Sex, Home & Videotape

One Languid, sticky summer night in New York City, I watched two people having sex from a rear window of the Chelsea Hotel. I was sitting in my room watching the moon rise over Soho when I spotted them in an apartment across the back alley. They weren't just making love, either. When animals do what they were doing, we call it rutting. So I turned out my lights and watched the show.

The man and the woman had left their windows open, the shades up and the lights on. He was taking her doggy-style on the bed, in a pile of damp sheets, right under the window. Her rhythmic yelping noises carried in the night air.

I sat in the dark, a short but uncrossable distance from the couple working on each other in their own well-lit erotic theater. It was clear they wished to be watched: The entire back of the hotel was their grandstand. And yet they didn't acknowledge the lights or look out the window. Their reward was my response. I did what they wanted me to do: have sex with them, without ever meeting them, without touching them, without intruding into their lives in any messy way and without being able to recapture the moment except in memory.

But I wish I had it on videotape, so I could roll it back whenever I desired. No commercially available porn tape could ever capture the honesty or the voyeuristic thrill of this live, free, throwaway exhibition.

And yet video technology does offer an alternative, and has for years. Swingers jumped on the camcorder as an erotic tool when the price came down in the mid-Seventies, placing ads in swing publications offering to swap tapes, with the option of meeting if they liked what they saw. But it didn't boom as an erotic home appliance until celebrities were caught in the act.

In 1988 brat pack actor Rob Lowe faced criminal prosecution for having sex with a 16-year-old girl and not taking very good care of the videotape he'd made of the act. Tonya Harding and Jeff Gillooly reached an even wider audience. Last year their wedding-night memories went on sale for $29.95, and all the world could watch the tacky skating star put her steely Olympian muscles to work, facilitating some gymnastic penetrations by Gillooly. There was no hidden camera work involved--she even rolls out of bed at one point to show the camera a handful of hard-won ejaculate.

Was I supposed to be seeing this? Was anyone? Regardless of the legal issues involved in selling it, this tape is so hot exactly for the same reasons that it is shocking--it was private, it was real and those two were performing for no one other than themselves. And if they decided later to sell the rights and make some money, that doesn't affect the original erotic urge, does it?

These tapes highlight the fact that making homemade erotica is now a favorite national pastime. Tens of thousands of Americans are using camcorders as sex toys. For the past few months, I have been trying to recover the rare heat and immediacy of that voyeuristic, anonymous sexual jolt at the Chelsea Hotel by watching some of the so-called amateur porn videos that have captured a major segment of the erotic vid market. For the most part, these tapes don't cut it. The home erotic experience cannot be purchased. It must be made.

So I started searching for a partner. It was easier than you might think. I was in a tough spot at first, living alone in Los Angeles, and thus having little access to anyone who might join me in front of the lens.

I asked one of my closest girlfriends, but she categorically refused. I begged. I bought lingerie. I promised never to lie again in my whole life, to anyone, so help me God. I had her watch tapes with me, but that made it worse. I promised to erase the tape after one private viewing. I said we could make it ''art.'' We could add a time-warp story line and become the next Quentin Tarantinos.

This same girlfriend, of course, mentioned a certain Bay Area newscaster who had allegedly been betrayed on a bootleg tape having sex with a man's, uh, fist. It was a private moment getting public exposure. I saw her point. If you don't want to risk exposure, don't make a tape.

I was still lamenting this turndown a month later when I went out to dinner with another trusted girlfriend and had a lengthy discussion about the meaning of erotic video for committed, safe and adventurous couples. Suddenly, in the middle of eating a plate of flautas, I heard myself blurting: ''Would you like to make a video with me?''

I regretted it instantly. What a cad! Who would say something like that? What did I expect, other than a punch in the teeth? Before I could apologize, she quickly said, ''Well, I'm going to say yes. But I want to know more about what you intend to do on this video.''

