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Cinéma & Cie. Film and Media Studies Journal
Pornscapes. Re-enacting Porn Film in the Landscapes of Contemporary Pornography
Text.Serial.Journal
https://riviste.unimi.it/index.php/cinemaetcie
9
New Studies
2009-03-01
2022-12-16
2009-03-01
2024-02-14
Cinéma & Cie
Giovanna Maina
2009/03/01
Università di Pisa
2036-461X
12
en
Pornscapes. Re-enacting Porn Film in the Landscapes of Contemporary Pornography
https://riviste.unimi.it/index.php/cinemaetcie/article/download/19415/17273
9
PORNSCAPES. RE-ENACTING PORN FILM IN THE LANDSCAPES
OF CONTEMPORARY PORNOGRAPHY
Giovanna Maina, Università di Pisa




   I was born in 1974. And I am a woman. For these reasons I have never been inside an adult
movie theatre, unfortunately. Until a few years ago, my idea of x-rated films and their use was
limited to the infamous separate section of the video rental shop, or the assortment of DVDs on
the innermost shelf of the newsstand near home. So I have no direct personal memories that allow
me to describe the actual experience of a movie-goer, who goes out especially to see a hardcore
film in a specialized cinema. Of course, I could base my ideas on the “real life” stories of people
who have been to a porn cinema at least once. I could collect and analyse colourful descriptions
imbued with the flavour of legend, or the nostalgic air of the “good old days”.
   Alternatively I could try to trace this singular visual experience in its cinematic reconstructions.
Starting with the incipit of the porno chic classic The Opening of Misty Beethoven (Radley
Metzger, 1975), up to the recent documentary Inside Deep Throat (Fenton Bailey, Randy
Barbato, 2005), there are several examples of films (even mainstream ones) in which the audience
of porn cinemas is portrayed, even though often incidentally. Or I could turn to the books of
authors such as Linda Williams and Eric Schaefer in the United States or Pietro Adamo, Piero
Calò and Giuseppe Grosso Ciponte in Italy. These scholars have widely described both the multi-
coloured fauna of men and women, often in couples, who filled porn cinemas in the 1970s, and
the sad, anonymous crowd of rain-coated men who went on hanging around in these “equivocal”
movie theatres a decade later.
   These strategies would maybe provide me with a description of the social composition of this
particular audience or of its behavioural habits. Or maybe I would verify the multiple meanings
that theatrical porn consumption has gained in our collective imaginary. Yet an “archaeological”
reconstruction of this type, however accurate, would never allow me to understand “what you
really feel” when you watch explicit images of sex, projected on a large screen in a public place,
where other individuals are sitting in the dark, waiting for some forbidden frisson. For this reason,
it is therefore difficult for me to compare “traditional” pornography with the contemporary forms
of hardcore visual material, which I have been able to experience directly. I’m referring of course
to the multiform complexity of proliferating pornographies1 that rage in the home video market,
on the Internet, or on UMTS cell phones.
   The accessibility and pervasiveness of the new pornographies have radically changed the time
and place of the use of hardcore materials, as well as its rules of etiquette. Not only have they
rendered pornography ubiquitous in the media panorama, but the consumption of explicit images
has become a more everyday, generalized phenomenon than ever before, in terms of user age and
gender. In the attempt to get round the obstacle of the “original sin” of my date of birth and
gender, and abandoning, for the moment, the temptations of media ethnography, I will try to
define the interrelations between these two different poles in the experience of moving image
pornography, taking as a starting point a series of prevalently textual facts. My aim is to try and

