Pornography

A plot that doesn't sustain any of its premises, and, some artificial, trivial, and, rather unnecessary assemblage of so called 'controversial' situations, we can hardly bare enough to care, before even completing to watch just the first half of this disjointed film. Here, we are never even close to an auteur film's atmosphere, or that of a Lynch's type of 'narrative construction',rather, we are closer to the likes of some lurid tale, confusingly and quickly put together,and, bragging some pretentiousness! And, this is unintentionally(i hope!)carrying the responsibility to cheat even more audiences over the meanings of a truly inspired,and, inspiring, highly artistic, personal piece of film work, with, in this case, whatever preposterous mix of Gay sub culture and wrecked psychological over tones, you may regret trying to follow in the lousy developments,and, dialog, infesting this movie and its lack of firm direction or basic film rules,featuring just some acting that drags performances into almost juvenile portrays,bringing most players down to such a misleading, unfocused state where indicated acting may just come as handy,as it is indeed,the over all,general confusion, and, profane misinterpretation of the failed intents of this production! I can be making excuses for low budgeting,technical difficulties, and, all the detriments that Independent Cinema must unarguably face today to even make it to the completion of a project,but, i cannot making excuses when to hide the lack of identity, and, real personal vision of products, such as this one,someone would use the name "Lynch" as, just an excuse to sell some slow moving, undefined material, as artistically challenging, because that, "Pornography"is not! I personally resented some of the "over heated","tweaked" sequences, written more like keeping in mind a conversation between raunchy costumers of some seedy sex house, rather than having in mind a film that would like to introduce us to a dark thriller with stylish tones! "Pornography"sadly kept reminding me of how transparent were becoming, all of a sudden, the radical but simply basic lines and substantial differences,within such a mess, and, instead,the electrifying, galvanizing experience someone could still get by watching(and,i would quite frankly recommend dearly "re-watching" many greater films, to all of those folks still having doubts on whether,this film has nothing merely even resembling the works of Lynch and of other talented filmmakers, or not, since we should all, at least, be able to understand, how hard it is to accomplish even just a mere impression of those contemporary masters' work, and, with such different creative ideas, cultural back ground's, talent,and,imagination, they must be working with!),something like "Lost Highway" or "Mulholland Drive",or even the out standing works of another great European director, whose name, someone even dared to make, when talking about "Pornography"! Especially unsuitable in this case,in fact, it was to read or hear cited by some, at the time of this film's premiere,the name of extraordinary director, Michelangelo Antonioni (well known in the US, especially,for the frenzy, the trend he established so unforgettably, with the mesmerizing mystery,and virtuoso script,and camera work,carrying his intense,unique "Blow Up"released by MGM back in 1967, when there was still someone truly caring for the cultural faith of this Country),who indeed made also a phenomenal movie about an unusual,unexplainable disappearance of a key character, bringing up events, eventually going much deeper inside the interiors,and "the reality", to the point of introducing,a completely new story,from the one the movie had originally started with! That glorious achievement "L'Avventura",was shot in Italy in early 1960,and,still gives incredible thought provoking thrills,and, many reasons for collective meditations over the never ending links between filmmaking,and representation of relationships, cheating, alienation, and, other social commentaries,including last,but, not least,a disease we all may experience and share at various levels today, called incommunicable feelings'despair. Again, quite frankly, after having watched such ineptitude,just the thought of such directors,and, subjects,feels out of place and utterly embarrassing, since Antonioni's,and, Lynch's works, in my opinion,should just not even be mentioned, when going through the motions of "Pornography", ultimately, becoming only just fine example of how lost and awry a movie project with, maybe even too many ambitions, considering the material's potentials, may so tragically turn out to be,at the end. I could also object that Lynch has never even edited a nonsense shot,like the many abominable ones we have gotta sit through here, but, at the contrary, how there's always plenty of heartfelt,visionary,meditative moments,and, insightful,layered content, able to introduce anyone into a new World, new experiences,and, philosophical journeys opening up new horizons to our lives and minds. But, why shall i even bother to go on? Would i be doing any good? I obviously don't have anything against daring, independent producers and directors,quite, at the contrary, love and try to route for, prize, and, always welcome all the works of new talented folks, even when not all completely accomplished, such as the films of P.T. Anderson,but, even those of Steve McQueen,John Cameron Mitchell,Van Sant,or of Todd Verow,and, Everett Lewis,for example,whose,movies are never less than compelling, but, always taking us through a creative,emotional,and spiritual journey of discovery! In fact, i have even bought and watched "Pornography",in its full entirety, before judging it so harshly! However, it did raise only one important moral question,and, that was just the absurd,but, painfully true misconception, today convincing many to believe, in good or bad faith, to be watching art films,instead of just boring, misguided,and tawdry attempts at exploitative, sporadic,utterly sensationalistic filmmaking.

Okay, I love psychological thrillers. I love gay cinema. I watched this movie and couldn't figure out what in the hell was going on.

First, I couldn't tell who was who. The movie was so poorly lit that I found myself squinting to see what was going on. All of the main characters looked the same - I guess it was to link the three phases of the movie together to show the different dynamics of the same issue, but good Lord. Turn the lights up so I can distinguish between the leads.

The story was so full of holes and there was nothing intertwining the different stories. It was like they couldn't figure out what direction the movie was going in. I felt the movie should have ended 5 times before it was truly over.

I feel like hours of my life were sucked away and I will never get them back. It wasn't even a movie that was so deep that I reflect on it later. I watched it until the end and all I could say was, "What in the hell was this movie about?"

The first half of the film is pretty exciting, let be a bit cheesy, but that's part of the genre. Then it just gets weird in a "it was just a dream - or was it?" kind of way. Boring.

I got the impression the writer didn't believe in his own script, thinking the basic story was too over the top to make it on its own. So he made a twist to save face as a serious movie-maker. Or something like that.

Sorry to be so negative about it, but just like another reviewer pointed out, this movie could have been so good with so little extra work done to it.

Technically it was well done, the acting/directing is okay too, I really just object to the script.

This is the first review i have written about a movie but I felt the need to share my utter disappointment with this film. I love watching gay films because a lot of them are low budget and poorly done which makes them that more interesting to watch. This film however left me lost and I spent more time trying to figure out where people were then watching the movie. It finally dawned on me that we had jumped to a completely different story all together...so glad it was made clear we were jumping stories. As one of the other reviews put it, with proper directing, this could have been a really good thriller and could have gone far. As it is now though, it just sucks and not worth your time.

While I normally enjoy pornography of all kinds when it is done in a documentary way; it is not palatable when one adds a plot which does not have a way of telling a complete story. This is that kind of film. The writer/director, apart from having an obvious love for film and its techniques and auteurs by the dozens, he only picks bits and pieces from some of his favorites, and then writes a story that should have been storyboarded, in order to even play homage to his most often used,enigmatic and "surprise/plot" directors. Hitchcock would have thought this the longest trailer in history......as a matter of fact, the movie IS a long trailer. I yearned for reason, as well as reason for casting, for lighting, for a clarity, and for ONE interesting character. What a bunch of bores the writer wrote. Who the hell cares? It sounds homophobic, but gay films must learn to realize that the serious subjects are always going to deal with "gay" and its problems, and MUST not try and take itself seriously. Lesbian films succeed because they are willing to take chances with honesty and anti heterosexual subjects.