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Interview with Jürgen Brüning und Walter Crasshole
How did things start with the Porn Film Festival Berlin?
Walter Crasshole: Jürgen will have to answer this. This is Juergen Brüning, the founder of the Porn Film Festival Berlin. And Jürgen founded it – How long ago? In 2006? 19 years ago.
Jürgen Brüning: I think so. You’re right. Honey, you’re very right. This is my best buddy, Walter, one of the curators of the Porn Film Festival Berlin.
Ich hab das Festival 2006 gestartet. Einfach aus dem Grund, weil ich Filme mit Bruce LaBruce gemacht habe, die explizit waren. Und dann haben die Leute immer diskutiert “ist das Pornografie oder ist das Kunst?” Und ich war so genervt, und dann haben wir gesagt, wir wollen selber mal einen Porno drehen und dann haben wir angefangen Pornos zu drehen. Und dann haben wir auch mitgekriegt, wie das damals in der Pornoindustrie lief, in den 1990er Jahren. Und irgendwann habe ich gedacht, das muss man einfach mal zusammen bringen. Und ich fand das damals ja auch schon furchtbar nervig, dass Porno dieses Image hatte, “das ist entwürdigend für Frauen”, “Das ist alles so stereotyp”…
I started the festival in 2006. Simply because I made films with Bruce LaBruce that were explicit. And then people were always discussing “is that pornography or is that art?” And I was so annoyed. And then we said we wanted to make our own porn and then we started making porn. And then we also realized what was going on in the porn industry back then, in the 1990s. And at some point I thought we simply had to bring it together. And I found it terribly annoying back then that porn had this image of “it’s degrading for women”, “it’s all so stereotypical”…
Dann dacht ich mir “machst Du ein Pornofestival” und das habe ich dann 2006 gemacht. Und das war von Anfang sehr erfolgreich in dem Sinne, dass Leute Interesse hatten. Und was das Schöne für mich persönlich ist: dass das Porn Film Festival auch dazu beigetragen hat, dass ganz viele Menschen sich entschlossen haben selber was zu machen und ihre eigenen sexuellen Phantasien in Filmen umzusetzen. Und das bedeuted natürlich auch, dass es viel diverser wurde, was heute die Leute Post-Porn, Feminist Porn, Alternative Porn nennen. Und das finde ich schön.
Then I thought to myself “do a porn festival” and that’s what I did in 2006. And it was very successful right from the start in the sense that people were interested. And the great thing for me personally is that the Porn Film Festival also helped a lot of people to decide to do something themselves and realize their own sexual fantasies in films. And of course that also meant that it became much more diverse, what people now call post-porn, feminist porn, alternative porn. And I think that’s nice.
Walter Crasshole: I just want to add to that, what I also admired about the Porn Film Festival from the beginning is that: In many sexual worlds everything’s divided. Gays only go to gay and lesbians only go to lesbian and straights to straight. And the festival itself was never a gay porn festival or never a lesbian festival. You told me once you made a conscious decision that this would also include so-called straights or whatever porn in it. It functions, it succeeded very well.
Jürgen Brüning: And what I would have to add is: over the years also the content changed. It became more diverse. And then at a certain point it started with gender fluidity and with non-binary. So you don’t have these labels anymore. We had discussions like ten years ago: Does anybody want to have labels or how should we label the films. And now we ask people how they want to be addressed by pronoun or so, to be really careful to address people correctly. So and this is also, for me, an outcome of this and that I learned a lot for myself, too.
What are your criteria towards the curation?
Walter Crasshole: Well, the first thing is: good film, I would say. That’s what we put a premium on more than anything else. Of course, the content has to be about sexuality or gender. But the top marker there is a good film we’d rather not show something than to show something that’s shit.
Jürgen Brüning: But then I have a question: How do you find what is a good film? For me, it’s like this: I had worked for other festivals and still work for other festivals, and I have been working in cinema, so I did curation for a long time. And for me, it’s always a subjective selection. The film has to resonate with me. And I don’t expect that the film resonates with everybody, because then you have a Hollywood stereotypical film. And it doesn’t need to resonate with everybody when it resonates with me. And sometimes even when it doesn’t resonate with me, that there are aspects: It looks to me very interesting. Or it is so strange that I want to even talk to the filmmaker to know more about why did they do this, or so and understand. But I think, I only can say it’s a very subjective selection.
