really projecting myself back to when I just turned 18 and started going to "Dirty Movies" in Seattle. There were three or four adult theatres in the downtown area then, and I hit them all. It did seem naughty; I was afraid of running into someone I knew, there was a thrill to it, and I would literally tremble. Paying your money at a box-office, walking in and your eyes slowly adjusting to that large dark space, lighted only by projected people fucking -- really fucking -- on the screen. And you never knew who was sitting near you in the dark, watching, masturbating. You just knew you were one of them, and you felt like you were getting away with something. And you were.
Yes, there are occasional wackers today with plots, but they're getting harder and harder to find, especially in straight porn. It's so easy to throw two or three people in a room or by a pool or under a tree or in the back seat of a moderately sized car and have them go at it. Even the scant situational set-up is becoming extinct, like the Hot Young Pizza Boy knocking on the Nearly Naked Older Lady's door and inquiring, "Did you order the sausage?" Scenes begin now with everybody naked, hard, wet, and fucking.
Now, the level of acting in porn is a topic for an entirely different post, and maybe producers decided to do away with story lines because, let's face it, these actors aren't exactly Kevin Spacey or Dame Judi Dench. Sure, they all know who Ron Jeremy is, but few of them have ever even heard of Stanislavski.
And there certainly were plotless porn flicks shot on 35mm, but they were very rare. Movies today are meant to be purchased, taken home and watched over three or four sessions, so there are three or four points in those films intended to get you off. Pre-VCR movies wanted to keep you sitting (and stroking) in your theatre seat for the duration of the running time, and so the sexual situations were doled out in a slower progression.
Aye, there's the rub! I find that slower untangling of the story sexier. I like the fact that in pre-1985 movies the two featured protagonists would meet and there would be sexual tension, but, at that first meeting, that's all it was, a first meeting. Later they would get together, and after some necking and feeling each other up, maybe undress slowly; we see her seductively playing with her still bra covered nipples, we see him with a hard-on in his underwear. That hard-on is then slowly exposed, flipping up out of his shorts, a droplet of pre-cum flying onto her face. Then a blow-job, a pussy licking and ... he cums! They didn't necessarily fuck in that scene, that was saved for another upcoming segment.
That's hot to me. That's hotter to me than the couple instantly naked and fucking in the first scene, and, an even greater crime in my opinion, doing the same routine of sex acts in exactly the same order as everyone else in every other scene of the film. Like comedy, eroticism depends on surprise, and if I know what's going to happen before it happens, well, that's not sexy (or funny).
So I often go back to the classic porn films of my youth, both straight and gay, many of which, thankfully, have been preserved on DVD. The performers are hotter, it's easier to project myself into the situation, and the sex somehow just seems naughtier. Come to think of it, maybe I'm really projecting myself back to when I just turned 18 and started going to "Dirty Movies" in Seattle. There were three or four adult theatres in the downtown area then, and I hit them all. It did seem naughty; I was afraid of running into someone I knew, there was a thrill to it, and I would literally tremble. Paying your money at a box-office, walking in and your eyes slowly adjusting to that large dark space, lighted only by projected people fucking -- really fucking -- on the screen. And you never knew who was sitting near you in the dark, watching, masturbating. You just knew you were one of them, and you felt like you were getting away with something. And you were.
