Amateur Porn
"In pornoland, 1989 will go on record as the year middle-class Americans, the amateurs, proved they play the f---ie-suckie game as well as the professionals do." (X-rated Videotape Guide 3)
Porn users tired of the hard look of the pro women, turn increasingly to amateur performers. Amateur sections in video stores sometimes approach half of total space.
Since the '80s, videotape camcorders have allowed couples to show their love to the world. Psychologists generally give it their blessing. "I'd wonder about anyone with a camera who hadn't thought of doing it," Chicago psychologist Kate Wachs told Time magazine. "It's usually a fun thing done by people who have absolute trust in each other, are relaxed about their sexual adventurism."
"Filming can hit touchy unresolved issues within a relationship," warns Bonnie Eaker-Weil. "People may have incompatible attitudes concerning sex… Sometimes an element of coercion is involved. It's nothing overt, more subtle. Usually the man instigates the filming, and the woman goes along. But she isn't comfortable."
Uncle Roy, a 250 pound Southern gentleman well into middle age, produced one well-known amateur line. He got into the business in the 1960s and says he will soon reveal that he's one of the creators of X-rated cinema.
"I've always been a behind-the-scenes person, shunning publicity... But now it is time to stop all the talk, and shush the imitators. I've discovered erotic talent for three decades and it's time I had my due. And besides, I'd like some dignity in my retirement, and a larger library of tapes for my own use.
"When the owner of Visual Images, Arthur St. Jean, came to me and offered me my own line of tapes, I decided to get back into the business I helped start.
"He paid my back rent and purchased a camera for me. I immediately went out and began hiring new talent. I found Summer Knight and Nick Rage at a gas station. She was pumping gas and he was putting air in the tires of their van. I watched her bend over and saw a glimpse of her bush peek out of her tight pink shorts. He was checking the pressure of their tires, and squeezing his penis through his shorts as he watched her pump. I knew at that moment these two had definite erotic potential. I offered them money, a play to stay and shaving cream and a razor. They made a wonderful shaving video for me. The first time they saw it, they immediately had sex again.
"I have compiled my favorite pussy shaving scenes in a series called Uncle Roy's Close Shaves. There is also something near and dear to me - lesbianism. I find that most men like watching two women make love to each other. We can fantasize about being in the middle without having some sweaty fellow getting in the way. Down South, this is an especially taboo subject for some men. That's why I've called this series Uncle Roy's Queer Girls. They are doing some very queer things on screen, in a lesbian way, if you know what I mean." (AFW)
Uncle Roy sums up his style of filmmaking. "You must be able to masturbate to the finished product. Choke your chicken, slap the weasel, beat the brat - whatever you may call it. For me, I have to be aroused enough when filming to stop everything and take things into my own hands."
The veteran prefers to shoot amateurs than mainstream porn features. "All that matters is the sex. I deliver the goods....Others may aspire to be filmmakers. Uncle Roy achieves greatness through honesty. My audience wants to masturbate to orgasm as quickly and efficiently as possible. My movies create an environment for the viewer where arousal is followed by the extreme urge to satisfy one's needs. I invite my viewers to write to me and I will create for them custom-made videos. I have filmed various fetishes for my audience. One fellow wanted to see bitchy women. Another was interested in feet. Some like women who smoke during sex. I know how important this is to my viewers. To the true porn fan, a tape of someone executing their innermost sexual desires is worth a lifetime of pleasurable release." (AFW)
Visual Images eventually fired Uncle Roy.
Toby Dammit told me: "Uncle Roy was a guy named Jim Talmag who was the editor of Visual Images before I started working there. He got roped into doing Uncle Roy and then after about two years wanted a raise. The guys that owned the company said, "Blow it out your ass," and he walked. When he walked, theyhad already printed the boxes with the girls pictures on them, so I was the guy they got to replace him in the editing department, because at the time I was working on Nympho Zombie Coeds for that company. They talked me into being Cousin Bubba. I hosted those last two Uncle Roy tapes they had already printed. Then we did two Cousin Bubba's also. They didn't want me to do more, because I wanted to make them interesting and I spent too much money. Uncle Roy bought scenes from outside producers for about five hundred bucks, so the whole tape only cost about $3000 to produce. My Bubba budget was way over that, and I still had to cut tons of corners. I wanted to shoot all new scenes instead of buying scenes. The story about Uncle Roy, Shelby… I made up to explain Uncle Roy's absence. No, he did not discover John Holmes."
