^The most exciting thing to me about 7 Into Snowy was the ending credits where the Pleasure Chest gets mentioned.If memory serves me correctly I purchased this film at the Pleasure Chest in West Hollywood on Santa Monica Blvd and they were displaying a lot of titles in display racks from VCA Pictures and had them on sale in small little boxes.I made a lot of great buys 7 Into Snowy was not one of my better purchases and my reason for purchasing it was Abigail Clayton. Edited by - mcewan on 2/6/2011 10:58:12 PM
I did the exact same thing through the second half. I really liked Faye and James's scene, as well as the threesome with Mr. Pete. Looking back, it was a good feature and has some staying power. I enjoyed Pornstar Superheroes the most though, but I should probably watch Speed on my own (watched it hosting a party, stoned.) No I am not Charlie Sheen.
I finally watched Teenage Twins remastered (part of the After Hours boxset). It's a fun film, horribly acted but charming -- I love movies with stilted shit-talking heroines. My co-watcher put it astutely when he said "It's like Bat Pussy, but coherent." Oh, and now I've seen it in all it's full film lusciousness, I take back my assertions that they aren't twins. It's pretty obvious when you aren't watching it on a fuzzy VHS transfer.
Finally saw The Devil In Miss Jones: The Resurrecton starring Belladonna. Belladonna was an interesting and surprising choice given she doesn't do features often and tends to go for decidely more hardcore films. A great choice I thought, since I find Bella incredibly interesting in general and generally sexually involved. This is one of many in this series varied and long occasional run. Appears to be the sequal to The New Devil In Miss Jones that starred Savanna Samson. I liked the latter a little more, but luckily Savanna returns in this one, but obviously different. Overall I thought it lacked a little story and was expecting more Savanna than I got. Thought there's be more interacting between Bella and Savanna, like it was with Savanna and Jenna Jameson in The New Devil In Miss jones. Still I really enjoyed watching this film, and watched it several times, which is something I rarely do with a newly found feature film. I thought putting Bella in the lead role was a stroke-of-genius, and hope more studios start thinking outside their normal inside boxes. Edited by - aplus on 2/10/2011 1:22:01 PM
She was also a fine performer in Pirates 2: Stagnetti's Revenge, one of the comparatively few recent features I have watched. The movie was better than I expected, and Belladonna a sizeable part of the reason why.
^Pirates II is miles ahead of the first iteration. Belldonna's scene with Jesse Jane is one for the annals while her scene with Sasha Grey and Evan Stone is incredible in its own right.
pornography wasn't sex but fantasies of an impossibly hospitable world 12377 Posts 9/07
Posted - Feb 13 2011 : 5:16AM
Little Part of Me - Part of New Sensations new 'Romance' series, this is clearly crafted as 'couples porn' and it largely works. The storyline is pretty corny, Bobbi Starr loses her lover/husband (a flashback may have helped in building this up) and to help get over it she visits three guys who received her man's eyes, lungs and heart. The acting, aside from the occasionally wooden line, is quite good, which surprised me as most of the cast I know more from gonzo: Zoe Voss, Allie Haze, Kimberly Kane. The men are all handsome and decent actors, Mark Davis stands out here for his understated acting as does Kid Vegas for his more OTT comedic character. This is well shot and edited, looking a lot better than most cable softcore, and the director James Avalon isn't afraid to use shadows in one of the sex scenes (Kimberly Kane and Danny Mountain). The sound here tends to be quite well recorded, but there are a few scenes that have that slightly hollow 'house sound.' Porn in general, but features in particular need to up its game when it comes to sound recording. Surprisingly for a 'couples porn' feature the best part of this flick is the sex. A warning to some, all these scenes feature condoms, and as I mentioned earlier the KK scene does use some shadows, although to me that just makes the foreplay sexier and everything is visible once the 'action' kicks in. But then, those who would refuse to watch any porn with condoms are probably not interested in a feature oriented towards women anyway. Voss, Haze and Kane's sex scenes are all hot and there's a definite emphasis on foreplay and naturalistic sex that I really appreciated. The decision to end every scene with a pop shot onto the woman's bush gets a tad predictable, but hey, at least all four actresses are sporting some sexy bush! Bobbi Starr looks absolutely amazing in this btw, seeing her in more everyday dress only emphasizes just how gorgeous she really is, unfortunately I found her scene with Davis' a little less sexier than the previous scenes. Not a bad scene by any means, and those who like seeing older men with younger women will probably enjoy it a lot more than I did.
