We caught up with director Jens Hoffmann on the eve of the release of his latest film, The Porn Diaries – a fly-on-the-wall documentary on the pornographic industry that was the talking point of film festivals when it was premiered last year. Filmed over three years, the film follows the exploits of some of the industries biggest names, including Sasha Grey and Belladonna, showing them in a light that has never been seen before (i.e. not just with their clothes off!) Yes, even porn stars have feelings too…
MP: How did The Porn Diaries come about? How did you get involved with the project?
JH: As a filmmaker I try to choose subject matters, which kind of have a natural attraction for me personally, since I have to invest a lot of time with this. Love, sex and death are the most popular themes of movies anyway, and it is safe to say there was this natural interest which I assume at least every male human being has.
Of course there was an incident which sparked the flame – a friend of a friend (as always when comes to porn) came by my editing booth to screen his tapes. He produced porn and it turned out that he was nothing like the stereotype porn person that I expected. He was studying theology, looked something like me – in-between a rockabilly and a nerd – and told me about his poverty and his miserable life in Prague. So no pimp-style, cokehead, big-dick porn star attitude. We started an interesting conversation and he asked me to visit him in Prague, which I eventually did. Once there, I saw nothing of the porn glamour we all expected.
After researching more and finding loads of documentaries, reportages and films about it I could not find anything which I thought reflected reality. Most of the stuff was covered porn for TV – a ’making of’ porn. I was interested in the people and started to write a script with hypothetical characters. Later on, when we researched more, we kind of met all these people in reality. It is important for me that a documentary is as emotional and entertaining as fiction, and reality delivers all these stories. You just have to take the craft of fiction film making over to the doc side: no narration, no telling the viewer what to think. Be aware of a smart audience and let them make up their own mind. Try to deliver all sides and make them think on their own.
MP: How did you gain contact with all the directors and actors in the documentary? Was it hard to gain their trust?
JH: Well as mentioned we did quite a lot of research before filming. The entire production took almost 5 years. Within the time of research we did some pre-shoots, made trailers and introduced the concept to the potential protagonists. It was clear from the beginning that from the moment one would agree to be part of the project we were able to film and record everything and would never ask again if we could use this or not. Of course, this requested a very high level of trust from both sides. My ethics lead me to the point that I never exploit people. We filmed a lot of personal stuff which we did not use, even though it would have been strong content. But this is how filmmakers are supposed to deal with this trust and not abuse it like done in many examples. This was actually one of the biggest barriers to overcome: many of the ‘porn people’ have been screwed by TV & filmcrews before – ask Belladonna – but it seems that they liked and believed our approach.
A crucial point was when Mark Spiegler offered his support and introduced us to many people. He is very respected in the scene and can be a big time door opener. He definitely took us under his wing and gave us his full support.
A second step was when Belladonna offered her appearance. When we met her first, she was OK with us filming on her set, but did not really be part of the project because of her very bad experience. But after she has been observing us, seeing what and how we did things, she actually offered form her side not just to be part of but also with helping us out on many occasion including accommodation, which led to a very personal relationship. Since she is such a well respected role figure in the industry, I guess from that point on nobody ever doubted our approach again.
MP: Do you keep in contact with any of the people featured in the documentary?
JH: As much as possible. I mean it is like it is. You start a new project and all of the sudden it is kind of hard to keep in touch permanently. I personally have personal contact to Sasha (Grey), who I keep meeting or talking to on a personal level.
We did have contact with everybody involved, after the movie was finished, and everybody was ok with it. Nobody felt mistreated or shown in a wrong way, and this is how it should be. The people trust you, and you should pay this respect back. I am very happy that we managed it like this, which is always hard, when you enter somebody’s private space on this level.
MP: Sasha Grey was only 18 when she was featured on the documentary. How do you feel about people that young being involved in porn?
JH: If you do not go to University, I guess 18 is about the age you start your professional career. At the end it all comes down to the individual’s personality and if it fits to the profession chosen. I am not saying that porn is a normal career, but also it is not a devils thing. It is a flat statement and would need a lot of discussion, but when I see how many people get depressed on their jobs in insurance or maybe become amoral gangsters in banking – how ready were they when they started their careers? You are able to go to war and shoot people by the time you are aged 18. In our days, kids do have sex before marriage. Of course, it is a different thing to have sex on camera, but this has nothing to do with real sex. This is a performance, a circus act, a fantasy. There are some people who do have an exhibitionist fetish and do get turned on by a camera.
Anyway, we asked the same question and that is why we included two 18 year old girls who just started out in their porn careers. Sasha has obviously proved, that she was ready for it and that she had a strategy for her life, in which porn is an important part. But for sure, she is not the typical 18 year old. Her life-experience and her awareness, knowledge and intelligence are way above average.
