I want to start out with a couple things regarding the porn industry in general, because a lot of other reviews of this movie out there are accusing the film of depicting the porn industry in a negative view when in fact the movie only wants to show the amateur porn side of the business, nothing else. Why does someone have sex with people in which they have never met previously, have it filmed, and for money? Curiosity? Love of sex? Kink factor? Fame? Money? Desperation for money? A few years ago my stepsister and I were having a conversation about porn and she said, you know most of these girls are drug addicts and or went through some type of abusive relationship or were abused as children. This did not stop me from watching porn, but it sure as hell had an impact on my own psyche regarding what it was I was watching. Now obviously, ALL actors who do this are not addicts, were not abused, and do actually like what they do for a living...as noted in this review of Hot Girls Wanted:
One thing that I want to acknowledge is my disconnect with what's in style today. What is acceptable by today's standards? I couldn't tell you. What I can tell you is that when Elvis started shaking his hips to his music, it was controversial, which seems ridiculous right? What about when Madonna had this video shown on MTV (and I apologize, I don't remember the exact year, probably 1990 or 1991):
I'd be more than willing to bet that someone who grew up in the 1950's wouldn't even imagine that it was possible for a performer to do anything 'masturbation-like' in public, let alone have it shown on TV, but yet it happened. When I first saw this, I didn't know what the word masturbation meant and I saw her touching herself and was like, umm, what is she doing? Anyway, today we have this:
Whats interesting to me is that I don't see a whole lot of difference with this video and the original Sir Mix A Lot video, except maybe, the clothing is more revealing, and of course, Minaj's booty skills. I kind of view this particular video as more her showing off her skills than sex, but every scene of this video definitely has sex all over it. This video has around 583 million views on Youtube vs. the Baby Got Back video, which has around 8 million views on Youtube, I guess it's safe to say Nicki Minaj is one of the more premier figures in today's pop culture. I don't remember a whole lot of controversy when the Sir Mix A Lot video came out, perhaps there was, but is there any controversy today with the above video? I'm guessing no because this is what's popular, this is what's acceptable by today's standards.
I'm trying to illustrate my own disconnect with today's mainstream, because apparently, porn is way more acceptable than it was twenty years ago. Its definitely more accessible as well, which brings me to one question/issue: Was I educated on sex by watching porno and music videos? I'm going to say no, with one huge exception which I'll get into later, but the pornos I saw were involving just regular sex, I definitely didn't see or have access to anything 'hardcore'. Porn for me when I was a teen was a few dirty magazines and a couple vhs tapes hidden in the closet. The internet was just begging with things like email and forums. During my college years was when there was a huge explosion of porn and it was almost like a phenomena taking our society by storm. But also, being in the porn business was definitely not considered glamorous.
So, now to the actual film. One of the ideas that this film is trying to portray to the audience is that there are on a daily basis, new girls who are just becoming of legal age, who have this idea in their heads that by getting into the amateur porn industry, they can become rich and famous. The main character of this film is Tressa, who we see is a newcomer into the business, has had sex before, and thinks that this is a good idea because she gets to leave her hometown and explore her new freedom by doing something she enjoys and getting paid at the same time. The directors show us these numerical figures of what an average shelf-life for a newcomer to the business is anywhere from 3-6 months, and the best case 1 year. This is because the amateur porn industry is constantly looking for new faces and unless you're an instant hit, if you want to keep the paychecks coming, you're probably going to have to resort to doing other 'niche' sex scenes which you probably wouldn't normally want to do, and you can just tell, Tressa only likes the money aspect of this because she ends up resorting to doing scenes like bondage, which she definitely doesn't like doing. In the end, she definitely did not know what she was getting into, never anticipated on having the things happen to her (like going to the ER because she had a huge cyst on or near her vagina as a result of too much sex), but also her bf and mother end up begging her to stop doing it.