What a trouper! At this moment, I broke through to a truth I had suspected, but hadn't been able to verify: Almost everyone I know wants to make one. She told me she had always wanted to make a tape, and that she had talked about it with girlfriends from time to time. After I told a few good friends I was going on camera, several of them confessed they already had or had always wanted to.

My friend and I made a date to roll the tape, and I started counting the seconds.

•

Videographer and educator Kevin Campbell had enough friends who were into taping themselves that he gathered up their experiences and wrote an excellent, responsible how-to book called Video Sex. He eagerly recounted his first experience with the camcorder.

''At the time I tried it, back in 1988 or so, I was dating somebody very adventurous,'' he told me. ''And she suggested we take the camcorder into the bedroom. It was the most exciting encounter I had with my old girlfriend. I have never been more open, sexually, with a lover than I was when that camera was rolling.

''She is a liberal person, but she's also a feminist. And there she was, with a sexy costume that she pulled off slowly. She was touching herself. She was saying all these wonderfully filthy things to the camera, and describing what she wanted to do to me.

''And I was saying things like, 'Take off your underwear. Play with yourself. Open yourself more, I want to see more.' And she was happily doing just that, as though she were posing for some adult film--which she wasn't a fan of, by the way.''

Campbell, like a lot of home videographers, discovered that being in a role-play situation freed his lover to live out her fantasies. It also opened him up to receiving those fantasies. ''I didn't know I liked dildos in certain places,'' he says in a whisper. ''And then, once that camera was out, look out Kev! That's what she wanted to see. She had never asked me this before. And other lovers since then, same thing.''

Why does this happen to ordinary folks when they get on camera? What is it about that recording device, the ultimate voyeur, that makes on-camera sex so hot? Are we a nation so hooked on images and TV that the mere trappings of stardom are erotic?

Campbell says the most obvious transformation wrought by the camera is one of communication. ''Let's face it,'' he says, ''most Americans are rather conservative when it comes to sex. They don't know how to say what they want. And they don't know how to role-play. But once that camcorder is rolling, it's, 'Hey! We're making a movie. I'm going to be somebody else.' If you're with a lover you trust, then you can lose a lot of inhibitions in front of the camera and say things you wouldn't ordinarily say to your lover.''

Part of the effect might be one of validation: The sex is being recorded, and the partners will be watching it played back and they want it to be hot. So they play to the camera. They keep their energy up. They say things they might not ordinarily say. They surprise each other.

The only real pitfall--and it's potentially a big one--is that one partner may feel pressured to perform, or to reach orgasm or even to be on the tape at all. The camera will tend to reveal nervousness or discomfort as well. The camera won't allow you to fake it. If you feel like you have to fake it you may as well buy a great Tori Welles tape. She gets lots of practice faking it, and does it really well.

•

Over the next few weeks my adventurous friend and I talked about scenarios. When we drank too much coffee or beer, our project evolved into an erotic epic, in which we would act out scenes in elevators and cars and bathrooms, on public beaches and in grocery stores and dark clubs--or wear fantastic costumes or invoke some fetishistic fantasies I'd rather not expound upon here.

But when the night finally came, we found that we were more like Joe and Jill America: We were unsophisticated in our filmmaking skills, interested mostly in great sex (as opposed to high art) and reluctant to invest a whole day in the production. We just wanted to make it.

We borrowed a hi-8 video camera and learned how to use the simple features--the pause, the zoom and the gain (to produce strobe-like effects). We had a floor lamp, a new bed and a good tripod. The results could not have been more excellent.

I have three things to report: (1)

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The sex could not have been hotter if it were cooked by a blowtorch, (2) this kind of behavior will definitely open doors to other kinds of role-playing and (3) men look idiotic when they try to act sexy. More on that later.

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What we have been talking about, of course, is sex between consensual and committed couples: Folks who have already cleared some communication hurdles and are looking for a way to enrich established sex lives. But there are lots of folks, men in particular, who tape themselves spontaneously with a variety of partners, for reasons having less to do with great sex than with bragging rights, bets, a good laugh or even ''art.''

