Kevin Smith Has a Good Eye for Porn

Zack and Miri Make a Porno, a Kevin Smith romantic comedy starring Seth Rogen and Elizabeth Banks, just came out on DVD. I hear there may have been some difficulties getting an R rating which caused some of the trash talk dialog I expect and love in Kevin Smith movies to be toned down. Now it would be easy to focus on how flawed the porn video business concept in the movie is (The whole business plan is to market to an email list they do not own.), but the point of the movie is really to be a lewd When Harry Met Sally. A recurring theme in Kevin Smith movies is realizing that the woman a man should love and appreciate most is perhaps right in front of him. So the movie is fine as a romantic comedy. It is not as hilarious as Clerks or as emotional as Chasing Amy, but it is solid enough.

The really remarkable thing about the movie is that Kevin Smith is good at making porn. It is no secret that I tend not to care for most video porn product. (This oddly gets me many job offers to make mainstream adult video product. Porn Valley is weird.) But I did say that I would excuse almost any obscenity if Jason Mewes did full frontal nudity and, although I would have preferred it if he were visibly hard, Jason Mewes is indeed nude through quite a bit of Zack and Miri Make a Porno, including a full frontal nude scene. The DVD has an extended version of the more appealing (not involving excrement) sex scene between Katie Morgan and Jason Mewes. Most of the rest of the cast is transfixed watching them have sex on the coffeehouse counter. And it is honestly surprisingly hot.

During the scenes where Jason Mewes’ character Lester is supposed to be banging the strip club waitress Stacey cast for the Zack and Miri’s porn movie, it certainly seemed like they were actually having sex. I had to look up who the actress playing Stacey is and it turns out she is Katie Morgan. Katie Morgan has excellent comic timing. Or perhaps Kevin Smith can just direct the heck out of a blonde big titty porn chick. At any rate, her acting is at least as entertaining and nuanced as anyone else in the movie, but Katie Morgan is apparently best known for having been in a couple hundred porn movies. Is that cinema verite?

The other really hot moment in Zack and Miri Make a Porno is when the two stars, Seth Rogen’s Zack Brown and Elizabeth Banks’ Miri Linky, are supposed to be doing it for the camera. Only they have a real moment. When Elizabeth banks says she is going to come and invites him to come with her, it is a really believable and beautiful piece of film-making. Genuinely hot and sexy and I would give any porn flick with a scene like that two thumbs up.

So go figure. A cautionary note: If a porn star named Brandon St. Randy, played by Justin Long, at your class reunion tells you he makes $100,000 a year, there are a few things to keep in mind. First of all, a pornstar who once got paid $1,000 for a scene will do special pornstar math and decide that means he or she makes $365,000 a year because there are 365 days in the year. For the very physically fit or twink dynamite, gay porn pays on-screen talent infinitely better than straight porn. Transsexual porn pays even better, if you are pretty enough. There is a lot more to making dough from smut than just having sex with your best friend at your place of employment, but isn’t finding love a better outcome anyway?

PS The merch for Zack and Miri Make a Porno is really inspired.

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