Babyface (1977) - Best DVD? | Porn Fan Community Forum

Author	Post
greybeard Member 181 Posts 8/00	Posted - Feb 6 2008 : 12:46PM Couldn't find any reviews here, so I'd like to ask those who may have seen both DVD versions of the deRenzy classic (TVX and Alpha Blue Archives) which has better video and is the most complete transfer of the film? I know the ABA DVD also has a companion feature, so there may be more compression there. Any expert advice would be very much appreciated! [Link]
sdc Member 236 Posts 4/03	Posted - Feb 6 2008 : 4:02PM I've got the Alpha Blue dvd and it's really quite poor. The screenshots at Orgazmik suggest that the TVX edition has considerably better picture quality. In terms of its completeness, I quizzed a TVX representative some time ago and it sounds like it's uncut. That thread should be in the archives somewhere. [Link]
greybeard Member 181 Posts 8/00	Posted - Feb 6 2008 : 6:56PM Thanks, SDC! I notice both versions list running times of 105 mins, which matches the length of an old VHS I have. Looks like at least _some_ folks aren't afraid of the "implied" subject matter here! [Link]
Flash Golden Age Classic 11018 Posts 5/01	Posted - Feb 6 2008 : 11:17PM I have both, the TVX version is better than the ABA version, but not by yards, neither one would I consider to be a great picture. As for the TVX version being uncut I think that's luck more than anything else as some of their discs are heavily edited. I think they use whatever VHS master they can find. [Link]
fatalbert Member Diagonally parked in a parallel universe 576 Posts 5/03	Posted - Feb 7 2008 : 1:17PM Have the TVX version. Don't know about ABA or tape versions, but on this one, with the exception of a couple of well-filmed BJs, it looked like both cameraman and editor had plenty of meth on hand (or, as I commented to a friend, looked like they strapped a camera to the head of an epileptic chihuahua and just turned him loose on the set). [Link]

greybeard Member 181 Posts 8/00	Posted - Feb 11 2008 : 9:12AM Thanx also to Flash and FatAlbert! Flash, I know what you mean about quality not being a hallmark of some of the DVD classic porn output. A lot of it depends on what was used for the Master, and a lot of people over-compress or over-noise-reduce the video during mastering. Witness the awful job TVX did with "For the Love of Pleasure." Even if it's a short running time, and a single-layer disc, some outfits over-compress the video resulting in a lot of artifacts and lousy picture. FatAlbert, I think you're reacting to Alex de Renzy's normal directing and editing style. He liked to get lots of angles, and, if I'm not mistaken, sometimes ran two cameras -- one or both hand-held -- to get lots of "grab" shots. One thing he never overlooked was making sure you saw a lot of "reaction" shots, especially of the women's faces during sex scenes. As one of the "pantheon" classic directors, he recognized the importance of showing the participants "enjoying" what was happening, rather than just locking his camera on his actors' sex organs grinding away. He also tried to vary his editing pace to the style of the scene at hand -- either relaxed and gentle, or very frenetic (as in the "Going for the Record" marathon with Kristine Heller). [Link]
fatalbert Member Diagonally parked in a parallel universe 576 Posts 5/03	Posted - Feb 11 2008 : 1:19PM Well, greybeard, I'm sure DeRenzy attained great "artistry" in his camera and editing techniques, but IMO he exemplified the worst instincts of directors in the classic era. I stipulate the fact that these guys were targeting a theater audience, and that there were other mitigating factors involved but, as one who acquires porn for the purpose of stroking to well-filmed sex scenes, I maintain that DeRenzy and his contemporaries had any consideration of this factor at the very bottom of their priority list. Witness the frenetic pace of quick-cut closeups with seldom a full-body shot in evidence, and then only for 2 seconds or at a bad angle. Artistry? Yes, perhaps. Stroke material? Well, maybe for those with the attention span of a dog-pecker gnat. I love the women of the era, and still seek out classics with eternal hope, but I've sadly concluded that the classic era -- and most notably Babyface -- was one mostly of lost opportunity. [Link]
john lyons Senior Member Co-founder of Vinegar Syndrome 1188 Posts 1/08	Posted - Feb 11 2008 : 8:08PM fatalbert wrote: I stipulate the fact that these guys were targeting a theater audience, and that there were other mitigating factors involved but, as one who acquires porn for the purpose of stroking to well-filmed sex scenes, I maintain that DeRenzy and his contemporaries had any consideration of this factor at the very bottom of their priority list. Click to expand DeRenzy was unique in his style of cutting which was much closer to the frenzied editing of Russ Meyer and his contemporaries. I think the mistake being made here is the assumption on your and many other people's parts that a film which includes explicit sex in inherently intended to be "stroke material." I think it's very accurate to say that many filmmakers working in the 1970s had making a good film as their main priority rather than making good stroke material. Those who have been dined on mainly video age smut might find it hard to swallow that many 70s filmmakers were no more concerned with making a movie with sex in it any more than they were concerned with making a sex film with a story. They simply wanted to make MOVIES! [Link]