Sunshine, for instance, is a quick-talking 28-year-old artist living on New York's Lower East Side. A painter, sculptor, musician and videographer (among other things), he first brought a video camera into the bedroom as an artistic tool. A natural exhibitionist, he never thought twice about being on camera.

''Video cameras have a real immediacy, so you can get this big wave of sexuality right there,'' he says. ''When I first got the camera, I was taping everything from ants swarming on a tree to my orgasms. As I grew more involved with the camera, it became more cinematic, more of a project: Let's see if I can get the lighting right. How good will it be? What can I direct the girl to do?''

Sunshine's partners have been a mix of one-night stands and girlfriends, all of whom required some convincing. ''I remember one of my girlfriends came over, and I got into sketching her. We got a little drunk. I said, 'Hey, let's make one.' She was intrigued by it, a little scared, a little fascinated. She's sort of a conservative girl, and she gets intellectually wet over the fact that something dangerous is going on. I was like Claude Pepper--diligently lobbying to get this thing through. But judging by her performance, you would never think she had been so worried about the act of filming itself. It was an excellent video.''

Sunshine finds the whole thing sexy--the talk, the convincing, the making, the watching--always stopping just short of turning it into a control game or a power trip. He emphasizes that he has never damaged a woman's ego by challenging her to do things because she was on tape. The idea, he says, is to acknowledge the camera, to use it.

''It's like an interesting sort of robotic voyeur,'' adds Sunshine. ''You are aware of its presence. It's just this gentle statue of excitement, right over there. This weird kind of eye. It's sort of like your own eye. It's wonderful.''

Sunshine projects an innocent enthusiasm for his hobby, but he also personifies some of the potential dangers. For one thing, he shows his videos to his buddies. He says it takes the voyeurism to another level and makes it even sexier for him. You have to wonder, though, how his partners would feel if they knew.

''I'm proud of the way they look,'' he says, defending his tapes, ''They look good.''

Early on in his book, Campbell offers the following words of caution, which I'll paraphrase:

(1) Don't ever videotape anyone without his or her knowledge and permission. Not only is it unethical, it's also a crime.

(2) Don't force or threaten your partner to participate in making erotic videos.

(3) Don't videotape or in any way involve minors.

(4) Lock your tapes away as if they were guns. This keeps tapes out of the hands of children and avoids the chance of public embarrassment. It also keeps them out of the hands of overzealous authorities in states that have sodomy laws.

(5) Don't use the tapes as weapons. If there's some chance they could be used to hurt you or your partner, erase them.

•

It was time to hit the record button.

We set the floor lamp at the edge of the bed and turned off the overhead (which had made everything look flat and pasty). We took turns on the bed while we checked out the exposure and found a good angle to shoot from--a medium shot big enough to include our whole bodies at a right angle to the camera. There were some shadowy areas away from the light, but it looked kind of good that way.

When the tripod was set, I took the camera and rolled tape, panning over her body and recording her initial smiling shyness. I began to give and receive specific instructions. She suddenly lost her inhibitions, taking charge as she stripped for the camera. She kicked off her shoes, then pulled off a sweater and beamed into the camera. ''Now I'm going to take off my pants,'' she said, slipping a finger along each side of the waistband. I suggested, ''On the bed. Lie back on the bed and do it.''

She lay back, spread her hair around like a halo, and proceeded with 15 minutes of slow peeling and writhing. I hit the gain for the strobe effect while she was struggling with her jeans, then stood over her and found good angles on her body, zooming and panning to get it all on tape. She was really responding to the attention. Her sexuality came flooding forward, urgent, exposed, vulnerable. At last she cast off her bra and panties, twisting around nude, radiant.

She said to the camera, ''I'm ready for your cock.''

