As a true crime troll, I've known this story from when it occurred, reading most if not all of the materials of the actual crime and circumstances from most involved. The film does a pretty decent surface scan of the story, as usual, a great deal of the deeper development is lost on movies who keep it "R" and whom also try to stay within a short length. When a true story is involved anything less than 2+ hours is gonna cut out a lot of the deeper character meat (I mean all involved have deep stories that brought them to where they are) not to mention a lock of as much nudity as you'd expect in a movie about the Porn industry for goodness sake. Some chests, speedos and a few quick limited butt shots are not quite the TandA you'd hope for. I'm not talking about full frontals, I just think they should have included a lot more booty if your setting is the booty business .lol
Th e acting was superb on pretty much all fronts and I found no fault anywhere. Slater was just amazing, and I felt sorry for him, I felt sorry for all of them in truth. Brent being the least though as he was the fire in which they all eventually burned. I'm not saying I admire Brent or his hetero counter-part Traci Lords...BUT, in the end they both proved one thing, not everyone under 18 is innocent, naïve or without the ability to manipulate, plan and execute conceived life paths with the skill of a 50 year old wolf of wallstreet. Both of them have also proven what most people loathe to admit, and that is this "Generalization of Age" as a standard for perceived "level of sincere innocence" is beyond ridiculous. That discussion may make folks uncomfortable, but then the truth often does on many issues.
The film itself stuff stayed acceptably within the bounds of the real events, and though a deeper development of the characters would have been appreciated it still managed to hit the surface points, and does you give you a pretty accurate knowledge of what happened, even if it is only the surface. This is a common occurrence though, with everything from Anna Nicole, to Star 80 just about any other bio-pic adaptation you will find out there, so it commits no sin that any other GOOD film has done with such issues when trying to balance a "regular length film" does in truncating a deep true life event like this.
I'm happy with the film in general, and am glad the story is at least out there to be seen and can lead viewers to then go analyze the many issues it raises. Glad to have it in my collection and I applaud the performances by all involved, especially Slater, Franco and the 2 objects of their affection.
Th e acting was superb on pretty much all fronts and I found no fault anywhere. Slater was just amazing, and I felt sorry for him, I felt sorry for all of them in truth. Brent being the least though as he was the fire in which they all eventually burned. I'm not saying I admire Brent or his hetero counter-part Traci Lords...BUT, in the end they both proved one thing, not everyone under 18 is innocent, naïve or without the ability to manipulate, plan and execute conceived life paths with the skill of a 50 year old wolf of wallstreet. Both of them have also proven what most people loathe to admit, and that is this "Generalization of Age" as a standard for perceived "level of sincere innocence" is beyond ridiculous. That discussion may make folks uncomfortable, but then the truth often does on many issues.
The film itself stuff stayed acceptably within the bounds of the real events, and though a deeper development of the characters would have been appreciated it still managed to hit the surface points, and does you give you a pretty accurate knowledge of what happened, even if it is only the surface. This is a common occurrence though, with everything from Anna Nicole, to Star 80 just about any other bio-pic adaptation you will find out there, so it commits no sin that any other GOOD film has done with such issues when trying to balance a "regular length film" does in truncating a deep true life event like this.
I'm happy with the film in general, and am glad the story is at least out there to be seen and can lead viewers to then go analyze the many issues it raises. Glad to have it in my collection and I applaud the performances by all involved, especially Slater, Franco and the 2 objects of their affection.