I checked out New Sensations' Romance line with A Little Part of Me and Almost Heaven (reviews coming tomorrow). Both are very nicely done and do a great job of showing that couples porn can be done without seeing how far the action can be toned down. The story is nicely done in each and the cast does every bit as good with the acting and story as they do with the sex. I'm definitely looking forward to more of the Romance line after these two. "I do not as a rule seek advice about food from thin people..." - Jeffrey Steingarten
pornography wasn't sex but fantasies of an impossibly hospitable world 12377 Posts 9/07
Posted - Feb 16 2011 : 5:51PM
Read your reviews Astroknight, I agree with pretty much everything you said about A Little Part of Me, looks like I should check out Almost Heaven, especially since it has the super-cute Brooke Lee Adams in it!
Definitely check it out as I think I liked Almost Heaven a little better. I have to agree on Brooke Lee Adams as well. I'll check out pretty much anything she's in after seeing her in a couple different movies lately. "I do not as a rule seek advice about food from thin people..." - Jeffrey Steingarten
I just finished watching Vampire Sex Diaries (review coming sometime this week), and I was very impressed. It's a great blend of sex, style, and story and I'm really looking forward to seeing more from Gary Orona because of it. "I do not as a rule seek advice about food from thin people..." - Jeffrey Steingarten
Finally watched Cry Wolf after I don't know how many good mentions read here. Enjoyed it quite a lot. Most telling clue? I didn't hit FF once. That's a rarity. I was tempted to during one sex scene but held strong. What I particularly liked was how Alexander/Marcus had a couple of sex scenes cut in a way that we could see the progression of their relationship. That was nice and different. All the cast members held their own when it came to acting and, of course, Steven St. Croix as Leon was totally awesome and funny. Him instructing the three playthings by the poolside was most memorable.
Review up for <i4Some</i. Very well done feature that's definitely worth checking out. "I do not as a rule seek advice about food from thin people..." - Jeffrey Steingarten
Just got through watching a film from 2006 called L.A. Vice. A film I almost avoided due to really bad reviews. Now I should flat say that I tend to view/grade features on a curve far exceeding most reviewers and maybe even fans too. I really enjoyed this film more than I was expecting. It had a female cast that I really really liked all-around, which is rare with me. I like crime dramas, even porn versions. Plus porn is mostly about the sex for me, well the sex ultimately matters the most. There are a few exceptions, but porn is rarely ever "that" good all-around to me. Can't say I really argue with what most critics say from a technical standpoint, but sex-wise it was on point with me, plus I didn't take the plot/storyline that seriously.
