Morphine

It's hard to know where to start with Morphine, although not because of any uncertainty about the quality. Morphine isn't far short of porn genius -- beautifully shot, gorgeously edited, with a great cast and great music; everything in it is as good as it could be. There are some things -- very few -- that are not in it that could have made it better. Getting them out of the way right now: a slightly more cohesive narrative and a little better sense of who the characters are. In every other respect, though, Morphine is a brilliant piece of work; if you look at it as not so much a story as a snapshot of a story. The mood and atmosphere are vivid and hyperreal, with music, editing, lighting and everything else coming together to make a movie that is edgy enough to be credibly "alt" but still sexy enough to be good porn.

Audrey Hollander is coming back to Nashville after some time away, making a not-so-triumphant return to her roots after some time pursuing a rock-and-roll dream. She's got a guitar and a drug dependency, and she rides back into town in a hitched ride, picked up by Faith Leon. Faith and Audrey get it on in the back seat of the car, just inside the city limits, and with that she returns to her roots. She seems to fit pretty seamlessly into the world she left, taking up with what appears to be an old girlfriend and hanging out at the same old strip club -- standing alone at the crossroads of what-to-do-next. With barely any dialogue at all, Kimberly Kane draws a picture of a girl on the brink of despair, waiting to find out what happens after falling down, still deciding whether or not to get up. Nashville and what looks like her old life calls -- it would be easy to slide, to quit. Will she or won't she? I'm not even going to hint at it -- Morphine deserves better than for me to give anything away.

As important as anything else is the sex -- it is a porn movie, after all -- and Morphine delivers in spades. With six distinct scenes and a host of interstitial nudity, the movie is loaded with great fucking. The standout scene is Kimberly Kane's bondage/gloryhole/grudgefuck at the Sugar Shack (the club), in which she and Otto Bauer bounce each other all over the club before Zak Atak and Daniel tag in and add their cocks to the mix. Kane is a rock star, and the scene (according to her commentary track, her roughest scene ever) is a testament to what she can do; she's all in. She has another scene with the deliciously zaftig April Flores that's great, too. Audrey Hollander gets two scenes as well, one with Faith and one with Alex Gonz and Otto Bauer.

Audrey is also unfailingly dynamic, with a beautifully delicate face and the carnal capacity of Catherine the Great, a contrast that always makes for great porn, and she plays a distressed junkie slut as convincingly as it is possible to play one. With almost no dialogue, only her face and body to tell the story, Audrey does a great job of portraying a girl in some turmoil. Ashley Blue, although she's not my favorite actress, puts up a good scene as well, as a stripper who's basically raped -- first unwillingly, then by choice -- and Jada Fire (also as a stripper) also has a good scene, hers with Julius Ceazher.

As mentioned, it's hard to know where to start with Morphine, but not so difficult to finish: Watch it. (and if you get the DVD, watch it with the commentary turned on; you won't regret it).