LOS ANGELES — A new movie about life in the porn business will soon hit a screen near you, but instead of focusing on the typical mainstream narrative — “good girl makes bad choices and now look what happened” — “Mope” is a dark drama that looks at the many men who dream of porn stardom and banging hot chicks for pay.
"Mope," a slang term for entry-level male talent, is Lucas Heyne’s debut feature, which recently received acclaim at Sundance and the Sitges Film Festival in Spain. It was produced by Parkside Pictures, Saxton Cinema and Uncooperative Pictures, with distribution by Vanishing Angle and XYZ.
On the surface, the film follows a pair of starry-eyed young men who envision a bright career for themselves as porn performers — without realizing how underappreciated no-name male talent is when it comes to sexual stardom. Under the surface, it tells a more chilling tale based on an actual decade-old machete attack that ended in murder and suicide.
“Mope” depicts wannabe porn star Stephen Hill (played by Nathan Stewart-Jarrett) and his best friend Tom Dong (played by Kelly Sry) as they attempt to make a name for themselves in an industry that won’t take them seriously.
Character actor David Arquette is featured in the role of Rocket, a top director the men admire.
Things didn’t turn out as planned, however, so when the manager of the adult studio that employed Hill, in exchange for a place to sleep at night, decides to evict him, Hill responds by taking up a sharpened porn-prop machete and going on the offense, surprising the studio manager with a devastating series of slashes and then killing his friend.
“Throughout the process, I became very close with all the surviving people involved in this story,” Heyne said. “They provided me a window into a world not many people know about. And I felt it vital to portray this story in the most realistic and frank manner possible.”
“‘Mope’ is such a carefully crafted project from conception through execution,” said Benjamin Wiessner, Vanishing Angle’s VP of sales and acquisitions. “The detailed attention creates an incisive vision of America’s broken promises we know will entertain and astound audiences.”
The movie has not yet been released, so we can only hope that the filmmakers don't succumb to typical “porn gigolo” stereotypes in their depictions and avoid gratuitous porn shaming for the sake of sales. But we won’t count on such level-ground treatment from a film where the trailer features the line, “You know how I know you’re a mope? Because you don’t know you’re a mope.”
A full account of the actual case can be found here.
The trailer for “Mope” is available here.