The other main character, is Ava Taylor or Rachel. As of today, I think she is actually still performing in adult film. There is one scene in the documentary involving her doing a film called "virgin manipulation". This has to be one of the most disturbing things I have ever seen in my entire life. We get to see some behind the scenes interaction between the director and Ava, but also some interactions between Ava and the way much older guy shes about to have sex with. It was so painfully obvious that she was not into this. He kinda tries to have a conversation with her "you're real quiet aren't you?". Let me pause this for a minute...I'm very curious about the 'before' and 'after' of a sex scene. What kind of interaction is there between the actors/actresses? Do they converse about what they bought at the grocery store earlier, then fuck, then finish their conversation and trade food recipes? Or perhaps talk about their favorite music? Making a porno film isn't just twenty minutes of fucking. It can take hours to do just one shoot. You got different camera angles, lighting, etc. I know that both parties might not necessarily be in the mood for sex when it comes to doing the actual shoot, but it's a job, so they do what they gotta do. But I'd be more than willing to bet, those actors/actresses who say they love their line of work, when they do a movie, they probably have a hell of a lot more control over things than Ava does in this particular moment. Porn actors probably have favorites in their inner circles, which probably makes the job a hell of a lot easier. I'd also be willing to bet they have a lot more say and power when it comes to who they want to work with. In this situation, Ava has little if any say in who she will be having sex with. So when they get into the bedroom to do the actual sex scene, the director is telling both of them things to say and Ava has this very nervous and miserable face on her, and just flat out wants to get it over with. Then there is a brief scene where we hear moaning and pounding, and then next scene we see Ava in the shower having to (I'm assuming) douche because the guy came inside her, because you get more money for that. I just couldn't help but feel I was watching someone get raped. I mean, it was legal...right? It was consensual....riiiiight? Ya, ummm, I think the only thing consensual were a few signatures.
When someone desperately needs money, and you flash a thousand dollars in their face, is that still 'consensual'? I don't think so. I think that's called exploitation. Look, back in the day, when I would go to a casino in Atlantic City, whenever you'd walk out, right across the street there are a whole bunch of pawn shops. Why are they located there? Because they are there to take advantage of you because they know there will be someone desperate for cash. This doesn't mean you should feel sorry for me because I sold my grandfathers jewelry for five hundred bucks, but I was definitely taken advantage of. I sold something that had value of well over two thousand dollars, for five hundred bucks, where as if I took it to another pawn shop that was not near any casino, I probably would have gotten more money. I'm using this analogy because these girls are definitely being taken advantage of. They instantly make all this money, and the first couple of scenes they do, they think it's great work, but unless they become an instant hit, then they become 'old' and thrown away. I mean, the one girl, Jade, is 25 and is considered a MILF????!!!
One of the questions I have regarding successful porn stars is this: Did they have to do sex scenes such as this one in order to make it to the top? Something along the lines of "I was a dishwasher for five years, before I got a chance to become manager"? But is that much misery and degradation worth it?
This leads me into the last part of the movie, which for me, the film took a complete 180 degree turn. We see Jade acting out in a fetish movie in which she is verbally abused and forced to vomit with a sex toy, and then forced to drink it. The immediate reaction I had was, "what kind of person finds this arousing?" But then this was followed with rage when I see Jade trying to defend herself by saying something along the lines of "I'd rather be it me acting, than having someone do it in real life,". I'm no psychologist, but I don't agree with that at all. I think if anything, for a person who likes this, it will increase their desire to want to do it in real life because now they've seen an actual person do it. This is then followed by a graphic which states that nearly 40% of porn depicts violence towards women. Then we see Belle Knox. This girl gained fame and notoriety because she stated that she was doing porn films in order to pay for her tuition at Duke. I don't think that's what gained her fame though. We then see her doing a scene from a website called facial abuse in which she says how she's in woman's studies and the guy says "Oh, so you're a feminazi" and she says "Yep, I'm a feminazi", then she gets repeatedly thrown around and hit and sexually assaulted. This is all ok though, because it's just acting.....*ANGER*........I swear to fucking god, this is absolutely horrifying. Maybe a lot of you who are younger than me aren't as shocked by this because this shit has been out there for a while, but I have never seen a video that is supposed to be a porn video, with violence like this, and I haven't even seen 1/4 of the video. This is bad. This is VERY bad. This isn't about some kink factor, or getting your hair pulled while having sex, or getting your ass smacked. This is an actual crime happening and what makes it so much worse is that there is someone, actually a LOT of someone's, jerking off to this. You know, I mentioned earlier my disconnect with pop culture because I do not hear of anyway, a whole lot of outrage from younger generations about this. This apparently is no big deal. And since the actress is 18, and since she totally knew what she was doing, and at the time of the video, she had gone on a major publicity stint with it, and she was claiming how liberating and empowering it was for her to be doing porn...then it's ok. You know what? Fuck that. At least I do not find it ok to be doing rape porn or facial abuse or whatever it's called. But you know, just watch the below documentary in Belle, or Miriam's own words,
I really worry about her, because I think she's created a monster when all she wanted to do was pay for her tuition. She is in fact a rape victim, scarred herself, and yet she resorted to doing these really awful things, and created a name for herself, and from a financial aspect, she's doing good. From a psychological aspect? Just look at the film, I don't know if she's ok.
