Lousy vanity porn production, justly forgotten

Bob Guccione's "Caligula" back in 1979 stands as the unbeatable example of a porno vanity production, throwing many millions and various great actors into the gutter as an act of unbridled hubris. Too bad Bob's no longer with us, as he stood for many years as New York's trashiest man until usurped by Donald Trump.

An unknown figure, "Toshi Gold", aspired to greatness with the silly "Skin 17: Succubus", shot in 1999 for the Astral Ocean Cinema banner, a name that reeks of New Age b.s., as does this sad excuse of an attempted erotic film. Except for card-carrying Jill Kelly fans, it has no audience.

The label has some hidden "gems": I note Jill Kelly directed the same year an Astral Ocean blockbuster titled "Perfect Pink: Wired Pink Gangbang" featuring over two dozen of the biggest femme names in porn of that day (Jessica Drake, Taylor St. Claire, Asia Carrera, etc., etc.) so some money was rolling in from the fans. But not for "Succubus", foolishly titled on its video cover as "The most acclaimed motion picture in the history of adult cinema: the biggest budget and the biggest cast", all obvious falsehoods. Too obvious for comfort - I like to be grifted with some care and imagination.

Not to dwell on "Succubus", which would take well over the 1,000-word IMDb limit to adequately annotate, it is basically a combination tribute to Kelly's beauty (nothing wrong with that, obviously) and an idiotic, repetitive abstract porn film on a Satanic theme. Think some amateur backyard filmmaker emulating Andrew Blake and failing miserably.

Kelly's ancestors were vampires and we have her in fetish gear sticking candles in girls' assholes then lighting them as the interstitial footage between sex vignettes. She's writing something like memoirs, covering her dad's sordid career as a vampire and mom's equally evil life as his victim/submissive. The relationship of Satan and an ancient Dracula-style vampire here presages the current plot line of Showtime's "Penny Dreadful" series.

The silliness of the content is a series of outdoor sex orgy scenes, often set in cemeteries, that are very poorly produced. They amount to what seems like a bunch of out of work porn actors gussied up in fetish gear and humping away, all filmed MOS with non-stop music to get that "put me to sleep" effect pioneered by "Andrew Blake". It was boring 20 years ago and is hard to watch today, though I suspect only a completist/historian of my level of mania will bother.

Only moments sort of making it worthwhile are young Julie Meadows in a key supporting role looking fine, beauty mark and all, and some busty co-stars like Kim Chambers making the scene. Toshi Gold's background is in German fetish porn, so perhaps this all-star effort to go mainstream on Jill's coattails was a logical if stupid case of overreach.

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Succubus: Skin XVII

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