5 Comments so far

1. Alice K. June 30th, 2010 3:50 pm

   Review by Alice K. for Private Practices (Unrated)
   Rating:
   I loved this film–as an 80s time-capsule of poor video quality and bad fashions, it immediately sucks you in. I expected it to be a kind of comical, after-school-special type film, but it is so unflinchingly honest about private human impulses and desires and longing to connect with others that I found myself quite moved. The director commentary is really great–he goes through the interesting boom-and-bust history of sex surrogacy, what happened to Maureen after the film, and what it was like to film such intimate scenes. At first I thought his conversational partner was annoying and borderline rude, but then I realized that he does represent a common reaction to the film–that of, “Well isn’t she just a prostitute?”–and Kirby Dick respectfully treats it as a valid reaction but goes on to articulate what makes Maureen’s work so special, and why she’s so good at it. See this film!!

2. R. Robinson June 30th, 2010 4:15 pm

   Review by R. Robinson for Private Practices (Unrated)
   Rating:
   Other than I think she talks to much for a therapist(and is a bit overbearing in response to her feminist mentality), often interrupting her patients stream of consciousness speak, but there are plenty of interesting bits in this movie as we view the mind of some of these men and their perceptions about women and about themselves. The scene at 44 minutes is one, you see the 2 brothers contrasting attitudes, and the one that is a patient, his has grown and he is likely to surpass his brother as a lover because of his changing attitude and education that his “hands on” therapist has given him. I like this film, the humility it takes for all these people to go on camera share their most intimate of thoughts, words, and actions (and this before reality t.v.; it makes me humble myself and want to work on improving myself by defeating the negative perceptions of myself and others. The scene at 57 minutes with the therapist’s family is also very enlightening.

3. M. A. Plus June 30th, 2010 4:56 pm

   Review by M. A. Plus for Private Practices (Unrated)
   Rating:
   I’ve looked into working with as sex surrogate before, but this video left me skeptical for the following reason: The overwhelming majority of men lose their virginity “organically,” so to speak, in their teens or early 20’s, resulting in a spontaneous order that nobody planned.

   Those of us who miss that stage in our psycho-sexual development and try to compensate for it years later by working with a surrogate seem to want to force a planned order on their situations. But in the real world, attempts at imposing planned orders on systems that want to work organically, for example socializing market economies, often don’t produce the results we want.

   So I have to ask: How many adult virgin men who have an adequate sexual experience but under artificial conditions with a surrogate often discover later that they still can’t start anything like a normal adult sex life?

4. Jeffery Mingo June 30th, 2010 5:56 pm

   Review by Jeffery Mingo for Private Practices (Unrated)
   Rating:
   This is an 80s documentary that must be new only in that it was put on DVD. A female sex surrogate works with a virgin and a divorcee. Based on the decade, there is much loud makeup and overdone perms here. The technology used to film this looks old-fashioned too, like something your uncle would have taped when he got his first video recorder back in the 1980s. But when I think that this was filmed before the exhibitionist reality shows of this decade, I am impressed that the men allowed themselves to be filmed. That took courage.
   
   The “red envelope” description on the DVD right away said that coitus would not be shown here. I would add that phalli are never shown either. People who don’t dig further may originally ask, “Well, how could this documentary differ from porn?” Well, it’s clinical nature, psychologists’ babble, and quotidian individuals make this so mundane that most viewers won’t be titillated.
   
   I’m not cool with this, but some thin people don’t understand why fat people like to eat so much. I try to empathize when smokers deride how non-smokers look down upon them. But it was very hard to relate to one of the subjects here. If you are a proud and rapacious horndog, then you won’t understand why a 20-something man fears doing the nasty. The divorcee just needed some sweet pudding while he was in between relationships. But the virgin will make your jaw drop, if your equipment works. In Coppola’s “Marie Antoinette,” it was hard to watch the dauphin not be frisky and want to handle his business in the boudoir. I had the same frustrations here and imagine that many viewers, especially men, will too. But another way in which this work is dated is that it was filmed years before godsends Viagra, Levitra, and Cialis.
   
   The work turns from observing the clients to observing the surrogate. It’s a two-sided work. Perhaps, psychology professors can use it when speaking about countertransference. Actually, the tame and dry style of the work will make this film appropriate for many classrooms.
   
   I wish this work spoke about the whole field and not just this one worker. Is sex surrogacy legal? How is it legal if prostitution is not? The surrogate seemed like she had much psychological training. What colleges or grad schools are preparing women for this profession!? What happens if a client or a surrogate are not attracted to each other? Wouldn’t everybody want to enter this field? So who gets selected? Do clients fake having problems just so that they can pay to get busy? Are there male surrogates for majority women or for rainbow flag men? How does this field keep those within it from abusing ethics? None of this is explained in this work.

5. William Alan Graves June 30th, 2010 5:58 pm

   Review by William Alan Graves for Private Practices (Unrated)
   Rating:
   My friends and I saw this documentary on HBO in the Very late 80’s in college had us cracking up although it is a documentary

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