Tuesday, April 26, 2016

King Cobra (2016) Tribeca 2016

KING COBRA is a head scratcher. The true story of a murder in the gay porn industry, the film feels unfocused and pointless.

The film starts with a fresh "18" year old going to the home of Christian Slater who plays a gay porn producer for Cobra films. The kid quickly becomes a star and becomes the hottest name in porn.  Meanwhile we watch as James Franco and his lover try to make a living in the industry under the Viper name. As the fortunes rises and fall Slater's star has a falling out and when he refuses to let him jump ship he reveals that he was underage when he started. This sends things spiraling out as greed and jealousy results in murder.

The one question I was left after seeing this film was why are we being told this story? I'm not sure since the film focuses on so many people that by the time it ends we're not sure what we are supposed to feel. Worse the film focuses primarily on the Slater character while the more interesting one is the James Franco one.

What exactly are we supposed to get out of the film? I don't know since while there is copious amounts of sex it's not very good, nor graphic, and makes you wonder if the film would have been more interesting if it had been hardcore.

Looking like a cheap porn film made by one of the characters the imagery looks like trash which makes the whole film harder to like despite some excellent acting by several of the supporting players. Seriously the film looks like its a step above a home movie which while making the film feel sleazy doesn't make it any more compelling to watch.

I'm still trying to work out why this is in the Midnight section,  since it'snot really a genre film and the violence and crime only comes in at the end.

One of the least films at Tribeca

No comments:

Post a Comment