Walter Crasshole: And we have a curatorial team of six people whose tastes are very different. Some of us are more into experimental, some of us like a more linear plot and so on and so we kind of get it all across the board. So yes, a good film is subjective, but we know what a good film is for each of ourselves.
Jürgen Brüning: And I also would say: We get a lot of short film submission, but with feature length films, these filmmakers don’t know about the Porn Film Festival. But because of my work, I see a lot of films, which I think they’re interesting. And for example documentaries which are not explicit, but they talk about body politics, gender politics or sex work. And I want to present these, too. The Porn Film Festival not only shows really explicit stuff, it deals with this issue of body and gender politics. All this stuff in all different kind of forms.
Where do you see the difference to so called mainstream-pornography?
Walter Crasshole: Are we talking about mainstream versus what here? Are we talking about post porn or so? One of our colleagues famously said that post porn is porn you can’t jerk off to. And a lot of our films aren’t necessarily straight up pornography either. So it’s hard to compare that, because when I hear mainstream-porn, I actually think of we have a ten minute scene of people begging and having sex, and someone got off to it and that’s it. But to compare that to our other films is a little bit difficult, because those other films aren’t necessarily explicit hardcore pornography all the time.
Jürgen Brüning: I wouldn’t say, and Paulita said that there is no “bad porn” because mainstream-porn is perceived as “bad porn”. And I wouldn’t say that mainstream is bad. Mainstream-porn is like Hollywood films. They present more stereotypical representation of fantasies in more stereotypical gender roles. But this is changing, too. In the beginning, when I started the Porn Film Festival, there was not so much alternative stuff. So I showed a lot of mainstream-porn, also to have the opportunity that people can watch these films in public with other people and then talk about it. For example, say “okay, this I don’t like or this doesn’t represent me.”, “I would like to have a different kind of representation of my fantasies, my bodies and whatever, my fetishes or so”. But that enables these people really to talk about it and said, “no, no, this is not really for me.”
But I remember the first time, the first year what I did, because it’s this cliché that pornography is made by all these stupid old white men. So I tried to get female filmmakers, female read people, into the first festival. So I invited to Erika Lust, Ovidie, Jennifer Lynn Bell, Petra Joy, these were women who made porn in the beginning of 2000s. And we had a panel discussion with all five female filmmakers. And then in the audience, there were a lot of female read people. And, they said “oh, we hate when men are jerking off in the face of women, this is degrading to women.” And then Erika said, “I’m sorry, but, I am doing films which represent my sexual fantasies. And in my sexual fantasies, I like that men are jerking off in the face of a woman. So that’s one of my sexual fantasies. So don’t dictate to me what I have to shoot.” And some don’t like it. But the good thing now is, because it’s getting more diverse, that, for example, in independent porn and even in mainstream now, I think it’s not so important that the money shot goes into the face of the woman or that penetration doesn’t mean that it always has to be the dick in the pussy. There’s totally different types of penetration. So it’s a development.
Walter Crasshole: All of this develops quite naturally alongside each other too. Because starting in 2006, you mentioned mainstream and there wasn’t so much alternative porn. Right about the time that you started the Porn Film Festival was when alternative porn was actually also really blooming. I think a lot of young people had access to digital editing. They knew they would learn how to build websites on their own. They weren’t even going to college for it. And you had things like, Courtney Trouble or something. Just making different body type porn. And this was never going to make her a million dollars. But now it’s really like a serendipitous time thing, like this festival started, these conversations were happening and they were also happening outside. So it was kind of a good way to bring the conversations to one place.
Jürgen Brüning: And I think, I was lucky because, in 1995 we started doing gay porn in Berlin, and it was the right time because a lot of the gay community wanted to expose their sexuality and front of the camera. And it was the same thing with the Porn Film Festival. That, as what Walter said: There were a lot of young people thinking of doing something different, and then the Porn Film Festival gave them a place where they could show it actually, and talk with other people about it.
Walter Crasshole: Yeah, it wasn’t just private conversations on an internet forum in totally separated channels. They got to meet in one place and exchange ideas. Even if they weren’t making the same kind of porn or porn for the same people at all.