•

Back in 1988 Suzie Wahl and her husband, T.J., decided to start their own mail-order business out of their suburban home. They had a hunch that people would buy America's funniest home videos and amateur how-to tapes, back before television capitalized on that same good idea.

''We ran ads that said. 'Free Catalog. Need Videos,''' remembers Suzie. ''We got in 'How to fix your bicycle,' 'How to play golf'--all different kinds of things.'' They also received a quick education about where America really lives. ''People started asking for X-rated,'' she says, laughing. ''And people started sending us X-rated. We were like, 'Holy shit!' We didn't have the slightest idea that people were using them for that purpose. But we said, 'What the heck? If this is what customers want, that's what we ought to be doing.' People from across the country started sending us videos they had done at home.'' Today their company, Video Alternatives, is one of the largest distributors of homemade and ''amateur'' porn.

Video Alternatives and the many other ''amateur'' video distributors I spoke with capitalized on two simultaneous phenomena: At the same time camcorders were becoming common, popular tastes in pornography turned against formulaic movies.

''I think people are tired of acrylic nails, silicone breasts, hair extensions and fake orgasms,'' says Veronica Monet, an independent filmmaker whose film Real Women, Real Fantasies was a (continued on page 154) Sex, Home & Videotape (continued from page 126) groundbreaker in the feminization of porn. ''There are just so many times you can hear''--she assumes a perfect high-pitched porn star voice--'''Ah! Ah! Oh yeah! Oh yeah!' You know? You get it memorized. There goes another blonde bimbo jiggling her silicone at us, going, 'Ah! Ah!'''

Monet's film features five women who separately describe their fantasies and masturbate on camera. There is no script, but the fantasies are real--even that of Disney, a dominatrix who admits to fantasizing about having sex with a donkey. The intimacy comes through on tape as the women work themselves to orgasm.

''People are saying, 'Hey, what about what I do in my bedroom?''' says Monet. ''I like to think my sex life is good, but I never see it on any film I buy. The whole reason to buy an erotic film is to get turned on. But if everything's fake, or if it makes you feel inadequate, then there's no turn-on. I think the amateur stuff appeals because it's a lot easier to say, 'Yeah, that could be me.'''

This has changed porn for women. Suzie Wahl says the promotion of ''real'' sex has become her company's mission.

''One reason most women hate X-rated videos and don't want their husbands watching them is because they can't measure up to the women on those videos. That's why I want to put out a product that has women just like them in it, because that's who I want the men of the U.S. to be turned on by.''

•

Now it was her turn to be the cinematographer. Standing nude, and fully aroused, she took the camera and pointed it at me. It was a moment of truth, and I responded with--men, take heed--bad acting. I pouted. I moued. I flounced. There was a basic confusion. After all, how does a man act sexy? After a few seconds, I finally got it: He doesn't act at all. He does whatever it is that he always does, but more slowly and with close concentration on the physical sensations.

I undid one button at a time on my 501s, then finally flipped out like a sort of snack food. ''I want that,'' she said, and bent to it, and I took the camera and held it on my chest. What followed was some of the best and most intimate footage of all, with her face slightly distorted from the closeness.

She stopped before it went too far, and there was some cool pull-away distortion as she leaned away and pulled off my pants. She took back the camera and ran close-ups all over me as I stroked myself, dropping every few minutes to get another taste for herself.

I felt a strange mix of sensations as she stood over me: I felt like a man being loved for himself, like an animal used purely for sexual pleasure, like the camera's next meal. I was surprised to find out what a turn-on it was to be deemed worth filming, to have someone care enough about the sex to want to preserve it and to want to put herself in it with me.

It was also incredibly sexy to see her as a camera girl, trying not to get carried away by the sex and forget her job. This created a terrific kind of sexual tension. She was quite obviously turned on by the images she was making: I could see her making mental photos for herself to pull out during a private moment and fantasize over. That felt really good.

