“AMATEUR PORN STAR KILLER” (2004)

Starring & Written by Shane Ryan & Michiko Jimenez
Directed by Shane Ryan
Alter Ego Cinema

Polly Staffle Rating: ****

NOTE: This review contains spoilers, but so does the film’s title for that matter. Reader’s discretion is advised.

Like “The Blair Witch Project,” Shane Ryan borrows a few chapters from the “Cannibal Holocaust” book on how to make an attention-grabbing low budget film. Get a camera, a couple of people and a fascinating concept, make the movie a bit twisted and tell everyone it is real. Sure, the horror mockumentary has been overdone in recent years, but none have been near as frightening as “Amateur Porn Star Killer.” This little indie is so close to being a masterpiece that even though it repulses me I have to praise it.

Shot on miniDV with a run time of 71 minutes, “Amateur Porn Star Killer” is a disturbing movie. It’s downright painful to watch. Mostly due to the fact you know how it is going to end because of the title, but it’s also so brutally realistic with top notch acting from the small cast.

Probably because no one would take the role, Ryan plays the lead and supposedly nearly had a nervous breakdown during filming. He is Brandon, who is by far one of the most vile movie characters I have ever seen. You remember the Leo Fitzpatrick character Telly in Larry Clark’s “Kids” who called himself the “virgin destroyer?” Well, Brandon makes Telly look like Prince Charming. Telly would sweet talk and shower his victims with love before taking advantage of them. He also didn’t get off to hurting the girls he seduced, he just wanted to have sex with them. His victims were also his own age. Lastly, Telly never fully intended to kill any of them. He had AIDS and passed it along unknowingly. Don’t get me wrong, I despised Telly, but Brandon is far more despicable.

Playing on the illusion that what you are watching is a snuff film, the audience follows along as Brandon takes a young girl to a hotel and proceeds to victimize her. For those that are unaware of snuff films, they have no special effects and what you see is what you get. They are Dogme95, gonzo, mondo and pornographic films to the evilest power. So not only do they feature actual violence and sex, but also murder. Many hoax snuff films started popping up in the late 70’s and many believe that’s all there ever was. It’s said to be all urban legend and no true celluloid featuring “white heat” has ever existed. War, executions, a serial killer’s personal video diary and deadly accidents do not count under the snuff umbrella. A true snuff film is produced with the intention of exploiting death for the purpose of entertainment. That being said, as cheap as it is to make a movie and with the number of sick freaks out there, I’m sure it probably has been done. Had I not known better, I probably would have thought “Amateur Porn Star Killer” was one of them.

Shot over the course of one night, this film shows us once again that you don’t need a millionaire backing you to make an effective film. In fact, you don’t need to spend a thousand dollars or even a hundred bucks. My guess is the budget was somewhere around $50. None of the three actors were paid, no props were used and most of the film takes place in a sleazy motel room.

Stacy (Michiko Jimenez) is bored and waiting on a ride that is running late to pick her up when Brandon spots her. She claims to be 18, but we know she is lying. Jimenez was 19 at the time the film was made, but she looks 16 at the oldest. Brandon asks if she would like to have fun. He wants to know if she will be in his movie. Naively, Stacy gets in the car.

Once they arrive at the hotel, Brandon starts to work on her. She is awkward and uncomfortable. He isn’t really smooth, but he is persistent. He knows what he wants and is going through with his plan and it doesn’t matter if Stacy is younger than she said.

The girl realizes very quickly that she has gotten herself in over her head. She wants to bolt for the door. We want her to as well. But she sticks it out, probably thinking to herself, “What’s the worse that could happen?”

To which I question, “What is the best that could come of this situation?” The best possibility is you do things you regret like expose your breasts and Brandon keeps the footage he shoots for himself. A little more serious than that is you are forced into performing oral sex on him and he shows the tape to his friends. The worst case scenario, which is just what happens is Brandon forces you to strip naked, sexually assaults you, suffocates you, smashes your head in with his fists and makes copies of the whole thing and shares it with the world.

From the title of this film, I expected an exploitation film or possibly a dark comedy. It’s neither of these. It’s a great film name, but I don’t feel it fits. This is a deep and thought provoking film. It’s bigger and better than that. “Amateur Porn Star Killer” sounds partly like a spoof on “Natural Born Killers” and is just a few words away from being a perfect throwback to 1950’s Police Gazette-style titles. Think “I Was a Teenage Amateur Porn Star Killer” and you catch my drift. Perhaps “Amateur” could stand alone as the film’s title. The current name reveals too much as does the background on snuff cinema we are given in the opener. Had the death scene came as more of a shock, it would have been more powerful. But then again, had the death scene came out of nowhere perhaps it would have been too much for many viewers. As is, many may find themselves stopping the movie before it’s over and calling the police to investigate the footage.

I would have also liked a bit of gentleness from Brandon, especially early on. There’s no easy going, party-time feel when Stacy and Brandon first meet and the film could use it. At the same time, Ryan does effectively give us creepy by insetting one of Brandon’s previous encounters with a picture-in-a-picture effect reminiscent of something Vincent Gallo would do in one of his films. The footage gives us the impression the other female Loren (Jan Gould) was a willing participant in the sexcapades, but after the rest of the film played out, I began to question how willing a participant she was. Which also got me to thinking about pornography in general. Lots of women that perform in adult films later say they were taken advantage of and manipulated. Though most of the images used by directors don’t give off that impression, perhaps there is something to it.

Both mesmerizing and terrifying, “Amateur Porn Star Killer” pulls it’s viewers in with the false promise of delivering real horror. It then holds up its end of the bargain and viewers are left feeling empty inside, ashamed of their internal hunger. To me that’s what truly gives this film its power. It’s not the excessive name or its underground no-holds barred approach to filmmaking. Plenty of other films offer these things. What makes this movie stand out is its uncanny ability to give society what it wants - sex and violence - and twist it, so we completely question why we ever wanted either in the first place.

- CCF, June 2006