We can't say much about this Big Beautiful Work-of-art, but we can say it's cast with hyphy amounts of crush objects (including a spectacular threeway with Syd Blakovich, Jiz Lee, and April Flores beneath a waterfall), it was shot in the splendorous wild of Northern California, and it's coming out in January. How did they find time to put together another genre-busting film in the midst of productions for Alice? Ponder that while you enjoy this exclusive trailer and photo gallery from our good friends, Carlos and April.

· Heartcore Films (goodreleasing.com)

This porn version of "Alice," the third to be shot this year, promises something far more Sunny (the delicious Sunny Lane is the most deceptively wholesome of the three Alices) and, well, less Stormy and Grey.

Not only that, but the movie, which wrapped yesterday at McLean's ranch in Sunland, will be released concurrently with Tim Burton's version of "Alice," slated for February 2010.

We've already visited the Hole, the dungeon down which Alice follows the rabbit (the rabbit is Lavish Styles), and now we're ready for the Mad Hatter's tea party, hosted by Evan Stone. But first Kimberly Kane must masturbate.

"I play Alice's dirty sister," says Kane, in yet another impressive hairdo. "I masturbate while reading this illustrated 'Story of O.'"

It's the last day of shooting and the mountainside is decorated Wonderland-style. Dust blows up the canyon and Sunny Lane and Kimberly Kane do their best to not squint at the camera. McLean's dogs, horses, and assembled menagerie try to avoid the camera.

Lane, just back from a month-long stint at the Moonlite Bunnyranch, is greeted warmly by Kane, who stands out in the porn world for having something nice to say about everybody.

"You are the sweetest thing," said Kane as Lane tottered down the hill. Soon they would be naked, with dust everywhere, but we will preserve the fantasy for a little while longer.

· Erica McLean (hardcorecircusxxx.com)
· Carlos Batts (carlosbatts.com)

Jane was just about to squirt chocolate on herself, at which point my camera was jostled by ravening lesbians who proceeded to lick it off her.

The event was the Exotic Erotic Ball, a hit or miss affair with heart and soul and plenty of local color. Like this protester's sign, however, the Ball tried to cater to as diverse a group as possible but didn't have its act together. Still, the friendliness of the crowd inside was a very welcome and opposite counterpoint to the real hatred of this group of protesters.

Down south, delightful pixie Aiden Starr auditions for Erica McLean and Carlos Batts' upcoming "Alice in Wonderland" porn adaptation (which will be at least the third this year and, if she gets the role, Starr's second foray through the looking glass).

April Flores, of course, plays the Red Queen. I think that will be awesome.

Across Porn Valley, Ashlynn Brooke plays Sookie in New Sensations' adaptation of "True Blood," scripted by Brooke herself. She is so unbelievably pretty I forgot her clothes were on.

The chameleonic Misty Stone plays Tara (she just found out Lafayette was dead) and Evan Stone plays Evan Stone playing a guy from the show. In the background we see Ralph Long, pulling double duty as a boom operator (we last saw Long as Screech in "This Ain't Saved by the Bell" as well as in "The Sex Files").

Finally we managed to get inside, to Silverlake's Bigfoot Lodge (this reporter's local bar), where at 10 in the morning Misty Stone inspired more wood within the woody surroundings.

Not surprisingly, April's life is not like the day-to-day grind we all face: not once during the two hour run of "Glamazons" does April, say, go to an office, or clean her bathroom. No, April's life is the stuff of glitter-filled fantasies. Strutting around in her impossibly high heels, the lovely lady serves as a muse to many an admirer, and we watch as she's captured on film, in paintings, and in Polaroid; as her team of fellow glamazons defy death as they contort their bodies on the stripper pole; as she seductively dons sexy outfit after sexy outfit; and, of course, as she fucks.

And oh, does she fuck: we watch her tangling limbs with the lovely Ruby Violence (who also has her own masturbation scene) and enveloping Jerry as he takes her picture; we even watch her have her way with Barbie in a segment titled "April Vs. Doll That Symbolizes Unrealistic Ideas Of Beauty" (spoiler alert: April wins).

April fans will no doubt be satisfied by another stunning performance; Carlos Batts fans will gaze in awe at the arty feel of this glimpse into the life of an artporn power couple. And we can all appreciate another beautiful film that test the limits of what a porn film should be, shattering the standard format and creating something truly magical.

