Asia Noir 6: Evil Sex Trap!

Trent (Mr. Marcus) wakes up in his own body, uncertain of who he is. He sees only the slick suit, the police badge, and the sidearm. He's in a bad part of Los Angeles, the kind where dreams don't come true, and he's getting drunk-dialed by a mostly incoherent Oriental Black Widow (Ange Venus), who beckons the amnesiac into her evil sex trap warehouse.

Her evil sex trap warehouse, I add, where things aren't as they seem. Sex is happening there. Black men on Asian women sex (Dick James and Lana Violet). And does Mr. Marcus start having flashbacks? Does he know, now, why he's here?

Asia Noir 6, like the best low-budget porn movies, succeeds because it follows certain rules and does not stray from its own economy. For example, most of the important dialogue is in voiceover, which Marcus delivers convincingly, a late-night DJ mixed with a dude you don't want to mess with.

The noir aspect is also not overwhelming. Director David Aaron Clark realizes that the audience has to see (please tell this to Wicked Pictures), so the noir is more in the mood and the skin tone of the performers than in the lighting.

In the evil sex trap warehouse, Marcus stumbles on a sexual encounter. His LAPD instincts returning, he mostly watches. But when it looks as if things will get ugly for the Destiny, he acts. But the girl disappears, and now Marcus has murdered Dick James.

Meanwhile, Ange Venus continues her cryptic phone calls. Myself, I would have fled, but Marcus is dogged and patient. He continues patrolling the evil sex trap warehouse until he finds Coco Velvett, who is a secretary "down the hall." Spookily, Velvett's hair is down on one floor and up on the next. Ange Venus' dialogue coach must have been handling the continuity.

Velvett fills Marcus in on what goes on in the building. There's an Import/Export business on this floor and a porn studio, Velvett whispers, in the basement. Marcus gets himself down there fast, where he meets Myla Montez, who doesn't have to try too hard to seduce him.

I am not making excuses here, but the awkward readings of heightened dialogue by some of the actresses gently nudges the overall creepiness of the movie. It is rare that bad line readings in a serious porn movie actually work. But here they serve to increase Marcus' -pardon the pun- disorientation. When working with a limited budget, any tool in the shed is helpful.

Upstairs, a frightened Velvett has dreams about Marcus, even as he works on Montez below (so "below" is Marcus' work on Montez that she doesn't take her shirt off). But girls keep disappearing after they've been serviced by black men in this movie, and Montez vanishes.

Marcus gets dressed and finds Velvett being throttled by Destiny, a strap-on succubus. He's not a very good cop. Must call William Bratton and tell him that there's a homicide detective in L.A. letting nice girls get strapped by ghosts.

Destiny, Montez, and Venus are, you see, an evil ghostly trinity bent on vengeance for a crime Trent committed in the conscious world.

When Trent finally figures it out, things have gone irretrievably creepy, and it is too late. He discovers the part he has played, and why he is at least partly responsible for the events. Of course, the vindictive spirits might have forgiven him, but vengeance is a bitch.

Studio: Metro
Director: David Aaron Clark
Cast: Ange Venus, Mr. Marcus, Coco Velvett, Destiny, Lana Violet, Myla Montez, Dick James

Review by: Gram Ponante

· Metro (metrointeractive.com)
· Buy "Asia Noir 6: Evil Sex Trap!" (filthyadultdvd.com)

Read our review of "Pirates 2: Stagnetti's Revenge" after the gap.

Pirates 2: Stagnetti's Revenge

Here's how much money went into "Pirates 2." When I opened the 4-disc box, three crisp hundred-dollar bills slid out. There was a code on Disc 1 that allowed me half off a 2008 Saturn Vue at the Porn Valley Galpins. There were free helicopter rides to the Van Nuys airport, and either Stoya or Riley Steele is contractually obligated to deliver your "Pirates 2" personally, wearing nothing but your family coat of arms or company logo bodypainted across her eager frame.

But I only speak from personal experience. Your mileage may vary.

A movie of excesses, "Pirates 2" is also an earnest attempt to be a family comedy – much like the "Pirates of the Caribbean" movies were, except with rimjobs in it. There are portions of the script devoted to loyalty, believing in oneself, and sticking up for friends that would not be out of place on "Hannah Montana." That these elements appear discretely between scenes of guys coming on each other (just from a porn angle, "Pirates 2" is dirtier and riskier than your average mainstream adult movie) was an uncomfortable marriage of childish themes with very adult ones, as if Digital Playground were trying to let the Sarah Palin demographic know that fisting was "super."

The first joke told by anyone who writes about porn (and a joke he is under the mistaken impression of thinking he has invented) is the one about the sequels. It goes like this: "Whoriental Sex Academy 4 addresses the vital questions left unanswered by Whoriental Sex Academies 1 through 3."