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GIOVANNA MAINA

record references, similarities and differences between the new pornographies and the classic
feature-length hardcore narrative film, in terms of the production of sense2.
  For evident reasons of space, I can only examine a small part of the many features of
contemporary pornography. I will therefore concentrate on net porn, leaving aside home video and
UMTS. I have also decided to further limit my investigation of Internet pornography, and to
exclude from this analysis the more directly interactive aspect of cyber porn. More specifically, I
will not deal either with ISS (Interactive Sex Simulators), a kind of hardcore videogame available
on line, in which your avatar can have virtual sex with a pin up, or with sexcams (webcams with
sexual content). Neither will I deal with cybersex – the fairly widespread habit of indulging in
sexual relations in absentia «with someone who is not physically present in our space but
connected through the computer»3. In fact these forms of pornography would pose a whole new
range of questions, regarding, for example, “real time” sexual relations (or in the simulation of real
time), between “real” bodies (or with figures that simulate the sexual behaviour of real bodies),
interwoven with “real” relationships (or supposedly real) through the mediation of technology.
  I will, therefore, only treat those situations, in which the moment of use follows the moment of
production, as was the case with cinematic pornography, and in which the bodies performing on
the computer screen do not respond to us directly – apart from generally addressing the viewer-
user, that is anyway a standard convention of the new features of hardcore.
  In my experience, the simplest, most direct and most neutral way, of getting into contact with
Internet pornography, is via the free porn sites modelled on YouTube, that function thanks to a click
and surf interface and keyword research. Sites such as YouPorn, Pornotube, XPorn, XTube and
RedTube4 are easily accessible – it is sufficient to declare that you are over 18. Right from the home
page, they present themselves as a “gallery” of thumbnail images. Each image is distinguished by
a title that alludes to a particular sexual act (anal, oral, threesome, etc.), to a particular “taste” or
setting (outdoor, office, bizarre, interracial, etc.) or to the characteristics of the bodies that we will
see in action in the various clips (brunettes, MILF, hairy chicks, Asian, etc.), at times even
combining several of these options («crazy old mom outdoor anal fucking», for example).
  The database or archive aspect, already evident in this first contact with the site, is accentuated
by the fact that, once we have visited the home page, we can choose which of these fantasies we
want to indulge in. The only thing we have to do is simply type in a few key words, and thus we
can refine the choice and mould it, either according to our habitual sexual preferences, or
following a momentary fancy. Having clicked on the image, a brief film clip appears on the screen
in front of us. We can watch it for the first time, and then watch it again and again, as many times
as we like. Alternatively, we can move freely from one scene to another, either sticking to a
precise leitmotiv (anal sex, for example) or succumbing to very different and unexpected
suggestions (from anal to blow jobs to orgies and so on). In this way, we can construct a visual
experience based around a sort of combinatory “vertigo”.
  Leaving aside absolutely basic questions, such as the physical conditions under which the
material is viewed, this first aspect already reveals the enormous differences that exist between
navigating in a site like YouPorn and viewing a “normal” porn film, above all if we consider films
produced in the 1970s and 1980s5. In this case, in fact, our power of choice seems to halt at the
door of the screening room, as the general conventions of this type of consumption allow us only
to choose which film to see and/or which cinema to go. And so, this prearranged one-way vision
contrasts sharply with the absolute freedom of choice and combination provided by net porn. This
statement is so obvious as to seem banal. On the contrary, behind this opposition there is, at a
deep structural level, a hidden substantial likeness between the morphology of a site like YouPorn
and a classic porn film intended as text.