· Buy "Glamazons (goodreleasing.com)

Pairing April with Syd Blakovich, Kelly Shibari, and Ashley Blue, "Behind the Red Door" takes us into "the Doll House of fetish dreams come true." We're not one hundred percent sure what that means, but it sounds pretty good to us. (And paired with these exclusive previews pictures, that "pretty good" is easily a very good—not that we expected any less from this talented team.)

April Flores and Syd Blakovich
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
Syd Blakovich
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
Syd Blakovich
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores and Syd Blakovich
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores and Syd Blakovich
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
Kelly Shibari
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores and Kelly Shibari
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores and Kelly Shibari
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores and Kelly Shibari
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
Kelly Shibari
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores and Kelly Shibari
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores and Ashley Blue
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores and Ashley Blue
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores and Ashley Blue
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores and Ashley Blue
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores and Ashley Blue
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores and Ashley Blue
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)
April Flores and Ashley Blue
C. Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)

Last Friday, this magnificent team converged in San Francisco (at Violet Blue's house!) to make history... or at least hot porn. We don't know what the movie was about, or when we'll be able to see it... but from looking at the behind the scenes photos that Violet was kind enough to post online, well, we can pretty much guarantee that we'll be buying a copy as soon as it's available.

· porn's neu wave invaded my house friday night (tinynibbles.com)
· Photo Gallery (fotki.com)

Commissioned in celebration of the April Flores cyberskin pussy, the show features, yes, plaster molds of April's ladybits, painted in a variety of styles by artists like Axis, Carlos Batts, COOP, Jim Mahfood, Kime Buzzelli, Kozy & Dan, Misha, and Small Paul. The show will be at La Luz de Jesus Gallery on May 13 (sadly, it's one night only)—but get a sneak peek at some of the art over on April's blog.

· Toy Exhibit Preview (fattyd.com)

· More Glamazons: Exclusive (tinynibbles.com, more photos here)
· Buy "Glamazons" (gamelink.com)

Our last few encounters with director Batts have been a series of incomplete epics, but in this five-scene effort also featuring Flower Tucci, Annette Schwarz, and Arianna Jollee, Batts returns to simple design and glamour photography, delivering a series of fun vignettes starring women any fan of April Flores (Batts' partner in crime) might find similarly appealing.

Two years can be a few generations in Porn (Annette Schwarz is now an airline attendant, for instance), so it is surprising to see Paloma in her pre-Tommy Pistol days, looking just as she did when he (and America) fell in love with her. Of course, she is not paired with Pistol in this movie, rather a dude named Barry Scott, who hastens to clarify that he is the asshole, not her.

We miss you, Gia Paloma. It would not be pandering to say "Come back whenever you feel like it."

· Adam & Eve (adameve.com)
· Buy "Sex Gallery" (adultdvdempire.com)

· Carlos Batts does Chuck Palahniuk’s “Snuff” (tinynibbles.com)

· Fine Art TV: Carlos Batts Uncovered (finearttv.tv)
· Carlos Batts: C Batts Fly Productions (carlosbatts.com)

So who do we root for in "Kiss Attack," this comic art/porn/hip hop/rave/drag effort by artist Carlos Batts and his wife, the zaftig April Flores, who plays lead vampire babe Ms. Sangre? Well, in that Sangre's sisters include Sasha Grey, Sara Vandella, and a woman named La Cholita, we vote for the bloodsuckers, stupid.

Batts enlisted the help of New Mexico artist Nathan Carlisle, whose splendid animations fleshed out characters (like Drakul) that budget restrictions prevented from human depiction.

But where "Kiss Attack" really succeeds (as it should) is in its sex scenes, each with its own color palette, such as this one with the pale and lush Sara Vandalla and this vivid (small v) exchange with Sasha Grey.

Do we really learn anything new about vampires in "Kiss Attack"? Er, no. But they're a fuckload sexier than werewolves.

· Carlos Batts (carlosbatts.com)
· Buy "Kiss Attack"@ Amazon (yes, amazon.com)

. . .

Despite the exhortations to "rise up" contained in the title being feted, those present at "The Doll Underground" release party seemed to openly mock the very suggestion of class warfare and sexual redistribution of capital as they nibbled on truffled foie gras and quaffed liberally from Waterford crystal flacons of 1995 Chateau Margaux. After showing up to the party in his custom Hummer stretch limousine, McKai exerted a Svengali-like hold on starlets Lexi Belle and Reagan Maddux throughout the evening, never allowing reporters to approach them directly and openly dictating their responses to them instead.