Watched Awakening to Love last night (review probably coming sometime next week or maybe this weekend). Another very nice addition to New Sensations' "Romance" line. I've gotta say, I've been really impressed with the "Romance" line, and even though I seem to go into each new one I try with higher expectations each time they're constantly met or exceeded. I can definitely see why other studios are trying to copy what they're doing there. "I do not as a rule seek advice about food from thin people..." - Jeffrey Steingarten
I just watched Budding of Brie and loved it: a funny, stylish, sexy movie with decent acting and a great sense of detail. I am a little sad to say that I was less impressed with the aforementioned Kandi Barbour scene. Partly it was diluted by being interleaved with another scene between Hillary Summers and Jake Teague; the cutting back and forth between the scenes sapped a lot of the heat from both (although the mixing of the two scenes was logical: both were occurring at the same time in separate locations). Both halves were still nice but diminished. (By the way, I always thought Hillary was adorably cute and never disappointed, but Kandi Barbour was in another universe entirely; she looked, if this is possible, even more ravishing in this movie than I ever remember seeing her.) For me, the scene that really stands out is the sizzling g/g with Hillary and Laurien Dominique -- off-the-charts erotic! (Although in the audio commentary, JIm Holliday and Shayla Laveaux ripped on the scene a bit -- just goes to show how tastes differ.) Edited by - alphadachs on 3/10/2011 4:06:04 PM
pornography wasn't sex but fantasies of an impossibly hospitable world 12377 Posts 9/07
Posted - Mar 11 2011 : 2:37AM
I'm watching Lost and Found, the latest Romance release, but haven't finished it yet. The sex scenes with Lexi Belle and Allie Haze are very good though, a nice mix of gonzo heat and feature sensuality.
Body Heat review is up. It starts very strong and has some very good things going for it, but ultimately I don't think it was long enough to accomplish what it wanted to. If it were three and a half hours long instead of 2 hours and 20 minutes I think it would have been unstoppable, but as it is it's strong but constantly left me wanting more both sexually and with the storyline. "I do not as a rule seek advice about food from thin people..." - Jeffrey Steingarten
pornography wasn't sex but fantasies of an impossibly hospitable world 12377 Posts 9/07
Posted - Mar 16 2011 : 6:35AM
Lost and Found really impressed me, I hope more features continue in this direction. Nicely shot at the level of a low-budget indie, solid acting from all involved, good cinematography (is someone from the mainstream moonlighting?) and well mixed sound. As I mentioned above the sex scenes all generate real heat, especially Lexi and Allie. Also, very rare for a feature these days, the soundtrack is really good, apparently some of it was composed by the director Eddie Powell. The script is cute and slight, but purposefully so and actually had me chuckling a few times, which is more than I can say for most mainstream rom-coms. There is more humour here than in the other Romance features I've seen (Kimberly Kane and her boyfriend are particularly good), and that helps cut back on the corn and make the sweetness all the more effective. While I appreciate the attempt to make porn that is lighter and more fun, it would also be terrific to see someone with this much ambition, skill and care tackle darker material as well. Lexi Bloom has a non-sex role in this by the way and condoms are used in all scenes. Edited by - BlackSix on 3/16/2011 6:40:44 AM
This Ain't Charmed XXX (review probably coming within the next week). Decent casting and production aspects along with some great effort towards the title sequence and initial mood. Unfortunately it's all down there and the movie ends up hovering around mediocrity due to some of the worst camera work I've seen in an Axel Braun release (there's just enough motion to let you know that the camera isn't on a tripod) and a feeling like the production could have used another day or two. By the end it was reminding me both of why many people groan at the mention of a new porn parody and why Axel Braun is a director who you have to give a good budget and time to work with. "I do not as a rule seek advice about food from thin people..." - Jeffrey Steingarten
I watched Bad Girls (Svetlana). It was great, but the ending sort of took it in a direction that dragged things down somewhat. The first two thirds were great though, and I can't get the John Leslie forest shenanigans out of my head!
Driller (full review probably coming by early next week). Fans of classic porn parodies will want to check it out, and although it's not the hottest movie out there it shows so much effort and style that I can't help but encourage anybody who's the least bit interested in it to check it out. "I do not as a rule seek advice about food from thin people..." - Jeffrey Steingarten
Please forgive a wasted post here, but I am trying to figure out how to link to a previous post (sorry, I'm old and technically inferior!), so this is just an experiment. Anyway, I watched Bad Girls not long ago and posted some remarks in another thread, so will try to refer to them: Adult DVD Talk Forum Post So, if that doesn't work, the gist of my thoughts is that I liked it a lot, as much for the beautiful women as anything else. Sorry to trouble dear readers with my experimental forays.
