In the comment of my post from 2005 The Porn Monster I wrote the following:
Whatever what label they’re given, my films are made on the hope that, like me, there are many people, both women and men, who find that the moving images of sex they’ve seen rarely rise even to the point of being offensive, and more often such depictions are merely boring; and that if I’m going to ask these people to sit for an hour, I’m going to have to remember that not everyone will desparately endure any sort of cinematic travisty just to see a little fucking. (In fact, I think many, pehaps most people won’t.)
Three years and five films later, there is mounting evidence that I am not alone in my feelings about the collision of sex and the moving image. Writes Goose, of TheGooseAndTheGander.blogspot.com:
I, generally speaking, am not a fan of traditional porn. I’ve tried it many times, much as I’ve tried foods I don’t like just to see if I’ve finally developed a taste. Every few years or so, I’ll come back to the porn well, ladle up a movie or two and watch. Sometimes alone, sometimes with Gander. And the result is quite usually the same. Some mild amusement or arousal, laughter, leading to an acute sense of unease mingled with doubt of my sexual progressiveness, all ending up in a morass of academic thought on feminism, power and sexuality. And no sex during or after.
So much for “traditional porn”, but what about “alternative porn, Goose?
I’m not a huge connoisseur of alternative erotica and porn, either. There is likely tons out there that is of extremely high quality, tender, humorous etc. I just haven’t found it. What I’ve seen usually makes me feel pessimistic about sex and sexual education, and openness and women’s rights, and so I usually don’t go looking around for it. This makes me kind of sad, cause I do actually like watching sexual activity.
I suppose this is where Goose feels like a blasphemer, and I guess I do too. I want to like “alternative porn”; all the explanation of why it was made and how it was made, peppered with words like “empowerment” and “agency” hit the right notes. But when the rubber hits the road… No, just no. I don’t see it on the screen. I see the same lack of craft, the same inattention to detail that I see in “traditional porn”.
Leaving the film-craft aside, I just don’t understand the attitudes being expressed about sex, connection, love. Maybe around the edges of the frame I can hear the echo of something familiar, but mostly I see a disconnectedness that leaves me cold. I think, “Is this how the people who made this movie really feel about sex?” Sometimes that makes me feel angry. Sometimes it makes me feel like a freak. Sometimes, like Goose, it makes me feel sad.
I decided to purchase a movie from Comstock Films, after hearing really good things about them from a friend. We watched Matt and Khym: Better Than Ever last night, and I have to say I came away from the viewing with a really renewed sense of hope surrounding sex positivity. They were a happy couple, a lovely couple, and you could see how much they cared for each other’s pleasure, how long they’d been together, how delighted they were. The movie was filmed beautifully as well and I can only imagine the excellent and ethical communication skills and fierce vision needed to build trust and comfort between producer and participant, cinematographer and performer to create something really intimate.
Intimacy. That’s what’s so missing from the cinematic artifacts of my so-called sex-positive culture, at least that’s how it seems to me. And sometimes I feel like maybe I’m the oddball for finding it’s absence so conspicuous; like there’s something strange about me for craving imagery the reflects my sexual reality; that sex is consequential.
And I feel like a bit of a blasphemer for calling it out.
