Venom 9

Have you ever wondered what it's really like on a porn set? Frank Thring spares no footage and offers more than a glimpse of what goes on behind the scenes in Venom 9. While the gonzo genre is considered to be a fairly relaxed format, Thring takes it a step further, allowing the production's peripheries to become part of the actual feature. Although it's somewhat of a gimmick, he even lets the performers handle some of the camera work; and to think, this was made before the whole Blair Witch hullabaloo. Altogether, this makes for some very laid back porn which offers a unique perspective of what goes on before the director yells "action" and after he yells "cut."

Frank begins the disc with a hot little three-way featuring Dakota, J.J. Michaels, and Guy DiSilva. Before the action starts, Frank asks J.J. and Guy some questions about their experience. Meanwhile, some lucky production assistant gets the task of lubing up Dakota; the guy smears a ton of lube on his hand and shoves four fingers way up her twat while she just stands there nonchalantly chatting away with the camera person. The PA then coats his index finger with lube and probes it in and out of her butthole a few times. With all the preproduction logistical tasks out of the way, the action finally begins.

Looking like a buxom pin-up girl of the 40s, Dakota begins by giving both guys some manual and oral attention; Guy and J.J. pass a camera back and forth while they get their knobs professionally polished. She keeps sucking a cock while the guys take turns fucking her well lubed pussy in various positions. When that gets old, it's time to move on to some anal, and Guy takes the first plunge. Feeling left out, J.J. climbs on top and fills her vacant twat to complete the DP. After they switch positions and tasks, there's a break in the action before the pop shot; Dakota needs to have her make-up and hair touched up first. While Dakota gets dolled up for the money shot, J.J. and Guy frantically stroke away in an attempt to stay hard and prepared for the next setup. When Dakota's ready, she holds a camera up to her face while both guys stroke and eventually fire away, coating her mug with a shiny film of jizz. When the action is over, she's handed paper towels to clean up. But instead, Dakota uses her fingers to scoop the cum off her face and then unceremoniously licks her fingers clean; don't you love it when girls play it up for the camera?

The remaining scenes all follow the similar formula. In the second scene Brick Majors gets it on with a young Hungarian named Susie Q. It starts off pretty slow but concludes with some nice anal. The third scene is a pretty basic girl/girl with Jessica and Brooke Ashley. Brooke returns in the fourth scene where she handles most of the camera work while Jonathan West gets serviced by Liza Harper. Even though she's supposed to be handling the camera work, Brooke sneaks in to suck Jonathan's cock for a little while and even gets a hard ass ramming a little later; for some reason, the scene concludes without a pop shot. Brick Majors and J.J. Michaels return in the fifth scene to take on Caroline and Rebecca Wild respectively. While the couples keep to themselves throughout most of the scene, J.J. helps Brick out with Caroline in a nasty little DP. In the end, both girls get a facial. In fact, Rebecca takes a high velocity stream of jizz up her nose and in her eye. Frank stays with this to cover the aftermath of a cum shot gone awry.

DVDs from Caballero are always problematic and Venom 9 is no exception. In terms of video and audio quality, there's not much difference between this disc and a video tape. Even though the box cover says the movie was "digitally remastered from original 35mm film," the feature was shot on video and there's no visible evidence of any digital remastering. The extras are pretty pathetic with the photo gallery being the only real extensive piece. Furthermore, the DVD is chopped up into separate titles instead of chapters. Depending on your hardware, this can make skipping scenes a bit difficult.

If you can look past the DVDs technical issues, Venom 9 is just interesting enough to recommend to those looking for an extremely realistic gonzo feature. Thring's focus on the production side of porno will probably turn off most viewers, but the action is decent enough to balance out the title, even if it isn't genuine. On a historical note, this title is also one of the last featuring both Caroline and Brooke Ashley; the two were into early retirement in 1998 when they both tested positive for HIV during a highly publicized scandal.