"Pirates 2," on the other hand, really does pick up where its predecessor left off, cannily depending on familiarity with (and perhaps ownership of) 2005's "Pirates" to figure out who "Serena" was and why Captain Evan Stone and First Mate Jesse Jane are searching the Caribbean for her. (Just so you know, Serena is Janine Lindemulder's character from the original. She doesn't appear, Jo-rel or Ben Kenobi-like, in "Pirates 2," however).

An adventure that leads from Jamaica to the (Armenian owned and operated) slave markets to the high seas to the netherworld, where Katsuni's magical Blue Pearl reanimates Tommy Gunn's Stagnetti, "Pirates 2: Stagnetti's Revenge" really is all over the place, and anyone who expects the story to make sense is, I guess, expecting too much. Ditto for the CGI. The pirate hunters' animated ship moves through animated water, leaving no shadow and displacing none of it. The massive worm slain by Belladonna is about as realistic as Jesse Jane's boobs.

But if the big effects are not even to the standards of late-night Sci Fi Channel fare, the sex and the scope of "Pirates 2" are far beyond what you expect and deserve as average porn consumers. You expect an awful porn script? Here you get one that actually expected something of the actors. You expect scenery chewing from the men? Evan Stone and Steven St. Croix ably comply. You want Jesse Jane and Belladonna to fuck the living daylights out of each other? Check.

Not only that, but the strenuous sex scenes we saw in the theatrical (yes, "Pirates 2," like its predecessor, debuted in a theatre) release are extended in the DVD set. So the thrill you got to see added footage of Minas Tirith when the "Return of the King" Extended Edition came out you can now feel when you see even more of Belladonna's colon.

But in other areas the sheer quantifiables of the movie are distractions. The Stagnetti of the title is, despite Tommy Gunn's performance, useless. He appears toward the end and, as it turns out, anticlimactically. Katsuni's incoherent black widow character was both evil and had boobs. Stagnetti wasn't necessary. The same goes for Sasha Grey. Sure it makes sense for Sasha Grey to be in the biggest porn movie of the year, but her presence and character are as tacked on as when everybody in class has to be in the school play, so suddenly Snow White has 40 dwarves.

And why was Shay Jordan not listed on the box? Her performance was wonderful. And why was Stoya only in a group scene? Both are criminal acts. Further inexplicability is achieved in non-speaking, non-fucking roles for Ange Venus and Adrianna Nicole ("I fell asleep on set," Nicole said.)

Regardless, we persevere. We remember that "Pirates 2: Stagnetti's Revenge" is a porn movie – and an excellent porn movie - with all the usual limitations even if, as shouted from the boxcover, it is "The Biggest Adult Production in History." We still have four DVDs worth of delightful, turgid nudity.

Studio: Digital Playground
Director: Ali Joone
Cast: Jesse Jane, Shay Jordan, Evan Stone, Jenna Haze, Katsuni, Steven St.Croix, Tommy Gunn, Belladonna, Stoya, Riley Steele, Ben English, James Deen, Sasha Grey, Gabriella Fox, David Aaron Clark, your mom, Shyla Stylez, Shawna Lenee, Abbey Brooks, Brianna Love, Brea Lynn, Rhylee Richards, Charles Dera, Mick Blue, Manuel Ferrara, Marco Banderas

Review by: Gram Ponante

· Digital Playground (digitalplayground.com)
· Buy "Pirates 2" (gamelink.com)

The biggest American adult industry event prior to January's AVN Expo, the "Pirates II: Stagnetti's Revenge" premiere attracted most of the movie's stars including Jesse Jane, Katsuni, Stoya, the sylphlike Riley Steele, Evan Stone, Tommy Gunn, Steven St. Croix, and David Aaron Clark, seen here with Jandi Lin, whose process in his pivotal whore-negotiating scene involved eating two turkey legs.

"I was there for two days of shooting," he said.

The premiere marks the midpoint of "Pirates"-related marketing and publicity, coming more than three years after the debut of its predecessor's first press release and three years before the collected weight of all its publicity efforts will sink the Pacific Rim (which, considering the analingus involved in this movie, would have made a good subtitle).

The only porn stars to arrive dressed like pirates were the swashbuckling Nicki Hunter and Tommy Gunn, the Stagnetti of the title, who wore his evil glass eye.

"I wasn't in the movie much," he said. "But I'm hoping for a Supporting Actor nomination," Gunn said.

"But you were the title character," we observed. Hollywood is so unfair.

Former Digital Playground contract performer Teagan prowled the red carpet for XBiz which, like rival AVN, now features video interviews. If only Sophia Santi and Janine had been there, it would have been a "Pirates" reunion.

Other porn luminaries in attendance were publicity magnet Kayden Kross, Aiden Starr, Bobbi Starr (no relation), Ringo Starr (not actually there), Satine Phoenix, Jenna Haze, and Sasha Grey, who came dressed as Sasha Grey.

