I have a feeling like this isn't going to end well
dir: Ninja Thyberg
2021
This flick is a lot to handle.
A lot of painful stuff to handle.
Pleasure, despite its name, you’ll be amazed to find out, is really about its opposite. It’s about capitalism. It’s especially about the kind of capitalism that takes people, in this case women, and finds a way to profit from their sexual abuse on camera, in this, the glorious digital age in which we live.
This is no Boogie Nights, delighting us with outlandishly dated hairstyles and funky basslines and the sense that we juuuuust missed out on a really wicked party, while it lasted, before things got too dark and everyone sold out. This film has no illusions about this wretched “adult” business into which people often voluntarily launch themselves into.
I mean, low rent scumbags have been treating women terribly for millennia solely for their own gratification as abusers, but it takes true entrepreneurs to monetise that abuse and turn a profit from it. It’s a process that sees a woman transform from being a person to being a commodity, a malleable object to be contorted and consumed, until she’s got nothing left, and then…
Well, I don’t know. Are we talking about a person, or their image? When their abuse is “captured” on film, either as a photo or a movie, is it “done” at the end of the scene, or is it something that’s reignited every time it’s viewed or played? Is it not as bad if it gets lots of likes?
And what does it mean that abject misogyny is an in demand product?
And before it seems like I’m ignoring the obvious, yes, our main character Bella (Sofia Kappel) actively seeks out this industry by moving from Sweden to LA, specifically to work. There isn’t an abusive suitcase pimp boyfriend forcing her to work to fuel his coke addiction. There’s no reason per se that we’re privy to other than that she wants to make money and get an elevated profile in order to make more money, but other than that…
I think if the film shows anything it’s that even people who think they know what they’re getting into often have no fucking idea what they’re getting into, and that the viewers / consumers have no idea what these people go through behind the scenes and even on camera, and how saying “well, these people consented, we’ve got it on paper” doesn’t really convey the half of it.
Bella wants to make money, and fast, and isn’t naïve about what that would entail, as in, having to be naked on camera, and do things and have things done to her, with the usual kind of finish at the end. As awkward as the initial sex scene is, if anything, it’s just boring and gross. Bella only pretends to come alive right at the end when she’s faking enthusiasm for her own selfies which she posts online in order to get more followers. More followers and hearts means more demand for work, I guess, or better money?
Let me just point out that even though seemingly every other person in this movie is an actual person who works in the industry, the main actress is not and does not, and so this isn’t a sexually explicit movie. All that stuff is implied. What unfortunately becomes very hard to watch is that there’s stuff that’s not sexually explicit that they don’t fake, scenes of verbal and physical abuse, in a circumstance where Bella is not expecting it even though she’s told she contractually consented to it, and these are by far the hardest parts of the movie to watch.
To say that I hated them (these scenes) is a profound understatement. But I hated them, or felt awful during the time that they were onscreen in a way that I’m pretty sure the director intended. This director in interviews has talked about how fascinating she finds the existence of this industry, but also how truly vile it is to the women it chews up and spits out. She has talked about, or at least part of an interview was played during one of the screenings Pleasure had at the Melbourne International Film Festival that recently ran, about first being shown pornography by her boyfriend at the time, and how she couldn’t believe that a) this stuff exists and people jerk off to it, and b) that people can knowingly consent to some of this stuff.
How does one consent to abuse? I’m not even talking about BDSM stuff, but like the other stuff, where consent was maybe delivered on a contract, but results in a scene where the lack of consent, where an abundance of cruelty seems to be the whole point?
Then Ninja made a short film about it, and now it’s a feature. And what a feature. What a depressing movie. Apart from everything else, the way in which sex positivity and female empowerment and all that stuff is treated as just a bullshit way to convince women to endure abuse on camera and then say “thanks” afterwards is just dispiriting, just soul draining. Whatever friendships Bella makes seem to be solely transactional, and whenever she thinks she has a handle on things, someone or something comes along to show her that she is far more limited than she thinks. That however much she thinks she can handle, it’s not necessarily true. And she’ll betray friends in order to get ahead.
Throughout the flick she briefly interacts with another performer (Evelyn Claire), who seems supremely indifferent to everything and everyone around her, but she gets the gigs and gets the money, and Bella can’t help but envy her, or at least to aspire to wherever it is she imagines Evelyn has risen to.
There’s this horrifying progression, escalation, in order to climb this grim ladder, and Bella seems determined to climb every rung…
It looks so painful, though.
Bella endures it all, endures even more, and then the flick puts her in a position where, on camera, for money, she can let out all her rage, all her frustration, and get to sadistically use someone to get back at the world, or maybe she could choose otherwise. I mean, we all have choices, we all make choices, no matter what’s happened to us, no matter what producers or directors are yelling at us to do.
This kind of industry, though, whether it’s the San Fernando Valley, or Hollywood, or in practically anyone’s apartment with a camera and an internet connection, takes something from people in exchange for money or clout, so I guess it all works out.
And what is the supreme revelation in the end, after all this misery, once Bella has crossed the line, and visited upon another some of the treatment that she has endured thus far? When she is moved to express sorrow at what she’s done, and apologises to the person she abused? The other says “What? What are you talking about?” completely unfazed with what happened, entirely inured to this life, calmly looking forward to the next club or next gig.
It’s shocking, and draining, even if as an ending I’m not sure what it offers – that Bella has some humanity left, that maybe it doesn’t make a difference if she sticks around too long, that anyone can end up a sadist.
I don’t know anything, really. I know that director Ninja Thyberg has a lot to say about all of this, or about people specifically and in general in this “industry”, but I found myself not being able to look at the screen at several points, or being horrified that this world exists, even though so much of this flick is people just standing around and talking in naturalistic and functional ways. There’s nothing showy about any of the performances, no-one’s really reciting Shakespeare, and, in terms of acting ability, well, they’re in the right corner of the entertainment industry. The main performance is strong, I guess. It is such a difficult role. Despite the extreme nudity and the hyper-sexualisation of some of the visual aspects of what’s going on, the prosaic way, might even say dull way, people do this job drains whatever “sexiness” or eroticism one might expect or hope for. “Hope” for if someone is a psychopath, I guess.
I think it’s a strong film, but it’s not one I can recommend in all conscience to any other person. It’s important, I guess, as a document of late stage capitalism, and how the brutishness of humanity can be turned into a product that people pay for in some way, and that people’s willingness to go along with it is seen as being the same thing as consenting to it.
Which is just nuts, people.
This flick isn’t a cautionary tale with a moralising tone, about a naïve young girl who comes to the big city and is tricked into a life of depravity and exploitation (which was probably the premise of thousands of pornos back in the day). This is more like: this is what it’s actually like, there’s no glamour, not a lot of actual fun, and it’s damn hard work, but maybe a bit of friendship and a lot of weed will get you through bits of it?
I just… It’s just horrifying to be reminded of how terrible the business of Pleasure truly is.
7 times there are some prices no-one should be willing to pay out of 10
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“I like being in front of the camera. I love having people watching me.” – well, have I got a career path for you - Pleasure
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