Orgone Cinema Erotica 002 Montreal Cinéma l'Amour

Finding pleasure in everything: Cinema Erotica comes to Cinéma l’Amour on Friday

The second edition of the erotic-film event promises “a celebration of love, sexuality and freedom,” with “drinks, dancing and spooky, sexy vibes.”

While some of us were wasting away on our couches during the pandemic, Ariana Molly and Veronika Yemelyanova made an erotic short film, Vain. They’d joke about screening the film at Cinéma l’Amour, and then, by chance, their dream became a reality. The first edition of Cinema Erotica was a film premiere and an erotically charged party. “We always screen the film between 11:30 and midnight,” explains Molly. “We close the doors, and no one can enter or leave. We create an incubated space, and it’s almost like being on a date and knowing that something like spicy is going to happen, and everyone’s just waiting with bated breath.”

On Sept. 30, Molly and Yemelyanova hope to recreate the magic of the first event. They will be screening the erotic short Orgone (NSFW trailer here) by Four Chambers (a U.K.-based pornographer), which features a score by Augustus Muller from Boy Harsher. The all-night party will feature DJ sets by Pulsum, Viperblond, D. Blavatsky and Kehdo. “It’s drinks, dancing and spooky, sexy vibes,” says Molly. 

While we currently live in an era where the pornification of culture has never been more heightened, mainstream porn tends to perpetuate the status quo. While the first event centred on a film made by Molly and Yemelyanova, making a film for each event was not realistic. As curators, they select the film and curate the series and have decided to expand into feature films and alternative erotica. In mounting an alternative vision, Molly hopes to expand the erotic imagination. “The best porn exists outside of PornHub, and the worst porn exists inside of it. No shade to PornHub… well, a little shade,” she laughs.  

Cinema Erotica
Cinema Erotica 001. Photo supplied by Ariana Molly

As the mainstream has co-opted eroticism, powerful underground movements have come to brush up against it. Rather than the industrial nature of mainstream sex films, there’s more room for experimentation and exploration outside the confines of the industry. “It only makes sense that artists are also creating the best pornography,” says Molly, “instead of through the lens of, ‘How do we get the money shot and get people from A to Z as soon as possible?’ [Artists] treat it as more of a journey and a process.” 

For Molly, integrating sex and art was a natural progression. “I’m somebody who leads my personal life under aesthetic principles,” she says. She links pleasure with aesthetics and models her life experience with almost gallery-level curation — everything from the apps on her phone to how she engages with social media. “Pleasure can be vilified or seen as dirty, something to be kept in a box,” she says. “I think of Kim Catrall, who famously made this statement, saying that she will forever live in pursuit of pleasure, and that resonated with me. So much of life is painful and brutal, so seeking pleasure in everything just makes sense to me.”

The Cinema Erotica events offer a chance to pursue and explore the radical politics of pleasure in a safe and open environment. This Friday also serves as a precursor for a more ambitious October event where Cinema Erotica will screen their first feature film, Peter Greenaway’s iconic The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover. As with the other events, it will feature a fantastic roster of queer and women DJs, including Frankie Teardrop, Syana, Overland and more. 

For those who didn’t attend the first event, Molly explained what they might expect. “It’s a celebration of love, sexuality and freedom. I think those are things people are actively craving, especially in ‘post-pandemic life.’” ■

For more information and to buy tickets, please click here

WARNING: NSFW

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