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   According to Linda Williams, the feature-length hardcore film is characterized by a
compositional principle based on the alternation between narrative segments and sexual numbers,
largely similar to the sequence of narrative parts and musical numbers that gives form to the
musical. In her essay Hardcore. Power, Pleasure and the “Frenzy of the Visible”, Williams draws
attention to the relation of interdependence between these two components, destroying the myth
(at least from a critical point of view) that the narrative parts of a porn film are completely
uninfluential and serve only to guide the spectator from one act of copulation to the next.
Nevertheless, it is an established fact that the sexual numbers are the high points of a hardcore film,
in much the same way that song and dance routines are fundamental to a musical. They are
moments in which the narration seems to stop, leaving space for the spectacle of the maximum
visibility of the bodies in action.
   But what do we mean exactly by “sexual numbers”? In 1977, Stephen Ziplow published The
Film Maker’s Guide to Pornography6 that, although written only five years after Deep Throat
(Gerard Damiano, 1972), demonstrated an early awareness of the highly conventional nature of
the genre. In his guide, in fact, Ziplow draws up a list of sexual practices that should never be
missing from a porn film, even going so far as to advise the would-be pornographer that “at least
ten separate come shots”7 in every film are an absolute must. The practices listed are:
masturbation (almost exclusively female), straight sex (that is penetration between man and
woman), lesbianism, oral sex (intended both as fellatio and cunnilingus), ménage-à-trois, orgies,
anal sex (always between men and women in each case). It is clear from the start, therefore, that
it is the combination of the various sexual acts that gives structure and sense to any porn film,
notwithstanding the so-called “mimetic”8 tendency of 1970s cinematic pornography.
   If we take Ziplow’s list to be a kind of paradigmatic indication, the single films could be
considered as actualized syntagms. Thus each syntagm is composed of different elements (the
sexual numbers), chosen and placed in succession in a variety of ways according to the internal
compositional demands of any particular text. This, for example, is the structure of the film Deep
Throat in terms of how sexual numbers alternate with narrative (Table 1)9.
   Each sexual number that makes up the final sequence certainly has its own connotations (the
type of setting, the positions of the actors and actresses, their physical characteristics, the
soundtrack etc.) that make it absolutely unique from a textual point of view. At the same time,
however, each one of these images of explicit sex, refers to a well-defined, highly-codified set of
numbers.
   This fact allows, or even forces, the spectator to “read” the film in two different ways. On one
hand he follows the movie as a linear narrative sequence; on the other hand he separates each sex
scene from the whole movie and takes pleasure in every single fragment. Furthermore in this way
he’s able to recall other similar scenes he has already seen in other movies and to compare them
with the ones he’s seeing at the very moment of the screening. A horizontal reading is thus
combined with a vertical reading that constantly refers to a sort of paradigmatic axis of all the
sexual numbers. This operation of cross-reading, while possible at a certain level with any type of
text, is facilitated here by the extremely conventional nature of cinematic pornography discussed
above, and by the clearly marked borders between the sexual numbers and whole of the text.
   In terms of the production of sense, this obsession for cataloguing represents the main point of
contact between the feature-length narrative hardcore film and the click and surf porn described
above. In fact the Net provides a sort of constantly open paradigm, both extremely amplified and
hyper specialized, that puts into practice the combinatory and taxonomical dream of traditional
pornography. Out of curiosity, I tried to contrast the sexual numbers present in Deep Throat with
a research into the same numbers on YouPorn, using Ziplow’s definitions as key words (Table 2)10.

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GIOVANNA MAINA

   TABLE 1
                                      The syntagmatic structure of Deep Throat

              0’    to      5’ 36’’                Introduction Title and Opening Credits
          5’ 36’’   to      9’ 17’’                Oral sex (cunnilingus)
          9’ 17’’   to     13’ 11’’                Narrative
         13’ 11’’   to     14’ 57’’                Anal Sex + Money Shot
         14’ 57’’   to     16’ 51’’                Ménage-à-trois (MMF) + Money Shot
         16’ 51’’   to     21’ 19’’                Orgy
         21’ 19’’   to     28’ 19’’                Narrative
         28’ 19’’   to     33’ 22’’                Oral sex (fellatio) + Money Shot
         33’ 22’’   to     35’ 47’’                Narrative
         35’ 47’’   to     39’ 22’’                Mixed number alternating:
                                                   - Oral sex (fellatio)
                                                   - Straight Sex (man on top)
                                                   - Bizarre (man drinking coke from Linda’s vagina)
         39’ 22’’   to     40’ 37’’                Narrative
         40’ 37’’   to     41’ 05’’                Straight Sex (“doggie”)
         41’ 05’’   to     42’ 27’’                Narrative
         42’ 27’’   to     43’ 08’’                Straight Sex (“doggie”)
         43’ 08’’   to     44’ 22’’                Narrative
         44’ 22’’   to     45’ 05’’                Oral sex (fellatio)
         45’ 05’    to     46’ 06’’                Narrative
         46’ 06’’   to     50’ 31’’                Mixed number alternating:
                                                   - Straight Sex (“doggie”)
                                                   - Oral sex (fellatio)
                                                   - Straight Sex (woman on top)
                                                   - Oral sex (cunnilingus)
                                                   - Straight Sex (side to side)
         50’ 31’’   to     51’ 16’’                Narrative
         51’ 16’’   to     53’ 43’’                Bizarre (Linda shaving her pubic hair)
         53’ 43’’   to     54’ 18’’                Oral sex (cunnilingus)
         54’ 18’’   to     54’ 28’’                Masturbation
         54’ 28’’   to     57’ 43’’                Narrative
         57’ 43’’   to   1h 0’ 14’’                Oral sex (fellatio)