Mia – the other 18 year old in the movie rather represents the average. Not that she got hurt or abused by the industry, but not all her dreams came as easy as she first thought and some might never come true. But at the end it is not a question of physical age, it is much more the question of personality, mental stability and intelligence.
Of course I am speaking about the world of porn as we know it from the USA and Western Europe. The more east you go, the more different the whole scene gets. I am talking about the relation to sex-business, prostitution and human trade. This separation gets thinner and disappears in places east of our homes, and then this is whole different story which we would discuss…
MP: How would you say porn has changed in the recent years? Is there a trend for more extreme stuff now?
JH: The first big change in porn was the introduction of video, when it became affordable and technically possible for small crews and amateurs to make movies, and for people to watch them at home on their TV in privacy. Another step in all this was the digital technology, with Mini-DV cams, Internet, etc. Now a full beginner could grab a camera and make a POV-movie, even edit it on his laptop and distribute it through the net. The consumer can access it without leaving his house. So it becomes more intimate and your ‘worse’ fantasies can be fulfilled without getting a bad look from a person behind a counter.
I mean – nothing is produced which is not sold. The consumer leads the production in terms if content. No freak stuff is produced without the request. Since it is much easier to produce stuff, more specialties are available, and this is the extreme stuff, you can find now and has not been there before.
Besides that, I guess there are a lot of national trends. Americans love the deep throat gagging stuff, ass to mouth stuff. Germans I guess, are more straight to the ass and pussy, and they do love the very dirty talking. In France, more pubic hair is seen, and so on…
I am not so sure about the Brits. I guess they are still quite new in the game and do not have such a big porn-tradition, since it has been kept under the counter.
MP: What was the highlight of making this documentary?
JH: The highlight was definitely the outcome. Against all odds the movie was so well received, went big on festivals and drew a lot of interest, even in the cinemas. When we made it we expected it to be way more controversial, making people leaving the cinema. But it turned out almost nobody left and the female audience actually was less irritated than the male viewers.
Another highlight was the support of artists like the musicians. Big names like Brant Bjork (Ex-Queens the Stoneage, Fu Manchu), Martina Topley Bird, The Dwarves – all of them offered their support after learning about the project. In normal terms we would have never been able to afford this kind of soundtrack. It was great to experience all this loyalty. Another highlight was when Sasha came to the world premiere in Montreal even though she was already a star on the cover of Rolling Stone.
MP: And what was the worst thing?
JH: The limited horizons of the industry people who refused any support, the way we had to defend the project and the way we had to discuss it. You mention the word porn and the eyebrow goes up. I am sure that these people I am talking about, the ones who see porn as a shady part of society, are the ones with the big download accounts on the ’spermwar websites.
Of course we had miserable moments, like the one when all our camera gear got stolen in Prague, unreliable people who make you drive crossways through the San Fernando Valley three time a day. The producer with the attitude. The so cool avant-garde electronic music producer from Berlin who refused his tracks by saying he does not want to be involved with porn because it is bad for his image. And the insolvency of our world distribution after cashing all advance payments, but never forwarding the money to us. It has been a rollercoaster for sure!
MP: You must have been involved in some pretty strange situations whilst filming. Which times stick out for you?
JH: Obviously you want to hear the crazy sex stuff. But sex becomes part of the work in this industry and also for our work very fast. Of course there were situations which you never experience out of the industry, like the fuck-machine scene, which is shot in front of the office desk between phone calls. A real bad situation happened in Prague, when we were on a porn shoot in a house, with 6 year old kids were playing around and in the house, hand guns with ammunition were laying around on the kitchen table, the set in the room was barely covered to anybody around. But this was the only occasion like this.
Another funny one – actually after the movie was out – happened last winter, when I met up with Sasha. We were entering a metro station and standing next to a family with 3 boys around the age of 10. The kids were starring at Sasha with their mouths opened and obviously recognized her. Of course, they did not tell their parents. Sasha was also not sure how she should feel about it. I thought it was very funny and tells a story about our kids and the internet.
MP: What is your own personal opinion on the porn industry? Has it changed since making this documentary?
JH: My opinion comes from a very liberal background. I was raised by very cool and liberal parents. Not that they watched porn all day, but sex was not an issue to avoid. Germany has always been pretty open towards this subject, at least in my lifetime, so I think it is and will always be around. There is bad porn, ok porn, bad people, good people – it is an industry like many others.
The industry is constantly changing, especially of the internet and its distribution facilities. It is very interesting how all the private porn stuff is affecting the industry, which people put on the web, without being asked and paid. The industry is now more ruled by the companies with the best web-distribution set up. The old-school film production companies will disappear if they don’t adapt.
MP: What projects do you have lined up for the future?
JH: I am recently writing on a script for a feature film, rather on the darker and hidden side of society and it is to do with drugs. Also, another documentary is in the horizon, this time it is to revolve around football, one of my biggest passions. You see where my interests are based.
The Porn Diaries out now on DVD.
