It's not always easy to direct gay porn -- particularly when the performers and crew members are being killed.
Archibald (Nicolas Maury) does his best, however, in this exclusive clip from Knife + Heart.
Directed by Yann Gonzalez, Knife + Heart is set in 1979 Paris, where a gay porn producer, Anne (Vanessa Paradis) -- heartbroken by a split from her girlfriend (Kate Moran) -- sets out to make a superior adult film with the help of Archibald. Unfortunately, a string of murders with a sex toy interferes with these plans.
According to Gonzalez, the film is meant to conjure the erotic but not the obscene in its portrayal of this place and time.
"It's first and foremost the portrait of a woman and it just so happens she produces porn films," Gonzalez said. "We kept all the imagery and the substance and had great fun with that but without showing the coarsest of images because to top it off, that's not what I retain from porn films of the period."
"I wanted to come back to a sort of innocence and naivete that you saw in the first porn films," Gonzalez added. "It was before AIDS came on the scene and there was an obvious enjoyment in playing together, and taking pleasure together and some films even mixed heterosexual and homosexual sex scenes."
Knife + Heart, evoking auteurs like Brian De Palma, is shot on 35mm and is playing at Landmark's Nuart Theatre in Los Angeles this weekend. Gonzalez, Moran, composer Anthony Gonzalez, and cowriter Cristiano Mangione will be present at the Friday screening for a special appearance.
Watch the trailer below.