We put the camera back on the tripod, set the lights again, pushed up the gain to get the fun strobe, and went at it. By some happy accident, we had put Laika's Silver Apples of the Moon on the CD player, and the camera's built-in microphone picked it up. The music built as we caressed and groaned. Every time we changed positions, the music changed. It was as if the gods of sex and wet slippery things were smiling on our video. Finally, during a frenzied piece of music, we crushed together and made furious love.

The music changed and I went down on her. What a soundtrack. As the song built up, her hips writhed and her moans and cries slid right into the music. It made us both so hot, knowing this bit of synchronicity was being recorded. She came fiercely, and she rocked up into me in a big ball. We rolled around the bed for a few minutes, always a little conscious not to put our backs to the camera or obscure a face with an arm or a leg.

We kissed, and she said with a big grin, ''I can't wait to watch this.''

•

Porn is a billion-dollar-a-year industry, and it couldn't afford to take the erotic home-video movement lying down. So, of course, the big producers came out with their own lines of ''homemade'' and ''amateur'' films, most of which really aren't. The actors are paid, however minimally, and the scenes are contrived.

John Bowen, for instance, who has directed more than 150 porn films with the credited name of John T. Bone, created his own ''amateur'' line called Harry Horndog. In these videos he himself often ends up having sex with the actresses.

''Here is the strangest thing in the world,'' he chuckles good-naturedly, sitting with me at his kitchen table in Echo Park, a hilly residential section of Los Angeles. ''Are we going to convince the public to spend good money watching a 44-year-old man, who is overweight and has gray hair, have sex with pretty girls? Three years later, we still sell thousands of the first two videos. We can't stop them from selling.''

The issue, again, is one of identification. Men who don't quite measure up to, say, Brad Pitt, can put themselves in Bowen's place quite easily. And, hey, he's getting laid.

The new amateur market has also made room for some great and hilarious innovations. Joe Elliot's College Girls, for example, is a funny and charming series. You can't take the tapes seriously, and that's what makes them work. Each features three or four different college girls (mostly Berkeley women), a lot of them recruited through newspaper ads in the Bay Area. They are encouraged to model, strip and masturbate on tape at Elliot's place. The comic tension comes from the fact that the women don't know how far the ''performance'' is going to go, until Elliot ends up naked in the scene with them and then, weirdly, they're having sex with him. You can feel them both making up their minds to act. Elliot says that he himself doesn't know what will happen until the camera is rolling.

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The beautiful and unexpected part of our home erotic video experience was in the playback. We walked to her house, passing under the blooming jacaranda trees, which were dropping their strange neon-blue flowers into our arms and hair. There's no video of that moment, but I'm quite sure we were both smiling. We discovered, silently, that we had forged a powerful bond because of the hot and dangerous (in the best sense) experience of making our video.

When we got to her place, we curled up in bed, popped in the tape and hit the play button. She was incredible on video. A star. She commented right away that she liked how her body looked onscreen, which is a surprise for anyone. I felt the same sense of surprise, having never seen my back and shoulders in action before. I looked at her on TV and realized another reason these home movies are so seductive: Because it was real and it was us, our sense of pride made us look pretty good. Not like Seka or anything, but really good.

By the time we got to the middle of our 36-minute video, we were at it again on the bed. There was no camera this time, but both of us sneaked looks at the action on-screen as we made it. An hour later we were finally exhausted and fell asleep in the blue light of the monitor. Our video ended with almost an hour and a half of virgin tape left, ready for more recording.

In the video afterglow, I kept thinking that we had discovered our secret language, one whose vocabulary I wanted to expand, refine and use again. To talk about what? Well, that was another surprise. Right in the middle of being filmed, when she held the camera in her hand, I thought, for the first time ever, What if, right now, I were eight pounds thinner and were decked out in enough leather harnesses, collars and cock rings to rival Judge Dredd? What if I had some rope? What would she do for me then?

Ah, sweet video dreams.

I stood over her and found good angles on her body, zooming and panning to get it all on tape.