John Leslie (R.I.P.) with an ax chopping wood then fucking the living daylights out of Lee Caroll.That was an incredibly hot scene. What made Bad Girls so good were the actresses that were absolutely gorgeous and only did a handful of films with the exception of Anna Ventura and even she didn't really do all that many.That's what Sventlana and David I. Frazier were know for attractive woman and a lot of nice outdoor locations with their films.
I just reviewed Nica Noelle's THE TEACHER V0LUME 2 (2010) with CHEATERS RETREAT 2 enroute. I like how Nica handles sex scenes but this edition does not really have a resolution and it's hard to tell whether these characters are going to return for the next edition a la the cast of CHEATERS RETREAT returning for the second edition. Anyway, I liked the second hour of THE TEACHER 2 best with Nica blending two sex scenes into a summer school session for failing students scenario.
Indeed! What was striking to me was how much it felt like a (hetero) woman's fantasy. This is obviously personal opinion, but there was something about the way it was shot (and I mean aside from lingering slo-mo shots of shirtless John Leslie chopping wood!), the way he just walks away afterward, that made it seem like it was straight out of the fantasy of a woman. Yet, if you presume porn is "for men" then it would read very differently. Interesting stuff.
Astroknight, I just got through reading your review of DRILLER and I was a bit confused by what you meant by this sentence in your assessment of the A/V quality: "There's a little grain, but this is an older movie that was shot on film and when one factors that in the picture looks remarkably clear." I might have misunderstood what you're trying to say, but the implication I got was that the fact that this movie was shot on film, the picture isn't as "sharp" as a newer, SOV production. If this is what you're implying, that's not the case. 35mm film has more image detail than any camera being used to shoot contemporary porn is capable of delivering (the much overhyped Red camera has a 35mm sensor and can create an image with 35mm -like detail, but very few porn movies are shot on a Red). The reason so many people think that 16 and 35mm XXX productions look like shit is because the companies that release them don't bother transferring them from pristine prints or negatives, but rather from 3/4 inch (or 1 inch) tape. Companies like VCX and Caballero couldn't care less about restoring their films and are happy to dump them on barebones DVDs. Therefore, most older XXX films look like shit on DVD. Not because they were poorly made, underlit, etc., let alone the completely untrue notion that 35mm film is "lower quality" then video. See a 70s/80s XXX feature projected in a theatre, on 35mm, and it'll look like a REAL MOVIE. That's something that modern porn has yet to really accomplish. Sorry to rant on about this.
But from my understanding, to make film look that good also takes a heck of a lot of money which is why most shot on film adult features leave plenty to be desired when it comes to picture quality. For that reason, video has normally given a better picture quality for most releases. "I do not as a rule seek advice about food from thin people..." - Jeffrey Steingarten
It takes money to make ANYTHING look good, film or video. Video requires just as much quality lighting as film to make it look "good." The reason contemporary porn makers shoot video is 1) they're cheap as hell and video requires minimal experience to get something watchable (though not "good") on screen and 2) modern porn doesn't play in movie theatres. It's true that a hell of a lot one-day-wonders were churned out in the 1970s and early 80s (the film equivalents to contemporary SOV porn), but even they often displayed more technical expertise than 90% of modern smut. Most people confuse "good" lighting with bright and "flat" lighting. Flat lighting just means that everything is evenly lit and in modern SOV porn, that's almost always the case. Everything is usually really bright too. Forgetting about one-day-wonders for a moment, the vast majority or feature length (60 min+) XXX films produced in the 1970s and early 80s were made by professional filmmakers, who didn't just work in XXX, and therefore most feature length hardcore movies had excellent cinematography and lighting which, yes, did cost more, but was seen as a worthwhile investment because they were real films that played in cinemas, not just TV screens. When most XXX features were transferred to tape in the early 80s, the transfers were done as cheaply as possible and the telecines used were less than adequate compared to film to video transfer machines that are available today. The result was a lot of dark or murky and badly cropped VHS tapes, which made it look like film only offered various shades of beige and gray. The same was the case with many early VHS releases of Hollywood films. Look at virtually any tape released pre-1985, of any movie, and you'll see the same bland, nearly monochromatic and muddy look that plagues nearly every DVD release of a shot-on-film XXX film. Starting in the late 80s, Hollywood studios started to run digital transfers for their VHS releases, which is why tapes from the 90s and 2000s look pretty good. Unfortunately, the majority of DVD companies which have released film-shot XXX have neglected to invest in even SD digital transfers of answer prints, let alone negatives and churn out awful looking DVDs using the same masters that resulted in those awful looking VHS tapes. So, I hope that clears up any misconceptions regarding why these movies generally look like shit on DVD. It's all the fault of the DVD companies.
