Elizabeth Canning, Marek Waldorf, Victor of Aquitaine
WRITTEN, DIRECTED & PRODUCED BY
Jon Moritsugu
DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY Jacques Boyreau
EDITOR Jon Moritsugu
COSTUMES Elizabeth Canning
SOUND RECORDIST Terri Brown
MUSIC BY
Unrest, Unsane, Superchunk, Medicine Ball, Cop Shoot Cop, Railroad Jerk, Red Bliss, Barbara Manning, Dustdevils, Jim Sauter, Don Dietrich & Thurston Moore
HIPPY PORN was shot in 16mm b/w reversal in San Francisco, Fall 1990.
LOS ANGELES TIMES, Kevin Thomas, 5-22-1991
For those who really get into smart-ass, black-and-white films about disaffected kids with cool hair, Moritsugu’s look at artschool-cum-nihilism is a treat… Following in the tradition of other rough-edged “music” films like Mondo Trasho or Repo Man, the soundtrack to Hippy Porn does as much to articulate what’s going on as the grainy visuals. The other thing that Hippy Porn has got going for it is Elizabeth Canning, the sulky, sultry actress who plays the main character, “L.” With her voluptuous face and figure, Canning has the cruel looks of a Russ Meyer vixen and the deadpan voice of an Andy Warhol star.
THE SAN FRANCISCO BAY GUARDIAN, Heather Mackey, 4-10-1991
A punked-out, pseudo-intellectual, low-budget flick… funky, self-consciously hip.
THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER, Jeff Menell, 6-28-1991
Funny… an enjoyable satire.
VARIETY, 7-1-1991
Strikes all the right campy notes.
VILLAGE VOICE, David D. Kim, 7-1991
Transcendent moments – moments of humor, of insight, of pleasure, of distinction… being young and pretentious has rarely looked this good
THE AUSTIN CHRONICLE, Marjorie Baumgarten, 3-20-1992
Jon Moritsugu is Dennis Hopper (of the EASY RIDER and THE LAST MOVIE period) gone post punk. He cannibalizes Hopper’s flash flame techniques and non-linear interventions to energize the dead weight of the narrative lull, thereby substituting a sixty’s hippy sensibility with a punk abandon… HIPPY PORN is Godard’s WEEKEND remade by Warhol’s Factory, a road movie about the End of the Road. The pure Beauty of Decay.
PURPLE PROSE (Paris), Roddy Bogawa, 1993
Action Christine Cinema, Paris (one-year run)
University of Paris
Chicago Film Center
Roxie Theater, San Francisco
Downtown Independent, LA
Northwest Film Forum, Seattle
Lausanne Underground Film Festival, Switzerland
Asian American International Film Festival, NYC
LACE, Los Angeles
Eye Gallery, San Francisco
Anthology Film Archives, NYC
Dobie Theater, Austin (one-week run)
Coolidge Corner Theater, Boston
La Val’s Pizza, Berkeley
HIPPY PORN was picked up for European distribution in 1993 w/ Allison Anders’ GAS, FOOD, LODGING, Alex Cox’s HIGHWAY PATROLMAN, Jon Josts’ SURE FIRE, and PJ Castellaneta’s TOGETHER ALONE. All five movies were released simultaneous in France as examples of the “West Coast American New Wave.” HIPPY PORN subsequently played at the ACTION CHRISTINE CINEMA (Paris) for over one year. It also screened extensively in BELGIUM and SWITZERLAND, where it was later released on television.
