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    --Jan 26, 2007--

    Dreaming of Snow

    Studio: Ethnicity Films/Metro
    Director: David Aaron Clark
    Cast: Annie Cruz, Brian Surewood, Cris Taliana, Heidi Ho, Kylie Rey, Mila Yung, Mr. Hentai, Mr. Marcus, Kammy, Sabrine Maui, Sledge Hammer, Sylvio Mata, Tami Lynn, Tyler Knight, Veronica Lynn

    Portions of this review originally appeared on Fleshbot

    David Aaron Clark, who worked in New York for earlier incarnations of Screw and Genesis magazines and wrote for various smut publications on the west coast before trying his hand at directing adult fare, is a pervert. He is also one of the smartest, most thoughtful men in the porn business, which tortures him.

    This combination allows Clark to effectively articulate his fetishes, one of which is Asian women, and present them in a way that makes you say "I get it". His low budget, made-on-a-Mac movies are little works of unaffected, earnest, painstaking art in which beauty, humor, regret, boobies, and creepiness vie for the viewer's attention.

    "You just have that tragic look that just translates so well," Clark says to Tami Lynn at the beginning of this compilation. As offstage gonzo director dialogue, that works a hell of a lot better than "Fuck. You've got great tits." While emotion has overwhelmed me to often utter the latter, good porn deserves more of the former.

    "I pretty much almost never make a mistake," says Lynn, about to be taken aback by Clark standby Mr. Marcus. Longtime partner in crime Brian Surewood also makes a few appearances.

    "Then what are you doing here?" Clark asks. The movie (full title: Dreaming of Snow: The Best of David Aaron Clark's Existential AZN Girl Gonzo) is chock full of unsanitized moments between an older man and the much younger women he photographs, sometimes in his apartment in L.A.'s Koreatown but also in swankier, less-realistic places, like Beverly Hills. Clark is unabashed in his affection for these women, talking to them like he can't believe his luck but also that he will go to Hell for it.

    This puts the women at ease, humanizes them. Sometimes it freaks them out.

    Conversations with his subjects paint an accurate picture of the parasitic side of the adult industry.

    "You have no idea how ambitious I am," Clark is told by Kylie Rey. "I will do just about anything for money."

    "I support entrepreneurship 100 percent," Clark responds. He later persuades her to scoop ice cream out of her vagina. She really is ambitious. He asks her if she's a Republican.

    In alternating scenes, we see performers having fun or cashing a check.

    "Are you looking forward to getting fucked?" Clark asks Heidi Ho, owner of the Best Asian Porn Name Ever (other than Hoochie Maguchi).

    "I guess," she says.

    "I guess?"

    Later Mr. Marcus advises Kammy to throw her arms up in the air and shout "I wanna be a star" as he fucks her. She does. That scene should definitely adorn the promotional material for the Porn Valley Chamber of Commerce.

    Through it all - as it is through most of Clark's gonzo movies - his plummy basso profundo resonates offscreen like he's a member of the World's Seamiest Barbershop Quartet.

    You might see some contradictions in this site's coverage of what we call the Gonzo Gaze. Some directors batter the talent and assault their audience with their boorish commentary. The impression I'm left with is that, for those directors, the movie is about them. For Clark it's about the performers, even if he's the one getting the blowjob.

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    --Jan 8, 2007--

    All About Anna

    Studio: Innocent Pictures/Zentropa Productions
    Director: Jessica Nilsson
    Cast: Gry Bay, Mark Stevens, Eileen Daly, Thomas Raft, Morten Shelbech, Thomas Lundy, Ovidie

    Portions of this review originally appeared on Fleshbot

    The mainstream porn movie is an elusive thing, and usually happens by accident. Wild Things seems to have had the right sensibility, whereas both the heavy Eyes Wide Shut and David Cronenberg's Crash fell short, as did Baise Moi.

    Denmark's Zentropa Productions, most closely associated here with Lars von Trier, has released a movie that combines some of the tenets of Dogma 95 with a script that seems like it was assembled out of the high school diaries of our favorite porn stars.

    Anna is a theatrical costume designer unlucky in love but not wanting for sex. Director Nilsson makes the best of a problematic script that is often simplistic and precious. Marketed as a romantic movie for women, All About Anna certainly pays attention to all the tempestuous relationships a blindingly attractive woman can have in today's theatre community.

    As in Lars von Trier's Breaking the Waves, AAA features the heroine's love going off to sea and coming back compromised. The rest of the movie deals with Anna's comings and goings with Johann (Mark Stevens) and their mutual screwups.

    Wicked Pictures is taking the unprecedented step for a porn company in distributing this movie in the United States. As a porn film, no one would argue that there is not enough sex in it. The sex depicted is also too tame for the established market. But the sets, direction, acting, and script are, in the absence of lots of humping, above par for standard porn fare.

    So this might be the perfect porn gateway drug. The one blowjob carried to completion results in shame and awkwardness - just like in real life! - rather than sperm-gargling, sperm-drinking from champagne flutes, and/or sperm-swapping with Cytherea. So that's got to count for something.

    Where Anna borrows best from Dogme '95 practitioners is the natural lighting and digital filming. Often the movie is heartbreakingly sweet and present, with no little help from its centerpiece, Gry Bay. Her episodes with men, women, and herself are refreshingly devoid of the porn posturing that often compensates here for a lack of time, budget, enthusiasm, beauty, and talent.

    But without all the sex, the viewer turns his/her attention to things like the script, which doesn't do justice even to a thoughtful audience willing to forgive almost anything for the love of Gry Bay.

    "I had to conquer my fear!" the script has Anna saying in voiceover. "I had to go back to that flat!"

    Ultimately, Anna is a sweet movie with a happy ending. Men will like it for Bay, loopy roommate Eileen Daly, and LTG tryst partner Ovidie, and women will like it for Anna's choice in partners, especially Johann.

    Do you know who won't like it? The French. But you'll have to watch the movie to learn why.

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