“They’re stunning and sensational, sexy and insatiable/You’ll watch them all the time,” goes the theme song for “The Flintstones: A XXX Parody,” Will Ryder’s first porn parody for New Sensations. This is a heady boast; Will I watch them all the time?
Studio: New Sensations
Director: Will Ryder
Starring: Hillary Scott, Peter O’Tool, Anthony Rosano, Brooke Lee Adams, Misty Stone, Hayden Winters, Rod Fontana, Dale Dabone, Seth Gamble
When archaeologists excavate the ruins of our civilization in a decade or so, they will doubtless be intrigued by the porn parody. They will wonder why elaborate (or not-so-elaborate) porn adaptations of Disney rides (“Pirates”) or brands of vitamins (“The Flintstones—A XXX Parody”) ever became so popular or captured the imagination of the porn-producing public, if not the porn-consuming public.
“Verily,” they will say in that retro language common to all people from the future imagined by people from the present, “Whither the accent on Brooke Lee Adams as Betty?”
“The Flintstones” is anchored by the excellent mimicry of Peter O’Tool in a non-sex role as Fred (you will remember O’Tool as Walter in Lee Roy Myers’ version of “The Big Lebowski“) and Anthony Rosano as Barney. In addition, Hillary Scott has come out of hiding as Wilma, and Brooke Lee Adams interprets Betty in a way I only recently came to understand.
Those archaeologists will surely also find my bestselling account of my directorial debut in “The Facts of Life XXX,” in which I recount how, when casting for a particular character who happens to be from Brooklyn, I neglected to ask her agent (and he neglected to tell me) that the actress had a strong Commonwealth Games/ANZAC Day-celebrating accent and couldn’t talk Brooklynese if you held the same gun to her head as apocryphally used on Linda Lovelace.
Today’s porn parodies are peopled by performers who have 1.) watched the source material and studiously endeavored to get the look and voice down, 2.) never watched the show but look good fucking on film, 3.) are last-minute replacements whom you can try to direct but you’d be better off sending back to work that section of Sepulveda Blvd. near the Denny’s south of Burbank, or 4.) have the lucky distinction of being the new character added as a sex partner to the character being porn-parodied.
That one parody cast often has all four of these types makes for a genre that, taken as a whole, just looks weird.
Fred Flintstone, in a competently-formatted 3-act script by a New Sensations executive, is feeling old and unappreciated, jealous of the mysterious friendship between his wife and an “old friend” (Dale Dabone), and uneasy about the burgeoning womanhood of his daughter, Pebbles. That such heady fare should be foisted on a cartoonish family in polka dot rags is one of the central disconnects between what audiences want to see and what studios see fit to give them.
This isn’t “The Dark Knight,” after all; it’s the “Flintstones”! The story seems more suited to one of New Sensations’ romance movies, save for the presence of a brontosaurus burger here and there.
Directed by Will Ryder against a series of green screens, “The Flintstones” treats us to several scenes featuring Adams and Scott, which is a welcome respite from a laugh track that emphasizes the absence of anything funny happening, despite the best efforts—really, the frenzied efforts—of people like Rosano and O’Tool.
Misty Stone also appears as the secretary of Rod Fontana’s Mr. Slate. Fontana is a solid performer, but if we’re going to watch him have sex, we might as well watch Fred do it, too. And, because James Bartholet was busy finally getting to have sex on screen in Dick Chibbles’ “Saw” parody, the part of the recently-inevitable Will Ryder movie gay character was taken by Dabone who—spoiler alert! (I like saying that in porn reviews, when we all know that movies end with a shot of jizz in the eye)—reveals that he is not “bed rocking” Wilma at all, but is the (gay) chef for Fred’s birthday party.
As in all of X-Play’s movies, the production design and costuming set a porn industry high mark. We see laudable representations of the Flintstones’ home and Fred’s rock-steamroller car (though producers couldn’t figure out a way to have him propel it with his feet). Also notable is the offstage presence of the Flintstones’ pet, Dino, which was a step up from the absence altogether of Scooby Doo from the recent porn parody of the same name.
