The Golden Age of Porn and How It Changed The Adult Industry
At the end of summer of love, in 1969, America went through a period of transformation, which changed the entire world. We all know that the 60s were a time of sexual liberation, gender equality and freedom of speech. But that extended at the end of the decade into the adult world.
Before 1969, pornography was getting a stink eye. Pornographers were considered scums of society and in most of the world it was completely illegal. Although directors were making pornographic movies and photographers were shooting sex scenes, although there were lots of adult magazines and underground cinemas projecting XXX movies, there was no real adult industry because society wouldn’t allow it.
But soon, that was about to change, and who would have though that the famous rock-star of the visual arts, Andy Warhol, was going to bring an end to sexuality oppression. I’m saying that because it was Andy Warhol and his Blue Movie that marked the beginning of the Golden Age of Porn.
What Was The Golden Age Of Porn?
The Golden Age Of Porn is considered to be the period between 1969 and 1984 in which pornography emerged from underground and found a place in the entertainment business of America. Andy Warhol’s Blue Movie (1969) and the movie Mona (1970) of Bill Osco were the first erotic films to be screened in movie theaters across America. These movies are not porn, they are real movies, but they feature explicit sex content, which was illegal to be streamed or broadcast public before 1969.
Blue Movie had a message against the Vietnam War, but it didn’t have a plot. It’s just an artsy shot in a bohemian New York apartment, featuring mundane tasks and unstimulated sex.
Mona on the other-hand, has a story about female sexual liberation, in which the burning desire for sex of Mona, a young girl who promised to keep herself for marriage is going through a series of oral adventures with her fiancé, a prostitute, and even strangers in a movie theater, which ends up with an orgy after she confesses all her promiscuity to her mother.
Other important movies of this era were Deep-Throat (1972) and The Devil In Miss Jones (1973), written and directed by Gerard Damiano. His movies were a total box office success, with Deep Throat making $4.6 million and The Devil In Miss Jones earning no less than $7.7 million, almost as much as a James Bond movie launched in the same period.
What Changed?
The thing that really changed porn was the law. It was illegal in many states to produce and distribute obscene materials, which made the profit almost impossible. Efforts to bring adult entertainment out of the grey area were made previous to 1969, without too much success. The movies we talked about previously helped change the public opinion on the matter. Magazines were talking about them, radio DJs were talking, even late-night shows had pieces on the TV about the new erotica cinematography. And a change in public opinion always has an echo.
What really changed the porn world was the 1973 Miller vs. California decision, which redefined the law on obscenity. I’m not a law expert, but from what I know, I can tell you that the directors were allowed to shoot sex from then on and they were allowed to sell it to the public or stream it.
This decision made it possible to turn a profit out of the work put in pornography. And that profit drew other directors and producers into the world of adult entertainment.