INSIDE THE 'ADULT THEATRES' OF MELBOURNE - Pt. 1 of an exposé on HOW SEX CINEMAS HAVE SURVIVED in the face of rapidly changing digital technology (from a filmmakers perspective)!

*Vintage French erotica from the 1880's or 1890's. 

In 1894, almost immediately after the Lumière brothers had invented the first motion picture cameras, filmmakers realised they could turn a quick buck shooting sex scenes, aka porno. Some of the earliest recorded and exhibited short, silent films, were pornographic in genre; of women disrobing in a strip-tease, belly-dancers, an extreme close-up of a couple kissing and, eventually, full-blown intercourse, complete with story-line, a horny soldier and a young servant girl, fucking. It’s fair to say, since the dawn of cinema, audiences have always had a lust for watching other people have sex.

"It is my dream, it is my goal, it is my idea to make a film that the story just sucks 'em in and when they spurt out that joy juice they just gotta sit in it, they can't move until they find out how the story ends."  - Jack Horner, Porno Film Director, as played by Burt Reynolds, in Paul Thomas Anderson's Boogie Nights.  

*P.T.A's timeless classic gets better with every viewing!

Upon revisiting the ode to porno, Boogie Nights, recently, this quote struck me! I couldn’t help but wonder; just who are these people (predominantly men?) who are ok with sitting in their own, or someone else’s, ‘joy juice’, and whacking off in public? Albeit in a darkened cinema… but still in public! And how do they walk out of the cinema and go back to work and about their daily lives with ‘joy-juice’ stains all over their pants? Do they take a change of pants with them?

In the 1970’s, connoisseurs of porn, who wanted to watch people having sex on film, a visual stimulation to aid their masturbation, crept into theatres, under bold, bright, neon lit marquees, collars flicked up, hats pulled down, to shield their identities, to rub one out in a darkened room to an X-rated movie like Deep Throat or John Holmes in Johnny Wadd, surrounded by other men, also rubbing one out. 

The film Boogie Nights deftly chronicles the change in era from film to video-cassette. Video, as Jack Horner’s nemesis, the shady, erotic film producer Floyd Gondolli points out, meant that lovers of porn could rub one out in the comfort of their own home. For artistic reasons, filmmaker Jack Horner initially resists the transition from film to tape. ‘If it looks like shit and sounds like shit… it’s probably shit!’ Rebuked the fictional character Jack Horner, who considered himself somewhat of an erotic auteur Director. 

* Burt Reynolds, Smokey and the Bandit the inspiration for this article.

Nevertheless, Floyd Gondolli was right. For good reason, people preferred to consume their porno, to flog the log, to bat one out, in the privacy and comfort of their own homes (not surrounded by other men slappin’ their salamis). And thus, in the 1980’s, the boom in home video cassettes all but killed porn theatres. 

*Floyd Gondolli from Boogie Nights, played by Phillip Baker Hall, a man of 'simple pleasures'!

In a perverse case of karma, video-cassettes and the proceeding technology of DVD, would also be phased out and die an inglorious death, with the 1990’s advent of the internet.

Some of the stats out there about how much of the internet is actually dedicated to porno are more like urban myths than actual fact. Rumours abound, like how two-thirds of all web traffic was attributed to porn. It is very hard to ascertain reliable data as to what the actual percentage really is. But according to one study, in 1999, 40-50% of all internet searches were for sexual content. (http://www.forbes.com/sites/julieruvolo/2011/09/07/how-much-of-the-internet-is-actually-for-porn)

The study, from the book ‘A Billion Wicked Thoughts’, claims that nowadays, out of the top one-million websites, only 2% of them are porno, which is a remarkably small number.

That being said, according to a 2013 BuzzFeed article, the site YouPorn reportedly pulled in 100 million page views per day, with 4,000 page views per second during its peak periods. (http://www.buzzfeed.com/charliewarzel/the-internets-weirdest-secret-nobody-knows-how-much-porn-the#.kpzzq90eR)

Chances are though, if you are visiting an adult theatre to watch porn on the big screen, then you’re probably not one of those people using the internet to batter the sav’ at home?

