Source: Adult Industry News
By: Rich Moreland
“Gone” a Film about Love and Loss — Rich Moreland Reviewer Rated: Power On!
“Gone” is short film by Sssh.com that stars Madeline Blue as Rebecca and Gee Richards as Todd. They are real life lovers who bring authentic sex to the screen. Directed by Angie Rowntree, the featurette is, according to the company’s webpage, a “beautiful and intimate story inspired by a Sssh.com member.”
For those who don’t know, Sssh.com is an online “erotic destination for women, by women.” Among its various offerings is original film.
“Gone” centers on love and loss in a narrative flush with images.
There is a healthy dose of kink hidden within a white clapboard house/picket fence existence that define Rebecca and Todd. The story is told through flashbacks of bondage lovemaking in their basement dungeon, a reminder that BDSM has filtered into Middle America.
The film explores the image of rituals. Rebecca, prone on a table/altar in the dungeon, is orally pleasured by Todd. It’s an illuminated sacrificial worship highlighted by crackerjack cinematography. Implied at the story’s end, is a similar ritual of sacrifice, one of sadness all too common in our society.
Speaking of society, the cell phone, the image that most represents us, puts its stamp on “Gone.” Of course, electronics are not flesh and blood and can only do what they are programmed to do. In a powerful scene, an anguished and angry Rebecca is reduced to pleading with hers to answer the unanswerable.
It’s a set up for an ending that punches us in the gut.
As the narrative winds down, Rebecca collapses into a dream sequence that trails away with good-byes. Time to go.
Futility and waste collect their debts as Rebecca packs up the bondage accoutrements she and Todd have loving displayed in their basement. In a final scene, there is a newspaper on a table near the staircase as Rebecca climbs out of the dungeon darkness into the light of day. She emerges from the depths of grief into renewal via her own grittiness and flashbacks of a love floating among dusty memories.
Two earlier scenes set up the conclusion and are worth a mention. The first is a blindfolded Todd who falls victim to a senseless and tragic ritual and the second is a Teddy Bear that leads him to it. In Todd and Rebecca’s bedroom, the stuffed bear lolls in a rocking chair, a hat over its eyes, vision obscured. It’s a message for every politician. I won’t fill you in, watch it for yourself.
The “porn as art” argument has been knocked around for years, roiling the male-oriented jack off picture of adult film’s basic reason to be. “Gone” is not traditional porn, nor is it male-driven though, quite honestly, it can bring an emotional moment to the toughest of guys. That said, “Gone” has another quality, it is a woman’s view of porn, a rarity in the history of adult film.
Women are rising to positions of influence in porn these days, directing their own work and owning their companies. This is not unheard of. The late Candida Royalle’s pioneering Femme Production and her politically charged film “Revelation” (1993) are the forerunners of Sssh.com and “Gone.” Thankfully a modern feminist like Angie Rowntree is positioned to carry on the Royalle tradition.
Though other feminists are making adult film from a woman’s perspective, “Gone” is the best we have in turning porn into an artistic statement while arguing that indie film and the erotic are poised to create a genre of their own.
To see the trailer and read reviewer comments, visit Sssh.com.
Rating: Power on.
