Modern Pornography

Motion Picture Classics.

The screen lit up in a brilliant white. A drum beats quietly at a slow heartbeat. Sarah held her breath as a small, white-washed room came into view. A white chair stands ominously in the middle of the room, angled toward the audience, inviting a rest. The drum, it beats and beats. For five minutes this room was the only thing on screen, closing in on the camera as the scattered audience swooned. Sarah's own heartbeat rose with desire.

 

"Pornography, what a horrible idea, separating people like that. Families fall apart over this stuff. Divorces are sky-rocketing. This endless trash is so addicting, it offers so much more than anyone can offer. It's simply unreal and degrading. Our televisions are being flooded with this filth, this lust of the flesh." Mom never approved of anything new, anything apart from what she grew up with.

 

The scene changed. They were now flying over some cold, desolate mountain range. Slowly peaks sped past Sarah's eyes with no end in sight. Purple, blue, gray, and white swirled together as she flew. The feeling was liberating.

 

"One of my very close friends started watching pornography. He had been married for ten years, a beautiful wife and two gorgeous girls. He skipped work to see these films, and every night he stayed awake, locked in his own bathroom looking at these magazines. Eventually his wife found out that he had gotten addicted and left him. I haven't heard of him since. I tried to visit but he's been locked in his room and alone. I guess his wife checked on him a while later and found him dead, his addiction had been so serious that he did not even leave the room to eat food."

 

Switch. Now the ground is pure cement. The camera pans up and out over the dark, star-less sky. Simple city noises filled the background, and the once slow drum of heartbeat now quickened its pace. Sarah's breath followed suit of the drum as the view spins endlessly around from the top of a skyscraper. The entire audience is sitting forward in their seats, waiting for the next scene.

 

"I simply don't get it. We've spent all of humanity making life easy for everyone. You can call any friend in a heartbeat. Hell, I can transport from New York to California in a matter of hours. No one is alone in this country, no one. We have created a world where anyone can be comfortable and happy, entertained. Part of the global community. I firmly believe that our world is slowly merging into one conglomerate, where no one is left behind."

 

Switch again. A hand is pressed against glass. The drum beats louder and louder, faster and faster. The entire audience grips the seat in front of them, the soft plush seat folding under pressure. Sarah suddenly is overwhelmed with emotion. Against the same glass, fists pound and faces are seen screaming. On the other side of the glass is some mob of people, ready to take on anything in their way. Their muffled sound can be heard from inside as the camera allows the more into view. They are in a large building, alone, protected by a thin wall of glass as more and more angry people push against it. 

 

"Our world today has ipods, MTV, fast cars, and starbucks. You might be in Denver and craving a starbucks, then fly halfway across the world and still find a starbucks. In our world today, everyone feels at home. No one, ever, feels alone."

 

Suddenly, a small crack forms in the glass where a large man had been pounding his massive fists. The entire audience, previously delirious from ecstacy, in a unifying cry, screamed, "NOOOOOOOOOOO!!"

 

Sarah herself felt a storm of emotions rise inside of her. Her eyes began to swell as the cracks of glass slowly spread across the wall. The audience was as livid as the mob pounding on glass. Some shrunk back in fear, eyes half closed. The drum had reached a deafening level. The cracks spread at an unstoppable, exponential rate. Previous scenes once again flashed on the screen, first the white room, the mountains, and the city view. As the last, unscathed corners of the glass had finally been corrupted by the growing cracks, the entire wall shattered and fell. The audienced gasped and cringed in fear.

 

Immediately everything went black. Saved by the horific thought of the next scene, everyone laid their head back and exhaled in relief. Sweat covered their faces.

 

Sarah burst into tears, covering her face with her trembling hands.

 

 

Reviews

[Anne Martin]

I had to re-read this a couple of times to come close to understanding it. Firstly, on pure technical points, you have quotes, but you don't tell us who is speaking. Is it Sarah? Was the first her Mother? You also float freely back and forth between present and past tense. Is there some significance to that that I've missed? I don't see it, so if there is, you should somehow make it clearer.

Finally, the content. You discuss pornography in the piece obliquely, and your connection of it to the scene in the cinema isn't clear to me. Is the film a diversion from something? Are you saying that the new pornography is fear? That people get addicted to fear? I can sort of see that, but what I don't see is Sarah's emotion. You tell us that she feels a storm of emotions - what emotions, and why? Show us her emotions; don't just tell us that she has them. Is there something else in the film that you aren't telling us about? Bring us into the story more. You've filtered the action too much. We are looking at Sarah from a distance, not really thinking her thoughts, and then there is the action. It's double filtered. Bring us closer. Make us feel the same emotion that Sarah is feeling.

I can't believe that the previous reviewer even read the piece. I don't see anything about sex here. I think you have the basis for a good piece here, but I think it needs some clarity. It has good intensity, but I think that you don't want people thinking, "Huh?" at the end.

[Eric Blair]

Uh�okay.

A note: pornography is for people whose personalities are so dreadful that no individual would want to have sex with them in real life. That's my opinion on the issue.