Sly Stallone couldn't get his fists up that high anymore.

It's simulated in Hollywood, anyway.

If people were to put more thought into their porn, I think the product would be a whole lot more intriguing to watch. There's a common misconception that you can't have hardcore AND still be stylistic. That's nuts. Ninn does it all the time. It's also all about context. When the courts start getting on about obscenity, they always ask the question regarding "redeeming social value". Now, I don't think it has to have any. I think getting a guy off and preventing him from raping his next-door neighbor's dog is probably a redeeming social value. But we're not talking about consequences. We're talking about the thing itself. If pornographers added something to each segment called "context", and developed an idea around it, it could still be ultra-hot and silence the guys in the black robes.

There is a point of diminishing returns in this genre. I think we've gone as low as we can go. Maybe instead of shock value, and thinking it's going to stand up in court, porn makers can start THINKING about how to make something exciting, provocative, and still highly arousing. Like I said, it's my personaly opinion that getting people off is a redeeming social value. My BA is in Art History, for Christ's sake, and that includes quite a lot of film theory. What separates the high art from porn is a matter of context and execution of the premise. (Well, great photography, well-formed ideas, and superior technical expertise also matter.) If porn could appropriate even a little of those ideas, we'd have something here.

I believe porn to be the last bastion of subversive filmmaking. With all kinds of creative license opened up because sex is what porn is all about, really cool films could be made, even on the gonzo end. I don't believe anyone needs to resort to violence to make an absolutely kick ass porno.

KN