Despite all the competition from VHS, DVD and finally the internet, remarkably, these porn cinemas have still managed to survive!  

When other businesses effected by rapidly advancing digital technology have fallen by the wayside due to easily accessible films online, most notably video shops, both the humble corner shop and the mega franchises like Blockbuster and Video Ezy, somehow, these adult theatres have managed to eek out an existence, dotted around the central business district of Melbourne, where the rent is also usually staggeringly high.

We’ve all seen them before - Club X on Swanston St. Another Club X just off Little Bourke St. near the intersection of Russell. Crazy Horse on Elizabeth St.

*Shaft starring Samuel L. Jackson screening at an 'Adult Complex' near you! 

With the neon lit silhouette of a ladies legs, how could we miss them? 

I'm pretty reluctant to walk in, for fear of, upon walking out, bumping into a work colleague, an employer, an ex-girlfriend or one of my missus’s best friends! 

But I will put my hand up! I’ll readily admit that I have previously visited these ‘dens of inequity’ as my mother would have called it! And, clearly, since they are still in existence, I am not the lone ranger! I guess my excuse would be a raging horniness fueled by the use of amphetamines. But more about my past experiences in Pt. 2 of this article! 

What I intend to find out on my next 'field trip' to one of our local Melbourne Adult Theatre Sex Cinemas, purely for research purposes of course, is…

Sex Cinema vs Adult Theatre; what is the preferred nomenclature? What do the proprietors prefer to be called?

How have these Sex Cinemas managed to survive in the ever-changing marketplace?

What have they had to do to ensure their existence in the face of rapidly changing digital technology, such as free sites like YouPorn?

How have they diversified to stay relevant and profitable and maintain their clientele? ('Glory-holes' spring to mind!)


At some stage of the game, Adult Cinemas introduced 'Real Live Girls' as their neon lights advertise (I always crack up at this - 'real live girls' as opposed to what? Cadavers? Inflatable ones?) 

How does an Adult Cinema with a 'Real Live Girls' differ to a strip club? 

And the '$2 Peeps' to lure horny customers in? 
Who are the girls on the other side of the glass in the peep show booths? How does their job compliment their lifestyle? Will one of these girls be willing to be interviewed by me?

Just who, when free porn is only a click of a mouse or a tap of your smart-phone away, still frequents these theatres? 

Although the cinemas would appear to be marketed at hetero-sexual dudes, is their clientele straight, gay or bisexual? 
A quick google will tell you that they are pretty common cruising spots for gay and bi men. And what about couples? How often do they get a couple wader in on a Saturday night and get freak-nasty in the cinemas, with a bunch of horny guys watching on whacking off?

How do they operate within the boundaries of the law in relation to things like lewd and obscene behavior in public? Indecent exposure? Sex in public? Sex on premises?

And what of the poor soul that has to clean up that ‘joy-juice’? 
For the sake of this article, let’s call him the ‘Jizz-Juice-Janitor’, once the customers have blown their wads and left the building? That has got to be one of the worst jobs in history? What sort of health risks, if any, are they exposed to? Are they paid extra, like danger money? What is their uniform, do they wear a biohazard suit complete with breathing apparatus when sponging up spoof? Are there any special industrial strength cleaners the Jizz-Janitor recommends? And just what air freshener overcomes the sticky stench of bodily fluids that can only be created by the chronic masturbation of multiple men, going hard at it, knob-flogging?  

Stay tuned as all these questions and more shall be answered in chapter 2 of my special investigation as we delve deeper into the not-so-secret, sticky-floored underworld INSIDE THE SEX CINEMAS OF MELBOURNE… And again, it's purely about the filmmaking. No, really. True. I swear.

(*All images ripped & reproduced without permission. 

The first image is from a website dedicated to vintage erotica http://www.deltaofvenus.com/ and is a genuine reproduction of late 1800's porno. Well worth checking out for those interested in genuine early porn & filmmaking.)