Jürgen Brüning: When I started, then, a person in Athens, in Greece, the next year started a porn film festival there. And then one started in Madrid and there was another one, but they didn’t last so long, and it took another ten years. And now we have like at least 20 porn film festivals. So it took another ten years that really people were able also to do a great porn film festival in Warsaw, which is very important. So I think and that’s also came out of all this.
Walter Crasshole: Yeah. I think Berlin is also a special place to do it. We could start out ten years before it was acceptable. I don’t think people in Vienna would have just entertained this idea so early because how possible would it be? Berlin is a special place.
Jürgen Brüning: The most important was: I was very well connected in the film scene. I had my own cinema for a while, and I know all the cinema people. So the most important was to have a cinema where we could do this. And when I asked around everybody in Berlin, every cinema, the people said “oh yeah, you can do the porn film festival here.”
And for example, there was a porn film festival then in Paris, and it was done by Helene Bossier at that time. But Helene told me that Helene had difficulties to find the cinema because there were special laws. When you show pornography, you have to pay higher taxes, so there are all these different problems in the countries, because every country deals with their laws differently towards pornography. In Germany pornography is legal. You can watch it when you’re over 18, but you cannot show it on the internet. In other countries it’s totally different. And for example in England you cannot show certain kind of sexual practices in porn, because this is illegal, like watersports or face sitting and all this stuff. But for me it was very easy to do and I was very happy.
You told about the other festivals developing. How is the networking between the festivals?
Walter Crasshole: Unterscheidlich
Jürgen Brüning: Ja, Unterschiedlich.
Walter Crasshole: For example, with the Warsaw Festival: We’ve been very well connected. I mean, they had come to the Berlin Porn Film Festival a few times and then they had told us a year in advance that they were going to do this. And we came the first year, we came the second year and we’re now here the third year. So something like Warsaw, yes, but not all of them. It’s it really depends.
Jürgen Brüning: People were coming to us and saying all “we want to do a porn film festival there or there.” And I said “okay, you do it, but, you have to do it by yourself because you know your cultural context. I don’t know it. We can help you with contacts to filmmakers, that you have a program, but how you do it and how you presented it – It’s your own thing.” And what I did is, when there were more and more porn film festivals were popping up, I wrote an email to all the festivals and said “can you tell me your contacts and the dates when you are supposed to do the festival? So we will put it on our website so that we have a list of porn film festivals on the Berlin Porn Film Festival website, where people can see which porn film festivals are going on.” But this doesn’t mean that everybody is connected. We know a lot of people, because a lot of these programmers from the other festivals come to Berlin. And then we meet, of course. And what we do is, for example, we asked other festivals to put a program together, like a Polish program or an Austrian program, a Greek program, like Nikola from Excentrico Festival in Chile to put a Chilean program together. But personally I think they should be a little bit more connected.
Walter Crasshole: they could.
Jürgen Brüning: And when I hear it now, with Aga and Zwirek, who are doing the festival here, and I heard that the Aga is a little bit worried that there isn’t enough money coming in to cover all the costs. I think, what I would like to do is: writing to all the other festivals and say “we have to support each other and the festival which have more money or more access to money should support the more poor festivals.”
How do you finance the festival?
Jürgen Brüning: For me, it was always like this: In Germany, the law is you cannot get public funding for something which is connected to pornography. It’s in the film funding law that they cannot fund pornographic film or a pornographic festival. And it was my conscious decision to call it a Porn Film Festival. I could have called it Erotic Film Festival, but I wanted to call it Porn Film Festival, because I knew that I get more attention when I call it Porn Film Festival. And it was my conscious decision that I didn’t apply for public funding. I thought I need to have some sponsors from the adult film industry. And because of my work with gay porn I knew people in the porn industry. And from the beginning we had sponsors like Beate Uhse TV and Erotic Lounge. And then I said we have to sell so many tickets that it covers. I didn’t want to make profit with the festival. And luckily it always worked that the festival broke even, made enough money to cover all the costs. And, of course, in the beginning, I couldn’t pay people. So a lot of people who helped me did it for volunteer work. But, of course, some things, like the person who did the catalog, I had to pay, they wouldn’t do it for free. And then over the years, we had more ticket sales. And luckily, the last ten years at least, we had so many ticket sales that everything is covered and some years ago we started that everybody who works for the festival gets a salary. It’s not a very high salary, but everybody gets the same amount paid. And I wanted to be very open about it, so everybody knows what everybody gets. So that it’s very transparent and that it’s equal pay, since like five years, we are paying people. It’s not big, but it works.
