This one gets everything right. Schoolgirl - check! Flash of panties - check! Simple, uncluttered layout: check!
Liverpool's eleventh year, and they were still producing great cover art.
I've always enjoyed their penchant for seedy, almost grotesque business types.
Long-running series. Cover prices for porno pulps were always more than twice that of regular literature.
At least they were cheaper than hookers! And much better value.
Not sure how Nancy Reagan got roped into posing for this cover, but it makes for a bizarre piece of anti-erotic art -- for me, at least. Nancy fetishists may violently disagree.
I guess Ronnie was cool with Nancy chasing Alfred E. Nueman-type schoolboys.
From the mid-70's to the late 80's, beasty porn was a genre that wouldn't lie down.
Inspired by European animal loops from the likes of Color Climax, Scandi Film, Gold Medal, and Chick (Holland), this 'last taboo' was thoroughly explored in porno pulps of the period.
Although bestiality media is now being produced in Brazil and Japan for an internet market, the world at large seems less comfortable with it.
Another terrific Liverpool cover with a military bent.
I've always been a Gibson fan. He's a true Hollywood Man of Violence in the tradition of greats like Lee Marvin and Robert Mitchum. I'm quite keen on his directorial efforts, too.
Although I was not terribly impressed by The Passion of the Christ when it first parted the cultural heavens, I've since come to admire it. Essentially, it's one of the greatest bible-sploitation films ever made. Mel took an untouchable biblical "event" and turned it into a a rousing blood and guts show. And he did it with style and verve. On top of that, he managed to get the church to run his publicity machine, the result being a monstrous box office windfall. When was the last time the church got behind a film so riddled with torture and dismemberment?
He stepped up next with Apocalypto, a rousing, bloody, action-adventure with a potent historical context and a dazzling storytelling style. And it was in a nearly dead language for Chrissakes! I respect that.
Gibson, a cop, investigates the death of his daughter in Martin Campbell's Edge of Darkness, a simplified feature version of a taut British miniseries (also helmed by Campbell).
Not as fascinating as the miniseries because there just isn't time to expand on the juicydetails, but it works fairly well as a slow burning, stripped-back revenge thriller. Mel is less hysterical than you might think from the trailers, and the action is not non-stop; there's quite a bit of chat, and there is a great turn from Ray Winstone playing a Mr. Fix-It type.
Since my favorite film starring Gibson of recent memory is Payback (the Point Blank remake), I couldn't help but compare the experience of watching both. Payback was much more fun and far more lurid, but Edge is still a worthy entry in the Gibson canon. He's still got presence and a trembling sense of unpredictability to burn.
Speaking of burning, John Stagliano ('Buttman') can singe the screen with his fine pornographic choices. His movies are hot because he loves what he's doing. With Stagliano, you get the impression that he'd be doing it whether he was making a buck or not.
His latest directing effort, Buttman's Beautiful Brazilian Ass, showcases the anal assets of a bevy of hot, fun-loving, Brazilian women. As is the Buttman style, the roaming camera leers, pokes, prods, and explores these women as Stagliano himself is heard moaning and editorializing.
He's the bone at home in every sense of the word.
Brazil is a favorite playground of Stagliano and his Evil Angel empire, and it's easy to see why he prefers it to Los Angeles. The attitude to sex is much more open down there, and the women he chooses (and that's the trick!) have an unbridled passion for shameless debauchery.
Best carnal turn here comes from the volcanic Monica Santhiago, an insatiable sex goddess whose fairytale curves will drop your jaw.
Aspects of this entry may disturb some viewers, however. Although Stagliano is not traditionally associated with the rougher side of porn, his foray into harder hardcore here is a paint-stripping effort. Actress Bella, who can certainly hold her own, engages in a brutal sequence where she is slapped, choked, pinched, punched and pounded while being drilled. It feels odd to see this in a Stagliano film, and I'm not sure it's what his disciples crave, but it's Stag's flick, and Stag can do what Stag wants with Stag's flick (he is, as a devotee of Ayn Rand, the Howard Roark of Pornography afterall).
Personally, although I find the rough stuff interesting from a psychological viewpoint, I don't enjoy seeing beautiful, sexy, voracious women at the receiving end of, admittedly, consensual abuse. The 'Buttman' I know worships women like this, and is usually reduced to a whimpering wreck in their presence.
Still, Buttman's Beautiful Brazilan Ass is a walk on the wild side with a master.
I enjoyed director Pierre Morel's Taken very much. It was paced to perfection, staged with skill, and exceptionally well acted by Liam Neeson.
From Paris With Love, Morel's latest, isn't near as much fun. Ironically, it's played for fun.
Maybe that why it's so not so enjoyable.
