Gary Gravers descent into PORN?!..:/ :O ;P

[danaya1]

So I'm just wondering what Wells fans on here think about Gary Graver's AKA 'Robert McCallum's' descent into "art porn"?? Especially considering Orson refused to do a semi-pornographic film like Caligula on moral grounds?? I mean I know Orson did that one racy car sex scene with Kodar in TOSOTW, but I don't think he approved of the porn film industry, which Graver turned out to be very much a part of.. Apparently he even directed quite a few while Orson was still alive!!


Gary Graver:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0004372/

 Maybe he did it to try to help Orson fund his films & stayed in that industry because the $ & work was too good??.. :O  
This dude sure turned out to be a far cry from a "latter day Greg Tolland" in retrospect (who Orson naively/superstitiously thought he was) Lol..

But at least he supported Orson..

Thoughts?? 

[etimh]

But at least he supported Orson.

Enough said.

Tim

[Le Chiffre]

According to Joseph McBride's recent Welles book. Welles actually helped Graver edit his 1975 porn flick 3 AM, with Georgina Spelvin. This would have been right around the time they were trying to finish TOSOTW. I'm not aware of any statements Welles ever made concerning the porn industry, either pro or con.

[A Sled in Flames]

Did not know Orson edited porn... That's got to be the most surprising thing I've learned about the man since I joined this forum. Dare I ask if anyone's seen the film to verify if it uses any Wellesian editing techniques?

[Roger Ryan]

I discussed this with someone who had seen one of the scenes Welles reportedly had a hand in editing: not particularly Wellesian was the assessment.

[Terry]

I've watched the lesbian sex scene from 3AM a few times, and while I don't find it terribly compelling as porn, it is firmly in both the style of Graver as cinematographer and Welles as editor. Before the carnal shenanigans begin, one could well be viewing an outtake from F for Fake or yet another sequence from TOSOTW, though when Welles told PB that he too could make a dirty movie, this surely was not what he had in mind. At least he didn't stray as far down the path of smut as did Ed Wood, who brought us such oddities during the latter part of his career as the truly horrible film Necromania and the rather intense stream-of-consciousness novel Killer in Drag. Perhaps it's just as well that Welles' work in this field remains relatively unknown (and even doubted by those who do know about it.)

[sierra]

Welles commented on pornography in a 1967 interview with Kenneth Tynan for Playboy: "I don't agree with the permissiveness of publishing [pornography]. By this I don't mean Lady Chatterley's Lover - the sort of book about physical love which used to be banned. I mean hard-core ponography - the blue novel and the blue movie...hard-core pornography may begin as a fairly benign sexual stimulant, but it ends up pretty vicious and sick. Then it isn't a harmless release for that which is sick in us; it excites and encourages the sickness, particularly in young people who have yet t learn about sex in terms of love and shared joy. The sexual habits of consenting adults are their own business. It's the secondhandedness of the printed thing that I don't like; not the fact that people do it, but that other people sit alone and read about it."
And if I remember correctly, on Dick Cavett's show he said something along the lines of he didn't like sex in a movie that wasn't a porn

[Wellesnet]

Curiously enough, 3AM was shown in 2010 as part of 70s porn retrospective at the prestigious University of Chicago:

http://docfilms.uchicago.edu/dev/calend ... day2.shtml

3 A.M.

Gary Graver, 1975 • The first X-rated feature directed by Orson Welles collaborator and protégé, Gary Graver, 3 A.M. is a study of guilt and loneliness in the wake of death. A husband, his wife, her sister, and the couple's two children live in an isolated beach house. The husband and his sister-in-law, Kate, have been having an affair. During a fight, she kills him, but the death is ruled accidental and there are no witnesses to the crime. In the weeks that follow, each of the family members is forced to cope with their loss while Kate becomes wrapped up in feelings of guilt over her dark secret. 16mm

[Wellesnet]

Someone has put clips of the scene online with commentary (Warning: explicit):
http://www.vulture.com/2015/05/nsfw-wat ... ok_vulture