No gay guy over the age of about 40 can claim ignorance of the top-notch movies, The Young and the Hung, Pizza Boy, and The Sailor in the Wild. They were huge classic back in the day. And for very good reason! haha
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My go to was 1997’s “An American in Prague”. Yes I discovered hardcore gay porn late in life.
Brilliant concept to send a hot young American boy to Prague to interrelate with those beautiful Czech boys! I read an article once that the Czech economy was in shambles in the 1990s to the extent that what Bel Ami was paying back then to do a gay porn scene was a small fortune compared to the pay of any other available job for a young Czech male with the result that an extraordinary percentage of Czech gay porn performers were in fact straights doing gay for pay.
The Bel Ami porn of that era was really high quality stuff. Classic. I've joked in the past that Czech Republic (and perhaps even Slovakia too) seemed to have a factory mass producing stunning young men who were just tailor-made for porn. haha
On a somewhat different topic it's quite true that Czech Republic and Slovakia were an economic basket case in the early 90's. Communism had just collapsed. And then if that wasn't a difficult enough economic transition trying to totally switch gears overnight from communism to capitalism, Czechoslovakia immediately broke apart into two different countries. So that was yet another economic disadvantage they had to deal with that other struggling former Soviet Bloc/Iron Curtain countries of Central and Eastern Europe didn't have to contend with. Who knows just how much the money of gay men in the U.S. in the early 90's and beyond did to lift young Czech men and their families out of poverty during that difficult period? Or at least give them enough to be able to eat and keep a roof over their heads until their economies could eventually provide them with some gainful employment?
I think it would be very naïve of us to look at Czechs of 18-28 of that era in the 90's who were doing porn and see them through an opulent American filter of an expectation of a young guy of such an age going off to college, or living in his own apartment and starting off on his own. Most times these European guys were poor and still living at home with their parents and siblings. And everyone in the household was struggling to find creative ways to earn money, cut expenses, etc. We're talking about just scraping by to do the basics of keeping groceries in the home and keeping the lights and water turned on. (Not the kind of modern American dinner table convo over whether we can afford to give the 12 y/o her own cell phone.)
No. There was hunger in the land. These were bleak times for the majority of people there. Dad was often laid off or otherwise unemployed from his old job. Many factories had shut down. He's out there trying to hustle with side jobs and the underground economy. (With varying degrees of success.) Mom's trying to bring in some meager cash by sewing, tailoring, housecleaning, babysitting, working one or two very part-time low paying jobs. So anyone who had a chance to bring in some desperately needed "big" money in a short period of time could be an incredible Godsend for the whole family.
All that to say that for all the darker sides of porn (and yes, there are many) the money that went abroad, especially after the collapse of the Soviet Union, really did do some good for many people we'll never know.
The Bel Ami porn of that era was really high quality stuff. Classic. I've joked in the past that Czech Republic (and perhaps even Slovakia too) seemed to have a factory mass producing stunning young men who were just tailor-made for porn. haha
On a somewhat different topic it's quite true that Czech Republic and Slovakia were an economic basket case in the early 90's. Communism had just collapsed. And then if that wasn't a difficult enough economic transition trying to totally switch gears overnight from communism to capitalism, Czechoslovakia immediately broke apart into two different countries. So that was yet another economic disadvantage they had to deal with that other struggling former Soviet Bloc/Iron Curtain countries of Central and Eastern Europe didn't have to contend with. Who knows just how much the money of gay men in the U.S. in the early 90's and beyond did to lift young Czech men and their families out of poverty during that difficult period? Or at least give them enough to be able to eat and keep a roof over their heads until their economies could eventually provide them with some gainful employment?
I think it would be very naïve of us to look at Czechs of 18-28 of that era in the 90's who were doing porn and see them through an opulent American filter of an expectation of a young guy of such an age going off to college, or living in his own apartment and starting off on his own. Most times these European guys were poor and still living at home with their parents and siblings. And everyone in the household was struggling to find creative ways to earn money, cut expenses, etc. We're talking about just scraping by to do the basics of keeping groceries in the home and keeping the lights and water turned on. (Not the kind of modern American dinner table convo over whether we can afford to give the 12 y/o her own cell phone.)
No. There was hunger in the land. These were bleak times for the majority of people there. Dad was often laid off or otherwise unemployed from his old job. Many factories had shut down. He's out there trying to hustle with side jobs and the underground economy. (With varying degrees of success.) Mom's trying to bring in some meager cash by sewing, tailoring, housecleaning, babysitting, working one or two very part-time low paying jobs. So anyone who had a chance to bring in some desperately needed "big" money in a short period of time could be an incredible Godsend for the whole family.
All that to say that for all the darker sides of porn (and yes, there are many) the money that went abroad, especially after the collapse of the Soviet Union, really did do some good for many people we'll never know.
