Inside Deep Throat (2005)

Entertaining if not super deep exploration of the 70s social and sexual phenomenon that was 'Deep Throat' -- the first hard core porn film to cross-over from the men in raincoats crowd, to huge success and long lines full of (then) 'hip' men and women, movie stars and even film critics.Frequently funny, occasionally sad and pathetic, sometimes infuriating (as in the aggressive criminal prosecution of poor Harry Reems simply for acting in the film).I don't know that there are any really deep insights here, and the film skirts a lot of more interesting elements it could have explored (e.g. the mob's involvement with porn at the time) but it's fun and fast moving.BTW - for those of you looking for a porn film turn on, move along there's nothing to see here. Yes, there are a few seconds of Ms. Lovelace performing the title feat, but the film really is a documentary, not porn masquerading as one. Interesting yes, hot, no.

Inside Deep Throat really left me quite surprised, I must say. It takes the startlingly successful hardcore porn film, Deep Throat, and comments on its cumulative effects upon the American way of life (what started in the lower rungs of NYC soon spread across the country to theater chains thanks to the mob!), pop culture (nowadays scantily clad men/women are everywhere; sex sells), politics (obscenity laws pushed by Nixon's administration; eventually, Deep Throat male stud Harry Reems was tried (and convicted!) in a court of law just because he starred in the movie!), sexuality (oral pleasure and "clitoral pleasure" were awakened to a larger public who perhaps never experienced sex quite like it prior to Deep Throat's success), and human rights (feminism condemned how women were exploited as sexual objects; Linda Lovelace would later claim she was abused and worked in Deep Throat against her will). The hardcore industry, as narrated by Dennis Hopper (!), is covered in depth, and the history lesson runs until today; the porn industry under the microscope is primary treated respectfully, although today's industry is held in contempt by some of the interviews (like Norman Mailer!) for its lack of artistry and gravitation towards money as the sole reason behind its engine. Even the likes of Wes Craven (obviously not proud of his association with porn), Peter Gruber, and Gore Vidal comment on the hardcore industry. We learn the tragedy that would befall Lovelace who retreated and "retired" from the industry to raise a family, joined forces with a feminist to speak against porn, and later tried to capitalize on what little fame remained as a much older woman (she tried to go straight, but because of her affiliation with Deep Throat, working in any professional capacity seemed non-existent), eventually dying in a car in accident in 2002. Harry Reems' treatment in a court of law seems positively frightening. That he almost went to jail simply by having sex on camera for a theatrical audience seems too surreal to be true…but it almost happened! There's some explicit sexual acts shown, like Lovelace's amazing ability to deep throat Harry's erect member (it is the primary reason behind the title of the film and its marketability), and scenes that depict lovemaking in hardcore, but to have the industry as its subject and completely censor it from the documentary would kind of defeat the purpose of the fight against censorship, right? Reems comes off extremely likable and his candidness about descending into drugs and alcoholism when he went to LA to make it in Hollywood is admirable. How the mob was so intrinsically involved in the spread of the film (they would go to theater chains with an offer "owners shouldn't refuse") and highway robbery from the man who directed it (Gerard Damiano; also quite open and honest about the experience; he never made a dime from his work in the film!), not to mention, how little Lovelace made from the film considering her "performance" and face ($1200! That's it!) contributed highly to its success, says a lot about how the criminal element operate as outright thieves and bullies with very little involvement on an artistic level. I think what remains so compelling is how controversial and polarizing Deep Throat was (Damiano equated it to "opening a can of worms") to the mainstream, political, and public opinion.

As Blockbuster was emerging as the nation's video store in the late '80s, they had some policies that made some video store patrons try more localized, adventurous places. One was that they didn't stock any X-(or today NC-17)rated movies. That would include such non-porn films like Last Tango in Paris, Henry and June, or this one, Inside Deep Throat. However, they do have Unrated movies meant for over 17 customers available like Dawn of the Dead, Zombie, and Kids-a drama about the sexual exploits of teenagers. To me, that seems like the most hypocritical stance a corporate chain could take concerning a movie's content and the judgment to make whether such movie should be made available to the general public. This documentary makes the point that before Deep Throat was released in the summer of '72 at a Times Square movie theatre, there were hardly any porn films that made such a fuss that the government wanted to shut down movie houses that showed it. It also looks at the lives of the three important people involved and how they were affected: director Gerard Damiano didn't make a dime because he sold his share to the mafia who controlled the financial end, male star Harry Reems was going to be jailed for 5 years before the charges were dropped, and star Linda Lovelace (actual surname Boreman), initially defending her participation in the film, then denouncing it after writing an autobiography called Ordeal, then coming back to pose in sleazy magazines because she was dead broke, eventually died that way when she was injured in a car accident in 2002. Damiano seemed to want to make the point in the film interviews that with the success of his movie, porn was entering the mainstream but emerging obscenity laws would make that an impossibility. Which probably meant that any X-rated movie would make that automatically porn no matter the content simply because of the stigma. NC-17 was supposed to change that in 1990 but there are some newspapers that won't show ads for such films or movie theatres exhibit them. So unless cuts are made in certain director's pictures in order to show in the most possible screens, the only other alternative is showing it Unrated except Major Studios won't accept that in their contracts, only independents do (this is why Miramax-a Disney subsidiary-couldn't distribute the aforementioned Kids so head Harvey Weinstein formed another distributing company-Shining Excalibur-for the sole purpose of keeping Kids from getting an NC-17 or clipped for an R). I've probably talked enough here so I'll just say that Inside Deep Throat puts in perspective what it was like in the '70s when both the sexual revolution and feminism was emerging and not on the same paths and how they affected society to this day. Whether what the results that became were good or bad depends, as always, on your point of view.

Yes, I know, it is indeed a film about a porn movie. But it is much more a showcase for how the US ticks.The US has (and always had) the biggest porn industry in the world. Though, there is no country in the Western World where this kind of business is more illegal, at least if you go by the present law. Does it make sense? No, for sure not. And that's the story of this really interesting documentary - at least IMO.For a German (in his late 30's) as I am, and probably for the vast majority of the Europeans it is and always was really strange how thing can go in the US. Don't get me wrong: Almost all Americans as single persons I met I really liked, but the USA as a society is a really strange place to me. Let me explain what I mean: An actor can be sentenced to 5 years in jail, while everybody else involved (director, producer, other actors, etc) is not touched at all for completely unknown reasons (legally I mean). A movie can make hundreds of millions bucks but it is officially judged as dangerous to the people. A prosecutor can even today think that he was right then. And to complete the picture, all the laws which harassed those people in those days are still untouched but for some unknown reasons not in use anymore.There is something hypocritical about the American society, and that's what is shown by this documentary. And that's why it is worth to watch.