Pure

Studio: Evil Angel
Director: David Aaron Clark
Cast: Asa Akira, Keni Styles, Jessica Bangkok, Lana Violet, Destiny, Mr. Marcus, Jake Malone, Valentino

It starts innocently enough. Sada (the beautiful Asa Akira) begins an innocuous flirtation with her castrating boss’s husband, Kichi (Keni Styles). What knew Sada would get a taste for it herself?

David Aaron Clark’s first movie for Evil Angel is an exquisite piece of pornography. Based on the true story of Sada Abe, “Pure” updates the subject matter of 1976′s “In the Realm of the Senses” to contemporary Los Angeles where, instead of working as a maid in a 1930′s Tokyo hotel, Sada is the receptionist at Asian-run BDSM dungeon Realm.

Sada and Kichi soon grow fond of one another and have the sort of sex-filled honeymoon one might want performers in a porn movie to have. But Sada is a little obsessive and Kichi is a little fickle; there is potential poverty involved if he doesn’t go back to his wife, and Sada believes her and Kichi’s relationship is finite.

Back at the Realm we meet the dommes, played by Lana Violet, Jessica Bangkok, and Destiny. Each to her credit has her own thing going on, and we are able to view them as separate characters. Still, they seem to have Mr. Marcus caged 24/7, playing a rapper who is guilty about his success.

Styles is an up and coming British Asian porn star, which is doubly rare. Added to this exclusivity is the fact that he is an excellent actor. His presence – despite what happens – might make “Pure” Clark’s first ever couples’-friendly movie.

But Clark never bogarts the creeps. In “Pure” there are two old-tymey porn staples in the persons of the reptilian businessman Pasquale (Valentino) and Sada’s former professor, played by Jake Malone. Malone, in exchange for Sada’s services, provides a cash infusion so that Sada and Kicki can continue playing house.

“Pure” is a very slow burn, and seems to get more compelling, sexy, and visually beautiful toward the end, with earlier scenes seeming ponderous. That said, in addition to just about everything in the movie being a niche or a fetish (leather nuns, asphyxiation, interracial sex, blowjobs while smoking, British Asian guys), “Pure” is the rare porn movie that makes us empathize with the characters.

Equal billing in “Pure” should go to the city of Los Angeles, particularly the corridor from downtown and Chinatown to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. There is not a pool or palm tree in sight in this movie, as if the city got its junk cut off, too.

Previously on Porn Valley Observed: In the realm of the hot, stab-happy Asians

Portions of this review also appeared on Fleshbot

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