The French started making porn movies in the early 1900s, and by the end of the First World War, the Americans followed suit. While most of the porn is lost to history, the one that survived is referred by the internet as vintage porn. I know you are interested in this evolution of the adult entertainment culture. So I have you covered.
Vintage porn way back then was more hardcore than you would care to imagine? That’s right. Take the plot of the sexually explicit “The Casting Couch” for instance. You will be very surprised by the plot. In the movie, a young girl walks into a studio, and the producer coerces her to part her legs as a quid pro quo for a part in an upcoming film. Now tell me you have not seen that routine in new porn clips. That’s is a script that has been tried and tested in the adult entertainment industry. The only difference is, “The Casting Couch” is a silent, black-and-white porno filmed circa 1924. Damn.
Stag films
The movie above was part of a species of hardcore movies shot from the dawn of cinema. Stag films were silent, black and white films not longer than ten minutes. Don’t get it twisted, they featured brief narrative scenes with a whole lot of random jumble of penetration, thrusting, “meat shots,” and, at times, snippets of oral and ejaculation. That’s not what you were expecting from 1920s porn, is it? These are films that connected the early 20th century and show that human history is more complicated than you would care to admit.
Stag films were illicit, produced anonymously and outside of the film studio system. More like amateur porn maybe. While the earliest known stag film has been dated 1915, no one really knows where the genre originated from. But it sure did take off in the 20s, when some of the earliest mass-accessible cameras and projectors emerged.
The films would be shot all across the nation by entrepreneurs (possibly with more than a little help from organized crime) and then trafficked to towns, where communal masculine organizations like the Rotarians, or college frats would host “stag parties.” They hosted screenings in which they’d all watch hardcore sex together. The only difference was that all this was conducted on a solid business model and producers probably never saw the need to be innovative, serving folks back then a silent, chaotic, and colorless style. But it was hardcore nonetheless.
Voyeurism
The early porn films may have had a grainy production, but the action was clear and remarkably modern. Boys would meet girls faster than you can spell the word pussy and within no time, they would be disrobed and ready to get down to business.
Because porn is all about voyeurism, it was a major theme back in the 20s. In one of the early French porn films, a sexually frustrated wife is unable to persuade her husband to fuck her. She storms out of the bedroom and opens her living room curtains, revealing a neighbors garden. While there, she spies on a young couple walking hand in hand. As they kiss, the guy tries to put his hand under the girl’s skirt. She quickly bats it away a few times before she happily welcomes it between her legs. Within no time, the man has dropped his pants and the two start fucking on the bench. The sexually frustrated wife is very excited by the scenes and calls over her husband to join her at the window. The sight of a young couple fucking is enough to drive her husband wild, and in no time, he carries his wife to the bedroom where they also get down to some serious fucking business.
In another film, two girls will start playing with each other sexually. A man appears. The girls are momentarily embarrassed, but almost immediately, a steamy threesome ensues. There are also oral scenes, and interestingly enough, one woman has a strap-on dildo. I bet you never knew such paraphernalia existed a century ago, did you?
However, men were a bit reluctant to go down on women and had to coax women into giving them oral. In one film, a man invites a woman to take a closer look at his erection. He then tells her to ‘blow it.’ She opens her mouth. Do you need me to explain what follows?
Vintage porn was clearly as hardcore as they come.
American porn more reserved
While the French were all wild, the Americans were a bit more reserved. In their vintage porn films, men are slower when approaching women and the women are not as wild. Not that the action is any less hardcore.
In one of the films, a movie director is seen interviewing a young woman eager to become a movie star. The producer gives her a bathing suit and points to a changing room. Once the girl is inside, the producer takes a peek through a keyhole in time to see her naked. He promptly opens the door and tries to drag her to a sofa. The girl is so horrified and pushes away the producer who backs off, understandably disgusted. The girl then dresses up and is ready to leave when she sees a book in the dressing room titled ‘How to Become a Movie Star.’ As she flips over the pages, there is a close-up, and the page says “Always give the casting director everything he wants.” That immediately transforms her into a nymphomaniac, and within no time, she and the producer are fucking hard on the couch. Admittedly not as wild as the French but still hardcore.
Final word
Ultimately, vintage porn opens up a window for us to have a peek at man’s lewd behavior from a century ago. It merely proves that our grandfathers and great-grandfathers were just as fucked up as we all are and luckily the STD was not real. Damn, I wish I was there too.
