Because not everyone is into pornography these days, the women behind Good for Her, founders of the Feminist Porn Awards, have launched a softer, artier but no less sexy event: the Toronto International Sex and the Erotic Film Festival.
Spanning two days, the festival features programming that includes movies dealing with relationships, sexuality and the act itself. Press-on nails, overdubbed moans and delivery boys have been removed from the equation.
I ask Jennifer DePoe, Good for Her store manager and director of the Feminist Porn Awards, why a new festival was being created.
“Because sex is awesome, but not everybody likes porn,” she says. “Carlyle [Jansen, founder of Good for Her] just returned from a Berlin porn festival where very few mainstream porn movies were screened. It was a festival about sexuality and a real conversation about what real sex is. She wanted to bring that conversation to Toronto.”
The Sex and the Erotic Film Festival features films from Sweden, Denmark, Canada and the US. And it’s not too late to catch one of the festival headliners: Remedy, by New York director Cheyenne Picardo, screens Wednesday, April 2 at 7pm.
Remedy tells the true story of a New York woman who accepts a dare to become a dominatrix in the underground BDSM scene. Things get intense when she interviews at a dungeon and her true desires are tested and revealed. (If that sounds cryptic, it’s because it is — no one likes spoilers!)
After the festival ends, the ninth annual Feminist Porn Awards begin their programming, which culminates with a gala award ceremony Friday, April 4 at The Castlefield, 2492 Yonge St, at 8:30pm.
“The Feminist Porn Awards celebrate porn that is inclusive of everybody’s desires, while mainstream porn focuses on one kind of porn for one kind of audience,” DePoe explains. “For porn to meet the FPA criteria, it tends to be ethically made, it tends to display real pleasure, and it shows a diversity of bodies and sexualities. There’s something good for everyone.”
Tickets and more information at goodforher.com.
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