The Bel Ami porn of that era was really high quality stuff. Classic. I've joked in the past that Czech Republic (and perhaps even Slovakia too) seemed to have a factory mass producing stunning young men who were just tailor-made for porn. haha
On a somewhat different topic it's quite true that Czech Republic and Slovakia were an economic basket case in the early 90's. Communism had just collapsed. And then if that wasn't a difficult enough economic transition trying to totally switch gears overnight from communism to capitalism, Czechoslovakia immediately broke apart into two different countries. So that was yet another economic disadvantage they had to deal with that other struggling former Soviet Bloc/Iron Curtain countries of Central and Eastern Europe didn't have to contend with. Who knows just how much the money of gay men in the U.S. in the early 90's and beyond did to lift young Czech men and their families out of poverty during that difficult period? Or at least give them enough to be able to eat and keep a roof over their heads until their economies could eventually provide them with some gainful employment?
I think it would be very naïve of us to look at Czechs of 18-28 of that era in the 90's who were doing porn and see them through an opulent American filter of an expectation of a young guy of such an age going off to college, or living in his own apartment and starting off on his own. Most times these European guys were poor and still living at home with their parents and siblings. And everyone in the household was struggling to find creative ways to earn money, cut expenses, etc. We're talking about just scraping by to do the basics of keeping groceries in the home and keeping the lights and water turned on. (Not the kind of modern American dinner table convo over whether we can afford to give the 12 y/o her own cell phone.)
No. There was hunger in the land. These were bleak times for the majority of people there. Dad was often laid off or otherwise unemployed from his old job. Many factories had shut down. He's out there trying to hustle with side jobs and the underground economy. (With varying degrees of success.) Mom's trying to bring in some meager cash by sewing, tailoring, housecleaning, babysitting, working one or two very part-time low paying jobs. So anyone who had a chance to bring in some desperately needed "big" money in a short period of time could be an incredible Godsend for the whole family.
All that to say that for all the darker sides of porn (and yes, there are many) the money that went abroad, especially after the collapse of the Soviet Union, really did do some good for many people we'll never know.
I most certainly do SFPS. It was both a book and later a film.Speaking of oldies, does anyone remember the book series Song of the Loon?
True. There is an interview done a year or so ago by Lukas Ridgeston in which he was discussing with one of the younger newer Bel-Ami models about how he came into the business. He mentioned he had been an engineering student, all of 18 years old when he made his very first movie, about a year before moving to Bel-Ami. He realized he could make more money doing porn than he could make as an engineer and so he switched. He and several of the other models of that time period switched to behind the scenes work - filming, editing, etc. Johan Palik is another who is still employed by Bel-Ami and according to Lukas is married with a wife and kids but working in the business office for the business.
Speaking of gay erotica, the first book I ever saw that covered gay sex was this book written in 1952. I somehow came across a paper back that looked exactly like the one pictured below, in the mid 1960's when I was a teenager coming of age and it was incredible to discover that other guys had the same desires that I did. Here is the book cover and an Amazon description of the story.I most certainly do SFPS. It was both a book and later a film.
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And on the subject of gay erotic books, I went to Times Square, (old sleazy Times Square way before the Disney beautification of recent years). I was either sixteen or seventeen when I walked into a book store on Sixth Avenue off West 42nd Street and found the gay section and purchased this book, my first all gay erotic jerk off book. The clerk didn't ask me for ID and he put the book in a brown paper bag and scotch taped it closed. I hid it under my jacket as I took the subway home and "enjoyed" the book in the bathroom with the door locked. lol
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"Hollywood Homo
by Michael Starr
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Beautiful. That's Randy Nelson. Homosexual... That's Randy Nelson. A good lay--that's Randy Nelson! A specialist in pleasing men--that's Randy Nelson. The most educated and experienced lips and tongue in town--that's Randy Nelson! Randy Nelson is one of the beautiful people, but there's nothing unique about that in Hollywood; it's jammed with beautiful people--male, female and some whose sexual identity is in question...."
I most certainly do SFPS. It was both a book and later a film.
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This is the Amazon synopsis:
“More completely than any author before him, Richard Amory explores the tormented world of love for man by man . . . a happy amalgam of James Fenimore Cooper, Jean Genet and Hudson’s Green Mansions.”—from the cover copy of the 1969 edition
Published well ahead of its time, in 1966 by Greenleaf Classics, Song of the Loon is a romantic novel that tells the story of Ephraim MacIver and his travels through the wilderness. Along his journey, he meets a number of characters who share with him stories, wisdom and homosexual encounters. The most popular erotic gay book of the 1960s and 1970s, Song of the Loon was the inspiration for two sequels, a 1970 film of the same name, at least one porn movie and a parody novel called Fruit of the Loon. Unique among pulp novels of the time, the gay characters in Song of the Loon are strong and romantically drawn, which has earned the book a place in the canon of gay American literature.
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