  Once explicit sex scenes were the main attraction of the porn film. Now they are transformed
into fragments, free from any plot or structured diegetic universe, though they may be linked to
stereotypical situations or characters belonging to a common, easily-recognisable imagery. Thus
removed from their context, they appear to multiply themselves infinitely within the spaces of
the Net. These short videos are absolutely perfect for the type of consumption that Emanuela
Ciuffoli has ironically called prêt-à-porner11. Easily accessible and readily available, the
YouPorn clips apparently allow the viewer-user to “get straight to the point” without having to
wait, as in the past, for suitable narrative conditions to be created, so that a specific sex scene can
take place in a given film. The sense of “expectation” that characterised the feature-length nar-
rative hardcore film would seem to be totally absent in a use of this type.

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   TABLE 2
      Deep Throat          Sexual Numbers                            YouPorn
           5               Oral sex (fellatio)                       630
           3               Oral sex (cunnilingus)                    628
           3               Straight Sex (“doggie”)                   403
           1               Straight Sex (man on top)                 181 (not relevant)
           1               Straight Sex (woman on top)               233
           1               Straight Sex (side to side)               9 (not relevant)
           1               Anal Sex                                  403
           1               Ménage-à-trois                            3 (241 as “threesome”)
           1               Orgy                                      278
           1               Bizarre (drinking coke from vagina)       46 (not relevant)
           1               Bizarre (Linda shaving her pubic hair)    421 (as “shave”)
           1               Masturbation                              505
           3               Money Shots                               482
           9               Narrative segments                        0

   Actually, even net porn has elements that contribute to delaying the visual satisfaction of the
user. As Zabet Patterson correctly notes in her essay Going On-line: Consuming Pornography in
the Digital Era12, first of all every kind of information doesn’t present itself autonomously on the
web but rather has to be found. Secondly, even on free sites like YouPorn, to access the content
the user has to go through a series of procedures that become more complicated on paying
member sites. In this way a new form of delay develops: «The delay of logging on, the delay of
finding a site, the delay of “signing through” the initial contract, the delay of having the
thumbnails load, and then, finally, the delay of waiting for the selected image, sequence of
images, or video segment to appear»13.
   One could even argue that it is precisely the presumed limitless possibilities of net porn that create
another form of delay in the viewer-user’s satisfaction. With such an excess of information and
suggestions, we are so sure we will find what we’re looking for, that we skip feverishly from video
to video, from site to site, from fantasy to fantasy, searching for the perfect image, succumbing more
to the seduction of the search than to the pleasure of the result. The feature-length narrative hardcore
film is obviously just one of the multiple forms that moving image pornography has assumed in its
long history. And yet the archetypal value with which it has been invested in our fantasies makes it
a perfect touchstone for understanding contemporary pornographies.
   And even with regard to the hardcore materials available on the Net, the click and surf free sites
are just an aspect of a complex pornscape that also includes, for instance, the so called indie porn
or alternative porn, whose relation to the feature-length narrative film is completely different: in
this case, in fact, the porn film can be re-enacted through the manipulation or parody of its
narrative and stylistic codes. Moreover, in indie porn the very features of visual hardcore are
often twisted by an identitary detournement related to queer culture or to other pre-existing
subcultures, such as BDSM or fetish.
   Anyway, many questions still remain. For example, how important is the size of the screen to
the viewer’s experience? What is the influence of the dialectic between the overwhelming,
engulfing vision of larger-than-life performing bodies at the cinema and the embrace that seems
to join the user to the computer screen14? Besides, how can we reposition the concept of public