BlackSix All-Star Member pornography wasn't sex but fantasies of an impossibly hospitable world 12377 Posts 9/07	Posted - Feb 12 2008 : 5:28AM Not to mention that what one finds 'strokeworthy' is mediated through the very act of watching porn: i.e. no one had a problem jerking off to porn in the classic era, it is only in comparison to today's porn that it seems less effective. I think watching a lot of porn conditions the viewer to expect and desire certain things, that's why it can become so mechanical and formulaic, and why the raincoater crowd is so resistant to anything 'different' in their porn. [Link]
fatalbert Member Diagonally parked in a parallel universe 576 Posts 5/03	Posted - Feb 12 2008 : 2:25PM I fully agree with both of you. But, considering some of the wonderful women performing back then, of whom I'm now lucky to see at most 2 seconds'-worth of any decent full-body shot in a BG sex scene, I still feel passionate in bemoaning "what might have been." Yeah, I know, it doesn't do me or anyone a damn bit of good, It just behooves me to bitch and whine about it. [Link]
greybeard Member 181 Posts 8/00	Posted - Feb 12 2008 : 6:40PM Very interesting thread we've got going here! First, at the risk of putting a slightly different spin on an old saying, I'm glad that the porn industry puts out enough varied product to provide different "strokes" for different folks! Some like chocolate, some like vanilla and some strawberry, and so each has his or her own preferences and dislikes. I'd be the last to say any one style is inherently better than another, or to put down anyone who prefers something I myself dislike. It's truly up to the eye (and organ!) of the beholder! As indicated by my name here, I was already a young adult when the modern porn industry was born with films such as "Deep Throat," "The Devil in Miss Jones" and "Behind the Green Door." At that time, you went to a theater to watch porn, and the closer the films were in style to "mainstream" cinema, the better. The best porn directors (IMHO, of course) used the styles and techniques of their "mainstream" counterparts to produce "complete" erotic experiences. Script, story, acting, editing and style were all combined with the sexual activities shown to both entertain and arouse the viewer. The idea was to try to get you involved with the characters and situations, to better share their emotional and sexual experiences. Often, because of limited acting skills and budgets, their efforts fell far short of the "mainstream" product they were emulating, but the best directors often achieved excellent results (and audience "wood" or "wetness")! This was quite a number of years before people like John Stagliano and, later, Seymore Butts began taking advantage of less expensive and cumbersome video equipment to help foster the "Gonzo" style of porn, with its heightened sense of "immediacy" and diminished need for stories or "film-style" techniques. I do believe, though, that the best of them, like Stagliano and Butts, largely due to their "first-person" style of presentation, still got you involved enough and were talented enough as video artists to please such "jaded" or "old-fashioned" tastes as mine! As far as "full-body" shots are concerned (again, IMHO), I'd have to say that there were a lot of them in "classic" porn. Perhaps de Renzy didn't use as many, but people like Henry Paris/Radley Metzger (who did some wonderfully erotic softcore films as well), Edwin Brown/Durrell, Bob Chinn and, later, John Leslie along with a number of others knew the power of showing the full bodies of folks like Annette Haven, Abigail Clayton, Constance Money, Lesllie Bovee, C.J. Laing, Amber Hunt and many more. Also, in a very different style of film- and video-making, I'd point out the work of Andrew Blake and his beautifully photographed bodies of people like Zara Whites, Tori Welles, Janine Lindemulder, Kelly O'Dell and many others. It is a crime that the DVDs of Blake's early work are such terrible transfers. I have Blake's first eight films on laserdisc and they (and the women) are simply gorgeous! Sorry this turned into my two "dollars" rather than "cents," but I felt it was worth getting this out on the table. [Link]
john lyons Senior Member Co-founder of Vinegar Syndrome 1188 Posts 1/08	Posted - Feb 12 2008 : 7:24PM Greybeard, insight about older films from the people who actually saw them in theatres is always appreciated. I definitely agree that full body shots were the norm in the 70s and early 80s, but there was also a lot more match cutting (i.e. going from a wide shot of something to a closeup of the ame action then cutting back to the wide shot). Then of course there were always films like Eruption (which I've seen on the big screen and let me tell you, the CU of bovee getting licked is SCARY!)... [Link]
