aka Zivot i smrt porno bande
Director: Mladen Djordjevic
Cast: Mihajlo Jovanovic, Ana Acimovic, Predrag Damnjanovic, Radivoj Knezevic, Srdjan Jovanovic, Ivan Djordjevic, Bojan Zogovic, Natasa Miljus, Aleksandar Gligoric, Mariana Arandjelovic, Srdjan Miletic
Synapse Films / All Region / Unrated / 1.85:1 widescreen / SERBIAN: DTS-HD MA stereo / ENGLISH subtitles / 112 minutes / BUY FROM TLACULT
Disk Extras: Bonus film: MADE IN SERBIA (101 mins.) – Mladen Djordjevic’s feature length documentary on the Serbian adult entertainment industry / Featurette: “Making Of” Featurette / Deleted Scenes / Original theatrical trailer / Alternate/Explicit Reversible Cover Art
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Unless you have been living under a rock for the past few years, you have definitely heard of Srdjan Spasojevic’s A Serbian Film. The hype it received as shockingly sexually violent was well deserved. When it hit The States, the opinions were extremely polarizing; some loving it for the sheer ferocity and others hating it, writing it off as shock for shock’s sake. I am in that former group, realizing the strong sociopolitical undertones that fueled that anger which drove the disturbing narrative. Around the same time that ASF was being shot, another horrific, politically driven film was being released. But this one wears its opinions on war, sex and the consequences of both, on its sleeve. It’s not hidden in nihilistic anger but paints a much bleaker, more downbeat image of a war-torn country and a society still dealing with its effects.
The set-up is very similar to the gory Italian slasher Ubaldo Terzani Horror Show in that the lead character “Marko” is an aspiring horror/exploitation filmmaker who can’t sell any of his ideas to a producer because of the social climate during the end of Slobodan Milosevic’s reign. By chance he meets Cane, a porn producer, in a bar and after having a few brews and shooting the shit, they decide that it would be good for them both for Marko to make movies for Cane. But Marko still has the itch to make his own film so he uses some of his boss’ money to make one without his permission and this doesn’t sit well with Cane so he, along with his brother the cop, makes it clear that the money must be paid back with interest. So Marko gets the idea to round-up a troupe of adult industry performers both past and present and put on a live theater sex show. They are quickly shut down and they decide to take the show on the road, to the small towns and villages of “real Serbia”.
Marko enjoys some quality time with a friend.
Just like before, some in the villages didn’t want the Artsy-Fartsy Fucking Show going on in their town, so not only did their business suffer, but they had to continually run from the authorities and angry mobs. They begin to get desperate because of running out of food and money. Lurking on the outskirts of their troubles is Franz, a former German filmmaker who used to make movies of war atrocities to sell to absurdly rich people. Now he has a proposal for Marko and Co. that is sure to ease their monetary woes; he wants him to use his creative talents to make snuff movies. He assures him that all of the “victims” would be people who volunteer because of one reason or another so they would not exactly be murdering anyone. After the first few turn out to be people the troupe agrees deserves it (one because he liked to hurt himself, another because he committed war crimes and the last because he was a rapist and murderer), they finally run into one who wants it for a non-selfish reason and that’s when everything begins to fall apart.
The tone of The Life and Death of a Porno gang is depressing and grim, a stark change from the aggressively antagonistic A Serbian Film. I saw a lot of parallels in tone and shocking content with Joe D’Amato’s Emanuelle in America, right down to a scene featuring a LARGE horse cock (as if there are small horse cocks). It’s the kind of movie where about halfway through you are thinking to yourself “this just can’t end well”. The realistic portrayal of the extreme hardships and inhumanities shared by this motley crew of freaky characters make Porno Gang a much more engaging and therefore more powerful and unsettling movie than A Serbian Film and that’s not taking one thing away from that very effective film. The back cover says that this is “adults-only entertainment” and I would have to totally agree. There is at least one hardcore blowjob scene and many more that are right on the cusp. The cover also says the movie is “funny” and “sexy”, both of which I strongly disagree with. The quirkiness only adds to the disturbing qualities and the sex, though plentiful, is NOT arousing.
Synapse Films is one of my favorite companies for resurrecting older films that need restoring and a quality release but acquiring a new, controversial movie and giving it the release it deserves makes me respect them as a company even more. This Special Edition, all-region Blu-ray is in the running for release of the year. They gave us the uncensored 112 minute version with a strong high-definition transfer that represents the look they were going for, and supplements that could easily be sold by themselves. The 101 minute Made in Serbia feature pseudo-documentary by Porno Gang writer and director Mladen Djordjevic takes a very interesting look a the underground adult film industry in Serbia that seems to be staged and runs parallel with some parts of Porno Gang including the vérité style. The picture quality of Made in Serbia isn’t very good because, as the opening credits tell us, it was cobbled together with numerous low def sources. The “making of” featurette is an entertaining look at the actors and actresses as they get ready for their scenes and goof around. If you are in the market for a very powerful, shocking downer of a movie, this release needs to be in your player, right now.
