PARIS — Eva Elfie’s personal journey and her rise as video creator to the upper echelons of Pornhub stardom are the subjects of new documentary “Artem & Eva,” currently being shown at international film festivals.
Directed by Evgeny Milykh, the film is a French, Estonian and Georgian co-production structured around the performer and creator’s relationship with her high school boyfriend — and later husband — Artem, during her transition from being Yulia to becoming Eva.
“Artem loves Yulia, and Yulia loves Artem,” reads the film promotional blurb. “They recently graduated from high school, moved to Moscow, and began their independent lives. Looking for ways to earn money in an expensive city and spurred on by Artem, they start to shoot homemade porn. Yulia becomes ‘Eva Elfie,’ an international porn star. Their sudden popularity becomes a trap for the young couple’s stability. How does this unexpected trajectory change the course of their lives and their relationship?”
“Artem & Eva” is described as a coming-of-age romance exploring the couple’s “hopes and doubts, their deepening desire to achieve the American Dream, and issues of their generation.”
A Film About Love
Speaking exclusively to XBIZ, Elfie — previously the subject of a 2021 profile on her unexpected rise to Pornhub’s top ten — said she watched the film twice already.
“First the director showed it to me before the premiere, about nine months ago,” Elfie explained. “The second time, I watched it at the Paris premiere in the theater with my friends, the crew, the producers and the director. I was surprised that a lot of French people came to see it, as it is a movie in Russian with French subtitles.
“To be honest,” she added, “I cried a few times, because I saw our wedding, and our problems in our relationship. It was emotional for me. Of course, I also felt cringe sometimes, and I was ashamed of some moments from the past.”
Milykh originally contacted Elfie via Instagram and started shooting the couple in 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic.
“He filmed us for a year and a half,” Elfie said. “He came to live with us to shoot our everyday lives, visited porn shoots with us and even came to our parents’ houses.”
Initially intending to make a documentary about the Russian porn industry, Milykh shot several performers and creators, but after meeting Elfie and her partner, he made the decision to focus the film on them.
“Artem & Eve is not really about porn,” Elfie said, “but about love and about us as a couple, and how relationships can be built within the porn industry.”
Elfie praised the film for its revealing look at the challenges male talent face in the industry, and at how professional production works in Russia and Europe.
“I think those who watch ‘Artem & Eve’ will be able to see that porn performers are normal people, and not unrelatable ‘superstars,’” she concluded.