BlackSix All-Star Member pornography wasn't sex but fantasies of an impossibly hospitable world 12377 Posts 9/07	Posted - Feb 14 2008 : 5:24AM fatalbert wrote: But, considering some of the wonderful women performing back then, of whom I'm now lucky to see at most 2 seconds'-worth of any decent full-body shot in a BG sex scene, I still feel passionate in bemoaning "what might have been." Click to expand I do know what you mean: a gonzo style scene of Desiree Cousteau or Leslie Bovee would be amazing. [Link]
fatalbert Member Diagonally parked in a parallel universe 576 Posts 5/03	Posted - Feb 14 2008 : 1:58PM Jeez, I really don't want to seem endlessly negative, but while (IMO) the classic directors got the beauty of the girls captured, and missed the boat as to filming sensibly shot-and-edited sex scenes (again IMO), the modern gonzo directors seem mostly to be coarse frat boy types whose (apparently) last consideration is capturing the beauty and erotic appeal of the girls they film. I just see a lot of Hey, look what I can do with the zoom on this thing-type explicitness, fisheye views, a preponderance of views from what looks to be the floor vent ... IMO an utter disregard for photographic flattery of the girl. Outrageousness trumps eroticism, it seems. You guys all have valid views, while I grow increasingly certain that there is, nor never has been, an era (or genre) of porn that really gets it right. What keeps me searching (while moaning and bitching, and generally making everyone else miserable) is that, just every once in a while -- whether accidental or not -- someone, for a rare luminous minute-or-so, gets it just right. Ah, bliss. [Link]
john lyons Senior Member Co-founder of Vinegar Syndrome 1188 Posts 1/08	Posted - Feb 14 2008 : 5:26PM fatalbert wrote: You guys all have valid views, while I grow increasingly certain that there is, nor never has been, an era (or genre) of porn that really gets it right. Click to expand Gets what right? In so far as how sex was shot in the 70s (and early 80s) as opposed to today, the 70s/80s shot it more naturally with much more attention payed to the psychological aspects and facial expressions and not as much to endless close-ups. Starting in the video age, sex lost really any interesting cinematographic aspects it had had and was reduced to a series of dull repetitive acts. The few modern features I've seen have been tedious to the point that I fast forward over every sex scene because they get in the way of the rest of the film. Sex today is shot so disgustingly and tediously with no attention to aesthetic detail. [Link]

BlackSix All-Star Member pornography wasn't sex but fantasies of an impossibly hospitable world 12377 Posts 9/07	Posted - Feb 15 2008 : 1:30AM fatalbert wrote: Jeez, I really don't want to seem endlessly negative, but while (IMO) the classic directors got the beauty of the girls captured, and missed the boat as to filming sensibly shot-and-edited sex scenes (again IMO), the modern gonzo directors seem mostly to be coarse frat boy types whose (apparently) last consideration is capturing the beauty and erotic appeal of the girls they film. Click to expand In general I agree, but there are some exceptions, Mason's latest films are very well shot and erotic. [Link]
fatalbert Member Diagonally parked in a parallel universe 576 Posts 5/03	Posted - Feb 15 2008 : 1:36PM john lyons wrote: Gets what right? Click to expand I happily admit to a utilitarian view of porn. I respect the fact that many here look to porn for fully rounded entertainment, i.e., plot, set-ups, costumes, humor, and so on. That's fine but, as I've posted elsewhere, if I want a well-staged and -filmed, interesting bit of cinema, I rent a Scorsese movie because, frankly, I've never seen anything other than straight-sex scenes in porn that wasn't beyond lame. So I acquire porn only for the sex -- preferably with a preponderance of full-body, upright, more-than-2-second shots that do not suffer from quick-cut, artsy-fartsy (missing the point, IMO) camera and editing techniques. So, with the cheerful admission that I therefore shouldn't even be posting in the Feature Side, I respect your more holistic view of porn, but don't share it. [Link]
fatalbert Member Diagonally parked in a parallel universe 576 Posts 5/03	Posted - Feb 15 2008 : 1:41PM BlackSix wrote: Mason's latest films are very well shot and erotic. Click to expand Thanks, BlackSix. Being the eternal optimist I am, I'll search out "Mason" at IAFD and my rental company to see what he/she has to offer. [Link]
BlackSix All-Star Member pornography wasn't sex but fantasies of an impossibly hospitable world 12377 Posts 9/07	Posted - Feb 16 2008 : 7:03PM Note, her latest films are under the name Sam No. As far as features, have you watched the best of the 70s classics? I find so many quick to dismiss the possibility of a good porno feature but then they've never bothered to seek out the films of Graver, Spinelli, De Renzy, Weston, Cecil Howard, etc so how would they know what a really good feature is like? [Link]

Babyface (TVX)