Preston Royal writes for Adam Film World (AFW): "The first time I met Uncle Roy and spent some time in his basement, I knew life on earth as we knew it had changed forever. Now, as impossible as it may seem, Roy's been outdone by his own "kin".
"Like his portly uncle, Bubba is a rotund, jocular fellow with a girth as impressive as his taste in smut. Half the time he's a hick, the other half he sounds like a surfer.
"What makes Bubba better than Roy? It's not the "amateurs" he shoots, because these folks seem to be from the same bargain basement from which Roy procured his alleged talent.... Most of it has to do with cousin Bobby Sue [Shelby Stevens], Bubba's busty cousin from the sticks. Her outfit would make Ellie Mae [of Hee Haw] blush.
"What's neat about Whitney...is that she likes to get f---ed wearing her big fuzzy bunny slippers. I never knew I had a fetish for these idiotic items until I saw Whitney with her legs in the air, the pink fuzzy rabbits bouncing around as Mikey slammed her pink hole. I was inspired. Then Whitney rearranges her rabbits to take it from behind: Mikey dumps his load between her cheeks to cap an otherwise hare-raising f---."
Susie Bright calls amateur porn "the quintessential documentary form of '90s America. It has the ingredient that's so strangely missing from MTV's "Real World" or daytime soaps: real sex, not just romance. It's the natural offspring of such revolutionary intimate displays as "An American Family," the documentary about the tragic Loud family aired on public television in the 1970s. It's an emotional free-for-all, and the notion that one is actually supposed to beat off to any of this sometimes gets lost in the spectacle of all those little pinball wizards demanding me to see them, feel them, touch their souls on a screen. "
J.M. Productions now markets the trail-blazing Uncle Roy's Amateur Home Videos and its short-lived successor, Cousin Bubba's Country Corn Porn made by Toby Dammit.
I rely on the 1996 Adam Film World Directory for most of the following summary of amateur sex production.
AFVC has put out 40 volumes of their Black Orgies line which usually features higher energy than similar all-white fare. I.R.A. (InterRacial Anal) combines three of porn's most popular subgenres.
An excellent pro-am line is Biff Malibu's Nasty Nymphos which features beautiful girls, hot sex and top photography. Biff Malibu's Nasty Girls is the all-girl version. His breakthrough series The Gangbang Girl spawned many competitors.
Astral Ocean Cinema once specialized in Asian girls but now they've branched out with their Anal Sex Tour line which visits places like Bangkok, the Phillipines and Budapest.
Joe Elliott talks attractive Bay Area coeds into stripping - and often more - for his camera. His tapes have single girl action, girl-girl and occasionally Joe-girl performances. "These girls are doing it not only for the first time," says Joe, "but for the last time."
Homegrown Video created the amateur genre in 1983 by duplicating swinger's tapes and sharing them. After a hiatus caused by legal disputes over ownership, Homegrown came to life under new owner Tim Lake who began his porn career in a Homegrown scene. The company releases footage from anyone as long as it's legal.
"Tim Lake is 31 years old and could easily pass for a drummer in a Seattle rock band," says Eric Schlosser. "Lake and his wife, Alyssa, sift through the new tapes that arrive at their office each week from round the world. The people who appear in these videos are of every race, size and shape. Their bodies are different from those seen in typical hard-core films, in which the performers often look like parodies of the reigning masculine and feminine ideals."
People who send tapes to Homegrown hope to break into the porn business, or earn a little extra money, or show off. The company pays them $20 for every minute of video it uses; about half the tapes that Homegrown receives are eventually released in some form. "In a sense, the company serves as a clearinghouse for the democracy of porn, supplying hard-core videos by the people, for the people."
L.B.O. Entertainment has slowed production of its Mr. Peepers Amateur Home Videos, "the granddaddy of pro-am lines."
Mark Carriere's Leisure Time probably releases more product than anyone. They put out the successful Snatch Master and Ass Master series which are shot by industry veteran Senor Snatch in hotel rooms. They feature six scenes per tape of sex between new girls and veteran studs such as Ron Jeremy. All the scenes are proceeded by interviews and "are notable for intensity, intimacy and spontaneous combustibility."
L.T. also releases Pussy Hunt from the Beaver Brothers and Butt Hunt, featuring all-anal first timers.