pornography wasn't sex but fantasies of an impossibly hospitable world 12377 Posts 9/07
Posted - Mar 21 2011 : 4:13AM
I agree with John, you only need to look at the amazing crisp quality of the prints that Alpha France releases of their 70s features to realize just how great many of these features really looked on film. At least those shot on 35mm.
As mentioned earlier, I watched Superman XXX and didn't think it was very good. Anyway, I wrote in a bit more detail about why it's not very good (and what stuff is a bit better than not very good) here.
Watched Penthouse's The Orgasm tonight and was extremely pleased. It's a heck of a lot of fun. The plot is light, but Randy Spears and the cast have a lot of fun with it and make it work great (Randy Spears fans really need to check this one out). The sex also fits into the movie well due to the movie being built around a porn shoot. A couple hours later (which included watching and writing up a review for a below average release that left me completely disappointed) and I'm still smiling over this one. "I do not as a rule seek advice about food from thin people..." - Jeffrey Steingarten
I watched Anthony Spinelli's SKIN ON SKIN (1980---!!!!) that's a series of fantasies much like BABYLON PINK (1979---!!!! 1/2) only set in San Francisco instead of NYC. The fantasies don't pack the same punch as they do in Babylon but Spinelli's direction and Jack Remy's cinematography are top-notch. The pairings are loosely connected until John Leslie appears with Eva Hausman (a super cute German in few flicks) in a fine closing fantasy scene that seems sort of tagged on. Mai Lin looks incredible in Jon Martin's fantasy about fucking the ticket agent voice he hears over the phone. Well-done.
I watched the Wildside release of 800 Fantasy Lane. Umm...somebody help me out here. What do these Wildside folks do to their movies? Is this release the same as the original? I know the U.S. dvd is cut, and assume this one is too. But what I'm getting at is whether or not Wildside re-edit and restructure their releases. I can't really explain it, but the structure of all their releases I have seen so far are incoherent and slightly nauseating. Regarding 800 Fantasy Lane, I did not enjoy it. It was incredibly irritating, disorientating in a bad way, and left me feeling like I was gonna puke. I've seen one of the scenes before as part of Forbidden Worlds and didn't feel the same way -- it was the "lion tamer" scene, and I liked it. So, I'm not sure if I hated the film or if I hated this version of the film.
pornography wasn't sex but fantasies of an impossibly hospitable world 12377 Posts 9/07
Posted - Apr 6 2011 : 1:58AM
I haven't seen the Wild Side version of 800 Fantasy Lane but the original film is essentially a 'headtrip' film anyway and makes little to no sense and has a very abrupt ending. Despite that, I liked it, but not as much as other Svetlana films.
^ Hm. The plot thickens. I could tell it was meant to be trippy, but there's something about these dvds. They look beautiful, but so far they feel chopped up and restructured. This might be a placebo effect. The only other I've seen so far is Co-ed Fever, which was ok, but felt very chopped up. I bought a bunch of them (about ten) from Italy, partially for the films and partially for the interviews (some of them are good). I guess I'll go do some research.
Interview, The (All Her Luv) - review by Danielmayu33216
Posted - Feb 6 2011 : 10:56PM
Sorry to trouble dear readers with my experimental forays.