Jonathan Rhys Meyers is teemed up with Vinnie Barbarino (Travolta) to stop some bad guys from killing diplomats and disrupting an international summit. Meyers is a greenhorn and Travolta is an effective loose cannon who does stuff like smuggling his favorite gun through the airport's security devices.
It looks like Vinnie and Meyers had a great time making this movie, but I didn't have such a good time watching it. The action sequences are curiously ho-hum in execution, and the non-stop banter between Vinnie and Meyers gets a bit irritating. Did the "fun" approach relax everybody too much? The whole kit and caboodle just feels slack.
I should have relaxed and enjoyed the nonsense for what it was, right? Hey, I was relaxed, and I tried to enjoy it, I really did -- but. I wasn't exactly bored, but I wasn't nailed to the seat, either.
As Morel's follow-up to Taken, From Paris With Love shot me with a silencer.
This fairly obscure curio is also known as Metti lo diavolo tuo ne lo mio inferno (Put Your Devil In My Hell).
I saw it many, many years ago in a small Melbourne art cinema, and remember little about it except that it was a very erotic British-style sex farce from Italy with a lot more sex and nudity.
Clearly inspired by The Decameron, Canterbury Tales, and their ilk.
And, yes, there is a friar who is trying to get into the panties of an attractive blond woman, but this token hypocrite spends much of his time ostracizing others for wanting her.
Working under the pseudonym of Albert Thomas, director Bitto Albertini also directed Black Emanuelle and Yellow Emanuelle.
His strangest film is probably Giochi erotici nella 3a galassia (aka Escape from Galaxy 3 aka Starcrash II). A bold move was blending light erotic material into a movie ostensibly aimed at kids. Unfortunately, the lovely Caroline Munro did not make an appearance.
The Put Your Devil in My Hell poster, which I recently found on-line, is stunning, so I thought I'd share it.
I Stand Alone is truly one of the greatest, harshest, funniest, and most brutal films ever made.
Director Gasper Noe followed it up with Irreversible and Enter The Void.
The film's protaganist, 'The Butcher' (Phillipe Nahon) is a chap I'd love to spend some time with. His world view is cynical and as raw as a freshly fucked orifice.
I was fascinated by a recent Gasper Noe interview (from Britain) in which Noe cited the relentless voiceover of Gerald Kargl's mind-bending Angst as being the inspiration for the relentless voiceover used by 'The Butcher' in I Stand Alone.
It's an extremely interesting and understandable revelation because the voiceovers of both movies serve to undermine and counterbalance what we're seeing on-screen. They don't simply underline what we're seeing.
Angst, a sadly obscure film, also influenced some of I Stand Alone's stylistic flourishes.
In the film's climactic moments, 'The Butcher' becomes disoriented after he's engaged in sexual relations with a family member. Noe conveys the mental state of 'The Butcher' by attaching a camera rig to his body. The rig mimics the erratic movements of the character, and, by design, puts us inside his head.
In Angst, director Gerald Kargl conveys his character's instability with a similar rig.
This, of course, was done fifteen years before Noe used the concept in I Stand Alone.
Although Angst and I Stand Alone share some stylistic similarities, they are very much the works of original, uncompromising artists.
I do find it curious that the protaganists of both films fail to bite as savagely as they bark.
Kargl's killer, just released from jail, plans an unholy rampage that he fails to pull off.
Noe's 'Butcher' has fantasies of revenge that are thwarted by fate and his own confusion.
Both characters have spent time in jail, and, as a result, are trying to make it in a world that appears to have passed them by.
Their violent actions represent a desire to be acknowledged and taken seriously.
The films are masterpieces, and would make a perfect double feature.
Prior to Xmas, I was kindly invited by the actress Renae Boult to attend a performance of Dennis Paoli's Nevermore, "An Evening With Edgar Allan Poe". Directed by Stuart Gordon, who was in attendance, and starring Jeffrey Combs, I found it quite mesmerizing.
As you can see in this beautiful portrait of Poe by talented and underrated photographer Ward Boult, Combs' resemblance to Poe is quite uncanny.
The actor's reading of The Tell-Tale Heart and The Raven were especially striking in light of the fact that they have been done to death over the years. Combs brings a startling authority to these pieces that made them sound as if he were composing them out loud for the first time.
Ward Bolt's striking portrait of Poe (Jeffrey Combs)
I have seen Poe performed before, but never with such disarming physicality and humor. Yes, there is some self-deprecating humor sprinkled throughout the initial stages of the play, and this negates the usual stodginess often associated with the character.
Writer Paoli wrote Gordon's ep of Masters of Horror, 'The Black Cat', as well as Re-animator, Dagon, Castle Freak, and Abel Ferrara's excellent version of Body Snatchers.
