Do The Business from Anna Span
Reviewed by Aly Mony

This film is already captivating to me before I’ve even pressed play, as it is that rarest of things – a porn film directed by a woman. Anna Span was the UK’s first female porn director, and is an intriguing character due to her considered, philosophical (bizarrely, your reporter here encountered her in a philosophy evening class a few years ago) and feminist approach to pornography.

That’s all well and good, I hear you say, but is it hot? Dear reader, you are a philistine, but I suppose it’s a fair question and I am pleased to report that they are. These films are not overbearing lessons in feminist politics, they’re still full of the same good ol’ filthy sex as male-directed pornography. None of the patronising (and let me state for the record, false) assumption that women need nice soft-focus films about intimacy and feelings, they don’t really like sex.

Not that this film is just for women – Anna is very careful to describe these films as from a female viewpoint, rather than just for women.

Most of Anna’s films are set in contemporary London (including one called Hug a Hoodie – amusing idea, but I can’t say I find rough council estates erotic), but Do The Business has a time-travelling fantasy setting of the earlier part of the twentieth century “Earnest, 1950's Stocking-Clad Housewives Seek Gentlemen” – plenty of license for stockings and saucy retro lingerie! Always a good starting point.

The film opens with sweet wide-eyed innocent blonde Alicia Rhodes, who is approaching a stately home wondering if her new mister will be a good man. I think it’s fair to say he’s not a good man, in fact he’s a layabout – in a reversal of the usual roles, he is a kept man to his wealthy girlfriend. I puzzle a bit over exactly what kind of statement this is supposed to be, while the scene takes a bit too long to get going, but eventually I am distracted when they get down to some steamy sex. It’s worth waiting for, cumulating in a truly cataclysmic money-shot “What’s all this?” exclaims Alicia in shock.

The next scene opens with another reversal, a cute young gentleman primping himself in readiness. Eventually we see the time-travelling blonde damsel, who is standing in the shower, appalled but somewhat excited by how vain modern day man is. An amazingly cute scene follows – he draws a stocking-seam line down the back of her legs, as in the days of make-do-and-mend. He follows the seams upwards and soon finds more of interest (Did they have clit rings in the 1950s?). I must at this point approvingly note that this scene involves condom use – the more the adult industry depicts condom use as a normal part of hot fantasy fucking, the better it is for everyone. And then it ends too abruptly – Mr Vain runs off to have the first shower before his lady can. Heh!

The third scene opens in the past (we know it’s the past because of the sepia-tinted colour effect). A glamorous, pseudo-Audrey-Hepburn in an extremely naughty cocktail dress split all the way up to – well, all the way up - travels to the future and the men are not all she expects them to be – she finds a young man urinating on the street. Naughty boy! So, naturally, she tells him she’ll teach him how to do it. I am digging the bizarreness of this premise, so far beyond the usual convoluted porn premises that it transcends them. I’ve also spotted that taking nice fifties ladies and transporting them to the present day gives a nice opportunity for a bit of degradation – pure retro styling can be a bit safe and nice.

The next scene, ‘Messy Fucker’, is supposed to be about a man with an unacceptably messy apartment – I didn’t think it was so messy, does that make me bad? But a stern, governess-type arrives on his doorstep to give him a ticking off. Alexis Silver, the star, is actually not a bad actress, not nearly so mannerly as the girls in most pornos. Sadly, this scene misses out on a chance of a bit of stern governess-ly whipping into shape and turns out to be quite vanilla, but nice nonetheless. She doesn’t miss an opportunity to tell him off a bit more at the end, though.

The final scene, ‘Wash Your Mouth Out’, opens with yet another stern madam, Poppy Morgan, who is appalled by the foul mouthed boys she’s spying on through a keyhole. Um, I don’t quite think she has the moral highground in that situation. She intrudes to tell them off. The boys are confused. She soon changes her tune, and turns into a rampant cock-hungry beast. The boys continue to be confused, but not confused enough not to go with it (with a condom – good work fella). But then, Cinderella-like, it’s over – she has to get back to the fifties. The boys are still somewhat confused.

I guess the moral of the story is that modern men aren’t all they’re cracked up to be, but they’re still good for some things. And that female-directed porn can be just as smutty as male. Hurrah!

Watch Do The Business online now!