Kink

As a sexual educator and BDSM educator and personal Dom myself, as well as a personal fan of James Franco's, I was delighted to see this movie in the library.

However when I watched it I was appalled from the beginning, and continued to be until about 2/3rds of the way through when I couldn't continue watching.

This movie can hardly be called a documentary because it is NOT educational.

Nor is it a documentary about the kink community and BDSM.

It is a documentary about a pornography company that films BDSM torture scenes.

And from the very beginning you will see the basic rules of safe, sane and consensual being broken by this company. You will watch models have things done to them that they are explicitly saying they DO NOT want done to them.

And worst of all you will be forced to watch sexual torture that you do not know you are signing up to watch and makes you feel that your own consent is being violated.

This film is nothing more than the filming of the filming of hardcore torture and rape pornography, with some commentary from the pornographers, that again is non-educational in nature, and is just their own personal thoughts and opinions and feelings and such.

The movie teaches you absolutely NOTHING about BDSM and Kink Culture, lifestyle or practices. It seems as though its main goal is to shock and appall, which it will for any sensible person who doesn't know that this is not really a documentary, so much as a filming of torture pornography...in which the people are actually being tortured since they aren't even consenting to everything that is being done.

This movie is a great disservice to the kink community. Far worse than 50 shades of grey. I never thought I would say this but shame on you James Franco.

Yes, it's sufficiently well-made to be watchable. Even if the subject is not particularly of your interest (it isn't mine) and you cannot relate (I cannot), it is still a good thing that such documentaries are being made and it is a good thing to be able to experience them at one's leisure.

It's not a great documentary, of course. After all, it simply records a collection of individuals doing their work and, at times, saying their piece. They don't have any "answers" and, frankly, don't need them either. But it is interesting to hear them struggle to explain themselves.

It is also good to see these young people engage as they are on an activity that not long back would have been dangerous, not pretend/consensual dangerous, but really dangerous, as in their lives could have been destroyed on a whim by the narrow-minded. Nowadays, especially the women involved, are no more than simply reluctant and this only due to the caricature that political correctness has made out of feminism. They are on their back foot, yes, but not running away.

Which reminds me, I particularly appreciated the absolute lack of politics. No lobbying, no proselytism, so suasion. This is rare.

Last, Franco has planted a flag with this work. One of a few, by now. Good for him.

I'm giving this documentary a 6. Hope it pleases a little and hurts a little.

It's all great for personal development. What's next???

Christina Voros's Kink is an important documentary and one of the most significant films to profile the porn industry that I have yet to see. Rarely has a porn documentary been able to truly humanize an incredibly popular, albeit far-from-mainstream, genre of pornography, the performers who freely partake in the genre, the interworkings and ethics revolving around the genre, and, finally, the exhausted ideas of porn actively degrading and oppressing women. Here's a film that takes a topic for those who are squeamish and makes it so digestible that even they should be able to pause for a moment and listen to what the film has to say.

Kink profiles the website kink.com, one of the most successful and lucrative porn sites currently on the web. Kink specializes in three different kinds of fetish pornography: bondage and discipline, domination and submission, and sadism and masochism including, but certainly not limited to, the use of cast-iron chains, leather suits, whips, industrial machines with long vibrators and dildos attached to an extended metal pole, and ropes. The website was started by a man named Peter Acworth in his college dormitory and has since become the leading provider in fetish entertainment since the inception of internet pornography. Before this, bondage - often referred to by the acronym BDSM - was largely segregated to the same magazines that glamorized other social taboos, such as swinging and interracial sex.

As an avid fan and viewer of pornography, I will admit that porn, no matter what site you frequent, is largely the same: same positions, same penetration, same actors with similar looks, and same story lines. All of this is true unless you visit the fetish websites (most of which are not for me). Fetish pornography's purpose is to explore the deepest taboos and sexual pleasures people didn't know they had; to leave all inhibitions at the door and explore the darker, more sinister side of human sexuality. Kink follows numerous art directors, film directors, and set designers as they recruit famous porn stars, such as Mr. Marcus, Phoenix Marie, and Francesca Le, to their website and inform them of the kind of sex scenes they are famous for. One particular scene involves casting director Maitresse Madeline showing a group of first-timers what BDSM entails. She explains how it's not pornography, so the only penis-fondling can be in a manner that's teasing or looks to be rather painful. "So you're going to beat me up?," the male talent bluntly asks Madeline. "No, we're going to make love to your butthole," Madeline boldly replies.

Kink.com has a strict code of conduct they pride themselves on in order to churn out not only the best content, but also the most ethical. Van Darkholme, one of the website's regular directors, states how he has always been about finding the person's reaction and not the porn star's. When Kink.com is filming its talent, they want the moans, grunts, and screams of the person and not the fake orgasms and noises common in pornography.

Some will inevitably ask, even after watching the documentary, why would people allow themselves to be degraded and tossed around like pieces of meat for the sake of pornography? For starters, Kink.com doesn't force or trick any of its members into being a part of their pornography. They firmly state that this content isn't for everyone, and they reiterate the fact that if people want to be sexually free they should have an outlet or a means be so. Several actors talk about a "euphoric state" the body enters when undergoing some of the treatment Kink.com has in store for them, where, often during orgasm, several human chemicals, such as dopamine and adrenaline, are released to give one's body a "natural high," sending them into a complete, almost out-of-this-world trance. The fact that something like that can bring a human being to such an other-worldly state is amazing and Kink is sure to emphasize the importance of not only the liberation of one's body and mind, but their entire sexual state of mind.

Inevitably, as the employees know all too well, there will still be the critics of the website and BDSM who say it does nothing but further objectify and degrade women like the pornographic industry has done since its inception. One Kink.com director brings up a fantastic point when addressing this; he states that it's difficult for people to understand that there are a group of women that need a sort of constant protection, yet there are also a group of women who lust after the attention and glitz the porn industry provides them. And, ultimately, if the porn is performed by consenting adults who understand the terms and want to partake in the sexual acts for entertainment and monetary compensation, why shouldn't they have the freedom to do so? If that still doesn't get you on board with the fetish movement, he goes on to state, he simply requests those people to admit that while the industry isn't for you, in particular, it is for someone out there.

Kink is not only a terrific documentary but a seriously important one because it finally addresses many of the issues that porn documentaries continue to dance around (coming up with a response to the numerous allegations of degrading and oppressing women), in addition to shedding light on one of the entertainment form's most successful genres since its inception on the internet. It shows the humans behind the scenes of your average fetish porn shoot, and how, for pornography that can be described as some of the most inhumane, it might be one of the most humane.

This is just another in a line of documentaries that try to explore the world of BDSM and end up showing us a bunch of people who come off as inarticulate and surprisingly unaware of the origins of their non-mainstream proclivities, but fails to render any real insight. What we are left with are interviews with a bunch of folks who seem to be ambling through life trying to convince themselves that this lifestyle has validity, but not really buying it. There is the Gay director who fantasized about the high school football players and the Dominatrix who worries about verbalizing her lifestyle to her children and others who indulge, but come off as disingenuous to a fault and unable to articulate the true nature of this lifestyle. One would think that any director/producer worth their salt wouldn't settle for superficiality, but instead would want to dig deeper. But, then again, this is James Franco we are talking about. A walking, breathing avatar of why some actors should stay in front of the camera.