It is probably because of this firm commitment to quality that Ryder disseminated this press release about Will Ryder, which I include in its entirety:
Facing Stiff Competition X-Play & Will Ryder Refuse to Lower Award-Winning High Quality
(Hollywood, CA) It would be so easy to say fuck it. In the face of stiff competition, a difficult piracy climate and a tremendous glut of inferior parody movies on the market, X-Play has refused to lower the quality of their award-winning movies and will continue to produce nothing but the finest adult movies.
“I make no apologies for what I am about to say but I feel sorry for the customers that purchase lousy parody movies from other companies that have jumped on the bandwagon and put out an inferior product,” remarked X-Play’s reigning director of the year Will Ryder.
“It makes me sick to see this taking place but we absolutely refuse to cut production corners because the fans and critics will immediately know it and we owe it to them to produce the best movies we possibly can.”
Although many adult movie companies and directors are cashing in on the parody craze by creating low-level productions some without a script and shot in a single day X-Play continues to make high quality faithful recreations of the original subject matter often shot over 4 to 8 days time. The official website www.sitcums.com is loaded with many of the best movies of the genre including spoofs ranging from the wholesome Brady Bunch to the sexy Charlie’s Angels to the irreverent M*A*S*H.
“When you walk into a store it’s hard to tell which movies are of high quality just from looking at the box cover,” stated X-Play’s co-producer Scott David.
“In fact it’s impossible so people should look at the reviews because they tell a more accurate story of what is good and what sucks.”
Reviews and commentary by top critics can be found on a multitude of online locations including AVN, XFanz, XCritic.com, Adult DVD Empire, TLA Raw, RogReviews, Adult DVD Talk, Luke is Back, Adult Movies Today, NightMoves Magazine, Dr. Jay, Porn Valley Vantage, Dirty Bob, Hustler Magazine, Genesis Magazine, Cheri Magazine, Tod-Hunter.net and many others and they paint a clear picture of who is making the best movies.
The critics know what’s good. They actually take the time and put in the effort to really watch the movies and often write detailed reports.
“We could shoot our movies in one day and make them cheap but then we’d be like most everybody else,” Ryder lamented. In fact Ryder had quite possibly his best directing year ever with movies that ran the gamut from brilliant parody comedies such as Not Married with Children XXX 2, the clever Not M*A*S*H XXX to the loveable spoof of The Flintstones a XXX Parody which Ryder directed for New Sensations.
In the face of tremendous competition some good but mostly bad, X-Play has decided to sacrifice higher profits by continuing to shoot longer hours, build better sets, tell more involved stories, spend more money on wardrobe and go the distance when most others take the easy way out.
Next up on the production schedule is Not Rocky XXX which will be the ultimate thriller.
“It’s not how many movies you make it’s how well you make them,” Ryder concluded.
As I found in my recent turn in the director’s chair, and am not ashamed to admit, decades of mass-market American pornography have created an environment in which sex often directs itself. On any set I’ve visited, it is the dialogue that most often causes tears and turmoil among the cast. Next time you see me, ask me about the actress who pronounced “Clitoris” as if it rhymed with the first name of Mr. B.I.G.
And next time you see Will Ryder, ask him about the artistic decision to show Fred’s shoulder imagine his own daughter having sex.
But porn movies are sex movies, we shouldn’t forget, so if you get the sex right in a porn movie, you’ve done OK.
So we can credit the performers for some really strong sex in “The Flintstones” parody, production designer Scott David for the Fred-mobile and Wilma’s string of pearls, and reigning director of the year Will Ryder for the laugh track.
- Buy “The Flintstones—A XXX Parody” here
Previously on Porn Valley Observed: Not Charlie’s Angels XXX—not enough cocaine; “Porn & Philosophy”—The Myth of the Gape
See also: New Sensations, Sitcums
I’m sure this is well-crafted and all but I can’t imagine it can touch “The Flintbones” a stone-cold classic (pun half-intended) from the early 90s with Lorrin Mick as a smoking-hot Betty Rubble (she also gets it on with Wilma) and Ron fuckin’ Jeremy as Fred (and Fred gets more than bronto burgers in this one).
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