Watching Combs, you are watching Poe, and Gordon stages everything with unbridled clarity and feeling.
The evening, rubbed thoroughly in alcohol, progresses through readings of stories and poems, and gets especially intimate when Poe discusses the loss of his late wife.
I'm sure the great writer would have approved of this wonderful exhumation.
After the show, I spoke briefly to the genuine Mr. Gordon, and complimented him on Poe and and his recent forays into genre cinema. I also asked him if he'd considered turning Nevermore into a film. He said it's something that's of interest to him.
Unlike so many horror directors we have long admired, Gordon has not succumbed to blandness and rehashes of old successes.
On the contrary, his last three movies have been works of extraordinary originality and energy.
I have so much respect for Stuart Gordon, and it's clear he has much respect for good work.
When I behold the astonishing work of Samura Hiroaki, I reflect on the pointlessness of debating High, Low, and Fine art.
Samura's The Love of the Brute (and Bradherley's Coach, another towering work) are mind-bending ero-gro (guro), and definitely Great Art.
Those who engage in the demeaning practice of relegating works of art to ghettos, galleries and museums often base their judgments on their own personal comfort levels with the subject matter. They seem incapable of evaluating the skill of the artist because they are blinded by the glare of their own inhibitions and they fear the career consequences of championing what they've been schooled to consider "trash".
The solution is to render irrelevant those who ghetto-ize material such as this, those nose-in-the-air tragics handicapped by a moral barometer that has no place in art.
These self-appointed guardians of mainstream acceptability spend their lives canonizing saints of artistic blandness while stitching circles of influence around themselves and their fawning acolytes.
Much of Samura's work, and the work of artists such as Jun Hayami, is unavailable in America because printers refuse to handle it, and most publishers fear the repercussions of publishing it.
What type of free society have we become that we fear written and illustrated expression? Why is freedom so damn conditional these days that the word itself is being redefined?
We should be shot for using it so loosely.
Why have we allowed our tastes and choices to be decided by an invisible cultural dictatorship whose only desire is dominion?
Who canceled the human race, and substituted it with a backwards human crawl to oblivion?
With exceptions, our planet has become a complex support system for frightened, paranoid, uninformed, ignorant lemmings. The exceptions are the fuckers raping these lemmings and a small minority who see it as it really is.
Great art shakes us like a bawling baby and questions everything we've been taught.
It peels the epidermis back and rubs our face in the excrement of our dreams and nightmares.
Most importantly, Art slaps us awake, and reminds us that most of what we know isn't... going... to... fuckin... save us, but it will sure make the journey fascinating.
Samura's The Love of the Brute and Jun Hayami's...
... are remarkable for their purity of vision and total indifference to the irrelevant sensibilities of a world that has exchanged truth with commerce.
Although it's the right of any publisher or printer to refuse to take a job on, the tragedy is that they clearly equate art such as this with criminality and immorality; they're unable to separate the work from the reproduction of the work.
The separation and understanding of the differences between what is private and what is public are keys to why extraordinary art such as this has emerged from Japan.
The production of er-gro (Erotic-Grotesque) art like this is not in any way considered akin to criminal or immoral behavior in Japan. The country has a rich tradition of work of this nature, a tradition launched by a movement in the 20's and 30's. Focusing primarily on the malformed and horrific, it broadened its definition to include sexuality, deviance, and bodily corruption.
And as depicted in these scans, Western cinema has had a potent influence on the genre also. It is impossible to experience these images without reflecting on Ruggero Deodato's Cannibal Holocaust...
... a film whose poster art is re-imagined with glee in the work at the top of the page.
In a peculiar way, ero-gro reinforces the status quo by illuminating its stark opposite (the "corruption" of the status quo), but let's not kid ourselves that it doesn't also express our inner anarchy, and let's not pretend that it doesn't raise a wet, dripping flag of truth about our primal selves. And by existing, I would argue, provides a catharsis.
Without that catharsis... well, you figure it out. Then take a look at sex crime figures in Japan versus sex crime figures in the U.S.
What other so-called High Art does all this so brilliantly?
This one gets everything right. Schoolgirl - check! Flash of panties - check! Simple, uncluttered layout: check!
Liverpool's eleventh year, and they were still producing great cover art.
Long-running series. Cover prices for porno pulps were always more than twice that of regular literature.
Not sure how Nancy Reagan got roped into posing for this cover, but it makes for a bizarre piece of anti-erotic art -- for me, at least. Nancy fetishists may violently disagree.
From the mid-70's to the late 80's, beasty porn was a genre that wouldn't lie down.
Another terrific Liverpool cover with a military bent.