Metro Home Video releases the long-running Max Steiner's long-running Casting Call on their Soho Video label. Max interviews the women before stuffing himself into their every available orifice.
New Sensations lived up to its name in 1996 with their Video Virgins line. Their motto remains, "What is more erotic than a woman's orgasm?" Each new girl, there are six to a two hour tape, is interviewed by a casual host, and when she starts to f---, the camera doesn't stop until she orgasms at least once.
Englishman and porn veteran Peter Davy heads Nitro Productions which releases Rodney Moore's series The Doctor Is In and Pussy Fest of the Northwest.
"The former places Moore's Rodnievision shenanigans in a hospital setting with lots of cute nurses taking facial cumshots. In the latter Rod revisits his former Northwest Pecker Trek stomping grounds - for well-shot scenes with both old friends and new faces.
"Analtown USA is a follow-up to the successful Analvision series Davy created for L.B.O.. One of the three scenes in each volume comes from Analvision regular Max Hardcore. The others show hot anal action from several newer pro-am shooters." (AFW 96D p.232)
Odyssey Group is one of the pioneers of amateur video marketing. In Triple Plays you may find your favorite porn star in one of her first on-camera performances. They also release the six volumes of Alex Jordan's First-Timers and two Rodney Moore series - The Cumm Brothers and Creme de la Face.
Pleasure Productions is one of the few East Coast producer-distributors. In 1995, Jim Gunn's East Coast Sluts debuted. Unlike their California beach bunny counterparts, these hardcore beginners are "lewd, crude, tattooed and ready to screw."
"Brand new on Pleasure's pro-am agenda is Old Guys and Dolls with geezers in their sixties and seventies doing their best to ball babes in their twenties." (AFW p.232)
The Streets of New York series is reality porn with Rick Savage (since replaced) and other guys doing fresh females in public, sometimes just steps ahead of the police.
RTP Distributors are the guys that do the wild f--- and suck gang bang series Just Open Your f---ing Mouth (J.O.Y.F.M.). Affiliated company BHS Video releases the House of Sex gangbang tapes and their spinoff compilations. "Shot in the back room of a Los Angeles night club while punk bands blared out front, with walk-on guys as the bangers, these are the closest thing to public orgies ever committed to video tape."
Like its companion company Glitz Video, S.B. Sales specializes in the raunchy and the bizarre. The men and women of Eat at Dave's are middle-aged. The Spectacular Deni O'Brian features an over-40 babe who enjoys DPs. Raunchy Raggae is about the conquests of Reggie, The Nastiest Jamaican.
Stevi's Secrets is a popular mail order outlet for amateur video that was raided in the summer of 1995 by vice cops who confiscated all their video stock, master tapes and equipment.
"Eventually a federal court judge ordered their material returned and Vegas authorities dropped charges of pandering against Stevi's partner, photographer M.R. Jones. During the almost two months it took for justice...Stevi's Secrets was able to stay in business thanks to customers and fans, who supplied them with their own copies of videos to re-dupe and sell. Now it's business as usual for Stevi, who specializes in hour long tapes of couples, both boy-girl and girl-girl, single-girl tease and masturbation, and fetish specialties such as shaving."
Stevi appears in head and crotch shaving videos and also does custom videos.
"Industry giant VCA was for a long time the last major hold-out against the amateur and pro-am invasion. But in late '95 they started their PRO-AM Series, their first venture into the genre. First out was two volumes of Byron Long at Large, about the adventures of shaven-headed black dude Long and several familiar pro-am girls. Next up came a one-shot Sunset Rides Again, a collection of pro-am scenes from Sunset and Zach Thomas, followed by The Adventures of Mr. Magoof, with shaven-headed Italian Claudio playing a Mr. Magoof lookalike and chasing more of those pro-am cuties." (AFW 96D p.234)
Beginning as a mom-and pop operation, Video Alternatives now claims to offer the largest selection of amateur erotica available anywhere. They survived a highly publicized but ultimately unsuccessful attempt by local authorities to shut them down in 1991.
Wicked Pictures has slowed its amateur productions to concentrate on their big-budget features starring their contract girl Jenna Jameson.
Zane Entertainment pioneered professionally shot amateur videos with
their long-running America's Raunchiest Home Videos line which they dumped
for the raunchier porn of Max Hardcore, whose 1992 Anal Adventures of
Max Hardcore set the pace for much of pro-am video.