As usual, Ange Venus, who plays the inscrutable Katsuni's henchwoman in the movie, attracted most of the attention on the red carpet, wearing almost nothing but her hair. Katsuni by comparison dressed very elegantly. It was as if Venus was going to the MTV Awards and Katsuni to the Golden Globes.

This reporter spent so much time outside that he did not get in on the free bar in the lobby, but by then the movie was starting. The crowd cheered as the first popshot broke over Shay Jordan's prow. We'll give you a review of the movie, that may or may not include the blurb Belladonna is salad tosseriffic!, soon.

- Photos by DCypher



• "Pirates II: Stagnetti's Revenge" (official site @ piratesthemovie.com)
• Digital Playground (digitalplayground.com)
• Order: "Pirates II: Stagnett's Revenge" (Adult DVD Empire)

These photos were taken by the estimable Glenn Baren because my glasses kept fogging up in the shower.

The standard Porn Valley pool scene seems so much more classy somehow when no one feels compelled to drink a jug of water and squirt at you. I'm glad it's not going to be that kind of movie.

"No Man's Land Asian Edition #7: Mr. Hentai's Super-Funtime Asian Pool Party" will doubtless be released before the Summer Olympics begin, so laser-topical is the porn marketing machine.

· Metro (metrointeractive.com)
· David Aaron Clark (davidaaronclark.com)

Read our review of "No Man's Land: Asian Edition 6" after the gap.

. . .

Studio: Metro
Director: David Aaron Clark
Cast: Lana Croft, Kina Kai, Kalyssa Kye, Leilani, Ange Venus, Kitty, Jandi Lin

Review by: Gram Ponante

"They say this house is haunted. But I know all the ghosts by name. At least the most important ones. Without them, I might end up lonely."

Poor angelic Lana Croft. The Porn Valley McMansion she rattles around is lousy with memories. Luckily for us, they are sexy, sexy memories.

Porn directors who've been around long enough know there are several ways to coax a narrative out of performers unequal to realizing the non-sexual aspects of their vision. David Aaron Clark chooses the millennial version of the silent film dialogue card to telegraph Lana Croft's thoughts as she clatters around the rented Encino home of a Persian dentist in his latest, which he describes as a "hardcore fever dream filled with broken angels and insatiable demonesses."

Croft is haunted by visions of a dead lover and her own sister, whose relationship with a "Korean bitch" sundered the siblings. The sex scenes in No Man's Land: Asian Edition 6 are both flashbacks and hallucinations, but the result is clear: grief and resentment strips us of our divinity, and not even Red Bull can get our wings back.

Croft stubs out her cigarette on the framed photo of her sister (Kina Kai who, like Croft, is Filipina) and the aforementioned Korean (Kalyssa Kye) who broke up their family, and we know that Croft chose to have the photo framed only so she could stub out her cigarette thusly again and again.

Then we meet Leilani, Croft's true love who, tragically, died in a plane crash, just like Col. Henry Blake.

"I've got no quarrel with Mclean Stevenson," said Clark. "But I accept all interpretations of my work."

In the final sequence, Croft reads a manga illustrated by Michael Manning. The pages come to life in a scene with Ange Venus, Jandi Lin, and Krissy as demonesses who complete Croft's transformation. Well, she had a good run.

More space is needed to adequately describe the thought process that governs the committing to film of a fantasy that must be carried out with a limited budget. There is a lot going on in this movie, which is far weightier than one would expect from a high-numbered porn series. We watch as beautiful tableaux are created but wonder if anyone gets it but the director.

It doesn't matter. It's delicious to watch.

"This is how we make fine cheese," Clark said.

· Metro (metrointeractive.com)
· David Aaron Clark (davidaaronclark.com)
· Buy "No Man's Land: Asian Edition 6" (gamelink.com)

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Previously: David Aaron Clark Returns to "No Man's Land", Popshots of the Week!

Sure they do. And since this is the final WWFRD of the year and because we always listen to a little Dan Fogelberg when watching Max's movies, please rename this film with the Bard of Maine in mind and see what runs through your instrument, just like Cloudcarrier did with last week's jubilant and strenuous winning effort.

· See the real title (jerkoffzoone.com)

Previously: WWFRD Archive

· Buy "Mamasans: The Asian MILF Movie" (gamelink.com)

Previously: Porn Of The Moment Archive

Join us after the gap for more images of America's porn stars not as the cameras usually see them, but as they really are.

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Stormy Daniels, Ron Jeremy, and IS THAT THE GUY FROM COLOR ME BADD??? at the "Operation Desert Stormy" release party.

The affable and volcanic Trina Michaels among the valets.

We stared at leather bar The Faultline's neon display for hours at Chi Chi LaRue's mansex epic "Link: The Evolution" premiere party. It actually shot several globules of manchowder every 30 seconds onto an illuminated "2007". Despite this display of coming on an abstraction falling well within California's sodomy laws, I still found it unsettling.

Chi Chi LaRue called everyone in the audience a bitch or a whore at least twice, and yet they loved him.

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Previously: Popshots Archive