Back to the Hot Girls Wanted film, a lot of professional critiques of this film accuse it of having a feminist agenda, and a LOT of the reviews I've read point to one particular thing in this film: The graphic which states that 40% of porn depicts violence against women". Again, I don't have access to any statistics that show the actual number of what people click on the internet, but even if it's 5% or even if it's 1%, people who jerk off to this shit, these people should also be in jail. Period. Am I being absurd? No, I don't think so, and you know why? Porn today isn't just seeing a penis and vagina and what happens when the two meet. Porn today is about fantasy. And just like the movie states, the fantasy is about 'the girl next door', the fantasy is 'she needs the money', the fantasy is 'virgins', the fantasy is....abuse. Not only do we live in a society where sex sells EVERYTHING, like we even use the term sexy on things that cannot be sexy....like "you need to make this pencil more sexier" but also, there is this obsession with youth. This is exactly (in my opinion anyway) what the movie is trying to say. I don't know much about feminism, I don't know what it's goals are, who are modern feminist figures in culture, and in fact, I do not agree with feminism, or at least this idea about a woman dominated society. I however, vehemently support feminism today and whatever their causes maybe in today's society, because we definitely do not live in a society where things that should be equal between men and women, are in fact equal. The porn business is just one example of that. You don't see a whole lot of videos where a woman humiliates a man, where a woman sexually abuses a man (except maybe dominatrix type things). It's all about the guy. Most porn is bought by men, most porn is enjoyed by men, the women are mere objects in getting the guy off.
But to further this, there is one aspect of the porn business that doesn't get mentioned by anyone, this film or reviews, that in my opinion, is all the proof I need that porn and the goal of porn is to humiliate woman, and that is the facial cumshot. What percentage of sex scenes involving a man and woman end with a guy cumming on the woman's face? I'd say more than 80%. I don't hear any outrage over that. This particular act, is so common, and so desensitized, that its become the norm. Almost as if it is natural to finish on the girls face. Seriously WTF? I wonder how many 20 year olds today do in fact believe this and that it's no big deal if not it's what you're supposed to do. You know what? Fortunately for me, I had Kurt Cobain in my life when i was a teenager. Maybe I didn't exactly realize the actual reasoning behind, showing respect for a female, but I knew that anything else was wrong. Who does the youth have today for role models? The Kardashians, Miley Cyrus? You know, I'd be more than willing to bet neither of these ladies enjoys porn, but since they're making so much money off their images, they kinda go along with it.
This is the other thing though that I don't think this movie, or any review of the movie really mention and that is the role of parenting. I'm going to be a hypocrite here somewhat, because I just mentioned how I had Kurt Cobain in my life to sort of give me a direction regarding how to view women.....what about my mom and dad, what role did they play in regards to how I should view women? They didn't. My mother sure as hell never talked about anything sex with me and the only thing my dad ever told me was 'to wear a condom'. I don't think we as a society should rely on celebrities to form our own opinions and views on things such as this. Again, I'm no psychologist, but I am one of those who believe that our parents are our biggest influence, negative and positive.
This movie gets a huge F for me regarding one thing: They do not bring up the backgrounds of these girls. Tressa is saying how she wanted to get away from her home, when in fact she could have gotten away from home by going to college. Why? What was going on in her home life that was she thought doing porn was better? With porn being more popular in today's culture, there is an apparent 'desensitization' of how porn is viewed. I don't necessarily buy that, I still think that abused people will have low self esteem and end up doing stuff like this where as someone who has a positive view of themselves, will still view as getting naked in front of a camera and having sex with someone you're not particularly attracted to, as demoralizing.
I'm concluding with one thing here: Capitalism does in fact have a face, and it's that of a man. The fact that porn is so acceptable today is in my opinion a direct result of what has been selling the past few years. Feminism does not sell well. A video of a group of women showing off their butt does! It's not that people aren't educated or don't have the opportunity to be educated on equality, it's that it doesn't support capitalism. For me, what's really disturbing about this is that as a society, it seems to be acceptable or that no one realizes this. When you've grown up with images of Madonna doing her thing, and that what she has done has become popular, you say "oh, well, she's popular, and what she does is acceptable," when in fact, it's not or at least shouldn't be.
Overall, I think this was a good film. I kind of view this film having way too much on it's plate. It still delivered, but there were a few things that should have been touched on.
