LOS ANGELES — The release of a new movie, “Hardcore Guaranteed,” offers a revealing look at Britain’s hardcore porn scene.
“Hardcore Guaranteed” is the biographical documentary of Michael J. Freeman, a pornographer, artist, activist and murderer. The film chronicles a pioneering career from the 1960s through 1990s, highlighting his relatively unknown role in the development of the British porn business.
During the 1960s Michael Freeman started selling his pornographic photographs and 8mm films to the Soho sex shops. His anarchic and entrepreneurial spirit found him unwittingly becoming instrumental in the inception of British hardcore pornography, producing sexually explicit films. This heralded the beginning of a fierce conflict with the corrupt Metropolitan Police and the gangland criminals who controlled the dirty square mile, which resulted in murder.
In 1969 Freeman was convicted of murdering Kray firm associate Gerald Hawley in a frenzied attack. Hawley, described by Richardson gang member ‘Mad’ Frankie Fraser as “a real hard man, one of those that can take a car door off with his hands,” was left in Epping forest with 89 stab wounds. Freeman received a life sentence for the crime and was released under life license 10 years later.
In the 1980s Freeman became the first person in the U.K. to film and distribute hardcore pornography on the video label Videx. He was arrested repeatedly for breaking obscenity laws due, including an 18-month sentence for selling hardcore gay pornography.
“I’m not gay but I thought I’d try making gay films,” Freeman explained. “They sold like hot cakes because everyone else was scared to make them.”
The film includes unique interviews with Freeman’s associates, academics, journalists and his defense solicitor. This includes infamous British pornographer Lindsay Honey aka “Ben Dover,” who began his career as a model for Freeman, and celebrated sexual equality activist, founder of the Sex Maniacs Ball, and the Outsiders charity Dr. Tuppy Owens.
The film was first screened in Soho March 27, 2019, to critical acclaim. According to the film’s researcher, Dr. Oliver Carter, “we wanted to give as truthful account of this untold, clandestine history, drawing on unopened police files and other forgotten archival material.”
“When I first discovered Mike’s story I believed it to be a work of fiction, yet to my astonishment it was actually true,” director Simon Fletcher said. “Freeman was a pioneer who blazed a trail that led to some of the modern, liberal freedoms we enjoy now.”
“Hardcore Guaranteed” is now available to rent or buy through Amazon Prime’s streaming service.
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