Petra's Blog
A unique insight into the day-to-day life of Petra Joy as she chronicles the fun, frolics and frustrations of an independent female porn producer.
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Flamenco and fun in the sun
Posted: 03 July 2008
In the last two weeks my feet have barely touched the ground. I am on the plane right now on my way back from Madrid where I spent the last 5 days attending the FICEB award, buying outfits and props and networking.
We arrived in Madrid last Wednesday and had only an hour or so to get ready to go to the gala night. Due to the extreme heat (38 degrees in the shade at 9 pm) I ditched the idea of wearing my long satin evening gown with matching gloves and opted for a short summery number instead. The awards party was held in a seventies style restaurant in the beautiful Retiro Park. All the big players of the Spanish porn industry were there and quite a few European porn celebrities as well. It was so nice to be able to share this event with Violetta who has become a dear friend to me as well as being my muse and one of the stars of my films. What we create is a labour of love and true teamwork so it seems wrong when I turn up at awards parties all by myself. It would have been nice to walk away on the night with one or even the two awards we were nominated for. It would have meant the world to me and a lot to Violetta who has supported me for 2 years now and had to take off three days from work so she could travel to be there with me. But it was not to be. ‘Best film' and ‘best director ‘ went to "Casino" – a big budget film created by Marc Dorcel productions. Congratulations to them ! I have not seen the film yet but am interested to see what they created. I must get hold of a copy and put it on my "to view" list.
I am not disappointed as I never thought that I had a realistic chance of winning as an independent producer next to all the big production companies with massive budgets. We enjoyed the night and sharing our table with the marketing guys from Daring media who produce big, lavish porn films in Barcelona. It was great to chat to them as they, to our surprise share our opinion that porn must open up to new consumers, styles and content in order to survive.
There is a reason why porn DVD sales are falling and it is not just the growing popularity of video on demand (downloads). I also think that even hardened porn fans are getting bored with repetitive content. The film titles and names of performers change yet the sex acts and order they are shown in remain the same. It is like porn by numbers and the lack of creativity and innovation bores many viewers. With time the industry will change and for us, a small independent label doing porn in a unique way, to be nominated for the two big awards is an indication that the industry is getting ready to embrace creative innovation.
The morning after the award party I went for a day to the Ficeb show but it was not what I expected. The opening hours were from 6 pm until 5am and the show was held in a massive rave venue. Girls were stripping and couples were fucking live on various stages to the beat of techno and trance whilst hordes of middle aged men tried to video or photograph the action on their mobile phones. There were only a few stalls selling gimmicks and none of the big exhibitors were there. So I could not make any deals. As a business trip this did not work out well but as a girly weekend it was fun.
One night we went to see an excellent Flamenco show with some male dancers. It was HOT: their bodies heaving and dripping with sweat their faces contorted in almost orgasmic ecstasy. What a turn on to watch them dance as if they had sex with an imaginary lover. It just showed that sexiness has to do with personality and energy rather than full frontal nudity and explicit acts.
Some other nights Violetta and me spent watching a selection of alternative porn that I have found recently. We analyse the films, laugh about clichés and celebrate anything that done in a creative way or puts women on top. We were particularly interested with "The gift", a Spanish film that won many awards at the Ficeb in 2006 and also "Constance", a Danish film that is ten years old and was one of the first European porn films catering for a female audience. Apart from one rough and slightly disturbing scene (a kind of rape scenario) I liked all the other scenes in "The Gift" – it was shot really well with lots of steadycam work which I would love to use in the future and even featured a roof top sex scene with shots taken from a helicopter. The sex was hot and varied and many clichés were broken. So thumbs up from Violetta and me for this unusual film. "Constance" impressed us because it featured a lot of women reciving oral, showed some pubic hair and also integrated the use of condoms. I like it when porn promotes safe sex rather than risking the health of the performers or pretending that condoms are not sexy. It's a shame that all sex scenes ended in a visible cum shot though – it would have been nice to see the orgasms just in the odd scene in people's faces or whole body spasms. "The Gift" and "Constance" were created by male directors. The films are proof to me that the gender of the director is less important than their artistic talent and willingness to break porn rules when it comes to the creation of alternative porn.
A highlight of our trip was meeting the fantastic corset designer Maya Hanson. Violetta needed some new outfits for her burlesque performances and we also hoped to find a look that could work well for a future shoot. Maya works in a wonderful loft filled with mirrors and stunning outfits. We did not know where to look or what to try on first – there was so much choice. Whilst most shops just sell red, white or black corsets off the peg, Maya hand-tailors all her corsets in a huge variety of materials and patterns. Violetta went for a purple corset with matching bloomers, called "polollos" and also an ivory/baby blue outfit with build-in suspenders. They both look a million dollars. I splashed out on an under bust corset that I can wear with my beloved black jeans and vest tops as well as over a dress. I hope to get it tailored in a strawberry print and if that is not available will go for the Hawaiian beauties instead.
I am happy but also worn out and glad to be back home at last. It gets tiring to live out of a suitcase and it is also beyond my limited means to pay for all these trips on my credit card. I love to network and to be part of all the different film festivals and trade shows but now the time has come to concentrate on spending my time to actually making some money – be it with writing, photography or filming.
I look forward to put the skills I learnt in a Final Cut Pro editing course into practise and start the postproduction of my "women on top" documentary.