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GIOVANNA MAINA

and private in the light of the new forms of porn consumption? Must we simply consider movie
theatre viewing as “public” and home computer viewing as “private”? Or is it true that the
pervasiveness of the new media makes it necessary to completely re-evaluate this opposition?
   We have seen therefore that the tendency to taxonomy and paradigm is common to both the
porn site and the hardcore film, from a structural point of view. Furthermore, in both situations
the mechanism of the viewer-user’s pleasure moves in a complex dynamic of alternated
expectation and satisfaction. In any case, it is precisely at the point where these two forms seem
most different, where one seems static and the other dynamic, one finite and the other infinite,
that in my opinion a shared geometry is concealed. And perhaps this common inner setting traces
deeper ancestral geometries linked to profound aspects of human experience, such as desire and
its eternal dis-satisfaction.



1     This term has been used several times by Linda Williams to indicate the protean nature of the forms that
      pornography takes on in the contemporary media landscape. In particular see Linda Williams,
      Proliferating Pornographies On Scene: An Introduction, in Id., (ed.), Porn Studies, Duke University,
      Durham-London 2004.
2     For a critical-historical reconstruction of the birth of the feature-length porn film see, amongst others:
      Linda Williams, Hardcore. Power, Pleasure and the “Frenzy of the Visible”, University of California,
      Berkeley-Los Angeles-London 1999; Eric Schaefer, Gauging a Revolution: 16mm film and the Rise of
      the Pornographic Feature, in Linda Williams (ed.), Porn Studies, cit., pp. 370-400; Pietro Adamo, Il
      porno di massa. Percorsi nell’hard contemporaneo, Raffaello Cortina, Milano 2004.
3     Linda Williams, Screening Sex, Duke University, Durham-London, 2008, p. 313.
4     For the functioning of sites in this category, see amongst others: Emanuela Ciuffoli, XXX. Corpo, porno,
      web, Costa & Nolan, Milano 2006, and the recent article by Roy Menarini, “La pornografia nell’era di
      YouTube”, in Duellanti, no. 44, July-August 2008, pp. 92-93.
5     Home video presents some differences. In fact there is a tendency to produce sectorial materials aimed
      at reaching the different market niches with specific products. In this case, DVD titles often recall those
      categories described above, as they are meant to guide the spectators in choosing films that can satisfy
      their general taste. And above all DVDs (and also VHS) allow the viewer to move through the texts, with
      fast forward, rewind or chapter selection.
6     Steven Ziplow, The Film Maker’s Guide to Pornography, Drake, New York 1977.
7     Ibidem, quoted in Linda Williams, Hardcore. Power, Pleasure and the “Frenzy of the Visible”, cit., p.
      93. The “come-shot” or “money shot” is an extreme close-up of an external male ejaculation and is
      considered the fundamental mark of the porn film.
8     By the “mimetic” tendency we mean the wish, on the part of pornographers like Damiano and his
      contemporaries, not so much to create a new genre, but rather to imitate mainstream production in all
      aspects, thus aiming at an integration of explicit sex in the cinema itself (for this very reason, this type
      of product has been associated with the term crossover). See Pietro Adamo, Il porno di massa, cit.
9     In order to identify the various sexual acts present in the film, I have used the categories proposed by
      Ziplow to the letter. In two particular cases, however, I had to use a more modern term (“bizarre”), that
      I find more suitable to describe the scenes in question.
10    The research was made on March 19, 2009 at 1:05 a.m. In some cases the results were not relevant, in
      the sense that the clips that appeared after the research, absolutely did not contain the sexual practice that
      had been searched for. Furthermore I find it amusing that, having keyed in the word “narrative”, I
      obtained 0 results.
11    Emanuela Ciuffoli, XXX. Corpo, porno, web, cit., p. 117.
12    Zabet Patterson, Going On-line: Consuming Pornography in the Digital Era, in Linda Williams (ed.),
      Porn Studies, cit., pp. 104-123.
13    Ibidem, p. 109.
14    Significantly Linda Williams dedicates to this problem the conclusion of her most recent study on sex
      in the movies. See Linda Williams, Screening Sex, cit., pp. 299-326.


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