How do you think did the porn or post-porn scene change in the last 10 years?
Jürgen Brüning: It became bigger and bigger. And what happened also is: People, started making maybe one film, but then they were thinking: “Okay, we want to do more.” And they were trying also to make some money with their films. When I started in 2006, the internet for alternative porn was not very big. There were no websites or streaming sites. It developed, like pink-label TV in America, so people had the possibilities to present their alternative porn outside the mainstream channels. But they also figured out: it’s a lot of work to do. And we are in a capitalistic society, and bigger companies eat up the smaller companies, or they have more money to promote their websites and for one single alternative porn-maker, it is really hard to promote their own work that people get to know about it. But it changed, because of this amateur porn: You have websites where people then started to film themselves and it got very trendy. You have OnlyFans, for example, which they use now.
Walter Crasshole: Some movement there.
Jürgen Brüning: …to make some money and show their work. This has developed a little bit that alternative people also wanted to become commercial and make money with their product. And the most successful alternative filmmaker is Erika Lust. Erika Lust is now the biggest what you would call feminist porn streaming website. But it’s the commercial site. They do it because they want to make money. This is fine for me. So, I think I cannot say to everybody you should keep ethical standards. You should fairly pay all the people. But I hope people will do it. And what I hear is that they are doing it. And when I hear that don’t then people talk about it and then they get problems.
What do you think is the influence of the festivals towards the filmmakers?
Walter Crasshole: It’s a place to discuss your films and your fantasies and your sexuality, which invariably influences people to create new films and create new art. I think it’s just a large conversation that continually pushes the boundaries.
Jürgen Brüning: Since ten years to Berlin, a lot of filmmakers are coming and they’re meeting and they’re seeing the works of other people, which I think is a learning thing, an inspirational thing to see other people’s ideas and also to connect. And what they do is: they film with each other. This is a big thing because when you are a little small entity, and you are doing films, you need people. You need people in front of the camera, you need people behind the camera. So there’s an opportunity for us. And sometimes it’s a little bit bad because nowadays they’re so busy to attend their screening because they’re shooting another scene just in the afternoon. And we say “can you come to your Q and A, please?” “No I’m busy with shooting with Aorta Films a new scene”. But I think it’s fine.
Walter Crasshole: We spend a significant chunk of energy chasing down filmmakers.
Jürgen Brüning: And then the next year you see the films they shot while they were in Berlin the year before.
Walter Crasshole: “Berlin Porn Film Festival 2017 fuck tape” or whatever.
Jürgen Brüning: It’s really about networking, what is necessary for everything you want to do. You need a network of people with the same kind of ideas and thinking and then start supporting each other. And I think the filmmakers support each other.
Walter Crasshole: And it’s like this with any film festival, this just shows you that pornography is another genre film. But it’s much tougher because we only have the porn film festivals, to do this. We don’t have a million different indie and mainstream, etc. that’s welcoming to me.
Jürgen Brüning: Of course in the whole film world networking is very important. But luckily at a certain extent the Porn Film Festival is still so small that everybody knows each other and it’s not the same kind of competition you have in the real film world where everybody is fighting to get funding and so on. When we come here, we know most of the filmmakers and it’s really like to meet friends.
Walter Crasshole: It’s truly nonhierarchical and egalitarian. I mean it’s glamorous too, but it’s not like the Berlinale and everybody’s behind the red rope and you can’t get to the people that you need to talk to. They’re just sitting at the table next to you smoking a cigarette or whatever.
Jürgen Brüning: And for example in mainstream non-porn productions now since some years that you have intimacy coordinators. When I did porn, started porn, it was always clear that you have to do ethical stuff, that you have to respect the borders of people what they want to do or what they don’t want to do. And this was always clear to be discussed and talked about before and taken care for and these things. So for me this is very obvious. And this is a little bit different in the real film world.