Also spotted at the gala were such prominent members of Old Los Angeles society as Ed Fox, Dave Naz, Ashley Blue, Zack Sabbath, Mandy Morbid, Kimberly Kane, Carlos Batts, and April Flores, all of whom listened in rapt attention as McKai described the splendor of his new palatial estate in Cap d'Antibes while feeding mouthfuls of gold leaf-encrusted cake to three or four waifish models inked from head to toe in "rebellious" tattoos and splayed at his feet. Later, after a shower of $1000 bills descended from the ceiling of the Little Cave upon the heads of the delighted guests, a Vivid Alt-branded personal helicopter spirited him away from the festivities. What will he think of next?

· Vivid Alt (vivid-alt.com)
· Order: "The Doll Underground" (Adult DVD Empire)

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Previously: Rise Up: Eon McKai's "The Doll Underground"

Carlos Batts' "Young Hollywood" is a little like the Grover's Corners of "Our Town": everyone knows each other, there is a kindly narrator and, as the spirit of Death is ever-present in Thornton Wilder's New Hampshire hamlet, so does Glenn Danzig hover above young Hollywood. The similarities end there, though, because you'd never expect Emily Webb to flash her tits to get into a music video the way Mandy Morbid does. Read our review after the gap.

. . .

Young Hollywood

Studio: Independent Adult Cinema
Director: Carlos Batts
Cast: Kimberly Kane, Mandy Morbid, Lystra, April Flores, Lindsey Meadows, Adrianna Nicole, Ashley Blue, Alex Gonz, Jerry, Steven St. Croix

Review by Gram Ponante

Actually, Mud's narration is more reminiscent of Samuel Jackson's omniscient DJ in "Do the Right Thing."

Like last year's "Boys' & Girls' Guide to Getting Down", "Young Hollywood" takes a snapshot of the short plain of city blocks south of the Hollywood sign, and makes no real distinction between porn performers and struggling actors (because there isn't one).

Morbid and Lystra fuck on the Mustang parked in Danzig's yard (it is actually Glenn Danzig's yard; the Satan-appreciating "Mother" vocalist lives in Hollywood) and later spend some topless time talking about cosplay and Comic-Con. This is a slightly more believable kind of unreality than what is found in traditional porn videos; it is only because the camera was on that their conversation seemed so awkward, because that's how the two of them actually talk.

It's not a rule, but porn shot in the San Fernando (Porn) Valley often looks different from porn shot over the hill in Hollywood and downtown L.A. We meet Kimberly Kane on the set of a movie. She fucks Steven St. Croix on an art installation chopper and makes plans on her phone for going out later. No Porn Valley McMansion and no chirpy starlet: just the angular, frank, and badass Kane in a room festooned with Atari art.

A lot of porn movies come with behind the scenes footage, and it is there where any consumer can become well-versed in what it is like to shoot a porn movie. Often this footage is ten times more entertaining than the movie it accompanies. "Young Hollywood" takes a different angle and seeks to dramatize the backstage logistics. In that way it is like an X-rated reality show.

Adrianna Nicole looks particularly sirenesque in a bathing cap on a Hollywood roof. Downstairs she gets fucked in the shadows of the venetian blinds in an empty apartment. Something about the light identifies Los Angeles - that and the fact that, if Adrianna Nicole lived on the east coast, who would ever leave?

Natural light plays more of a role in Ashley Blue's segment with Alex Gonz. It's twilight in Los Angeles and they're on the rooftop pool. This is a really good look for Blue, a very cool light.

The movie culminates at a party in Beverly Hills with fire dancers and carrying on; this scene is poorly lit and anticlimactic. But overall, "Young Hollywood" succeeds in its music, its sense of place, and its very loving photography. The statements it seeks to make about celebrity and hanging out would be more effective without the narrator telling us what we already picked up from the action, though.

Still, "Young Hollywood" paints a nice picture of Our Town; everybody gets along and looks good. It's a much better postcard for the area than the Christmas parade on Hollywood Boulevard.

· Carlos Batts (carlosbatts.com)
· Adam & Eve (adameve.com)

· Ashley Blue (davenaz.com)
· "Young Hollywood" Trailer (carlosbatts.com)

Check out some pictures after the gap.

- - -

This movie is distinct from the earlier and (we guess) limited selling "Voluptuous Life" that we reviewed earlier. Would you sacrifice such a great title just because you used it for a previous movie?

Throughout the movie, people are just delighted to meet Flores. I have seen this happen in real life.

· Carlos Batts (carlosbatts.com)
· April Flores (fattyd.com)
· Order "Voluptuous Life" (amazon.com)

* * * * *

Previously: Photoplay Archive