“SEX SELLS IN OUR DAYS …” SAYS THORSTEN SCHUTTE, THE DIRECTOR OF «I WAS THE KING OF PORN»
In his press conference at the Olympion theatre today, Monday, March 3rd, German director Thorsten Schutte was smiling and rather cheerful. His film “I was the King of Porn” is part of the 5th Thessaloniki Documentary Festival’s “Night Shadows” section.
“Some of you may wonder why I decided to make such a film. After doing some research in 1999 about the legalization of pornography in Germany, I came upon an article from the ‘Spiegel’ dated from 1974 about porno film production companies. Having grown up in the 80s’, I didn’t like the way this industry was seen, and so I decided to make a film about it”. The director was asked about the difficulty in finding and persuading people of this industry including porno director, Lace Brown: “It wasn’t easy finding him, the technicians and especially the actors. Most of them have changed their names and wish to keep a low profile. Even some of today’s musicians were part of this community in the 70s’”.
In a question regarding the quality of Lace Brown’s films the director said, “There were, of course, more creative producers than Brown, but his work was compositional. He utilized artistic forces and, although he copied from others, he set up trends in commercial erotic cinema.”
Making this film was a great experience for Schutte since all his previous work had to do with musical documentaries. He said he would like to work with the subject again. Thorsten Schutte put it frankly: “Sex sells in our days, which is probably the reason I was easily able to find a production company for my film. Some subjects just sell more than others. Three international television stations have already become interested in showing the documentary. Besides, Lace Brown’s case is strange: an Italian catholic who suddenly started to film pornos is not your usual everyday case”. At the end of the press conference Schutte claimed being happy that his film was chosen for the 5th Documentary Festival – Images of the 21st Century and that being at the Festival in Thessaloniki gives him the chance to see 5-6 films a day.
