Blue Movie

''Blue Movie'' (also known as ''Fuck'' and ''F,k'') is a 1969 American erotic film written, produced and directed by Andy Warhol. It is the first adult erotic film depicting explicit sex to receive wide theatrical release in the United States, and is regarded as a seminal film in the Golden Age of Porn (1969–1984). The film stars Warhol superstars Viva and Louis Waldon.

''Blue Movie'' was released Elgin Theater in New York City on June 12, 1969, before the legalization of pornography in Denmark on July 1, 1969. The film helped inaugurate the " porno chic" phenomenon, in which porn was publicly discussed by celebrities (like Johnny Carson and Bob Hope) and taken seriously by film critics (like Roger Ebert), in modern American culture, and shortly thereafter, in many other countries throughout the world. According to Warhol, ''Blue Movie'' was a major influence in the making of '' Last Tango in Paris'' (1972), an internationally controversial erotic drama film starring Marlon Brando.

In 2016, ''Blue Movie'' was shown at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City.

Synopsis

The film includes dialogue about the Vietnam War, various mundane tasks and sexual intercourse, during a blissful afternoon in a New York City apartment (owned by art critic David Bourdon). The film was presented in the press as, "a film about the Vietnam War and what we can do about it." Warhol added, "the movie is about ... love, not destruction."

Cast

* Louis Waldon as Himself
* Viva as Herself

Production

Andy Warhol described making ''Blue Movie'' as follows: "I'd always wanted to do a movie that was pure fucking, nothing else, the way '' Eat'' had been just eating and ''Sleep'' had been just sleeping. So in October '68 I shot a movie of Viva having sex with Louis Waldon. I called it just ''Fuck''."

The film was supposedly filmed in a single three-hour session, with 30 minutes initially cut for the 140-minute version. The climactic section was shot in a 35-minute take. According to ''Variety'', the film has only 10 minutes of actual sex.

Warhol explained to Leticia Kent in an interview for '' Vogue'' magazine that the lack of a plot in his films was intentional:

Scripts bore me. It's much more exciting not to know what's going to happen. I don't think that plot is important. If you see a movie of two people talking, you can watch it over and over again without being bored. You get involved – you miss things – you come back to it ... But you can't see the same movie over again if it has a plot because you already know the ending ... Everyone is rich. Everyone is interesting. Years ago, people used to sit looking out of their windows at the street. Or on a park bench. They would stay for hours without being bored although nothing much was going on. ''This is my favorite theme in movie making'' – just watching something happening for two hours or so.

The film acquired a blue/green tint when Warhol utilized film stock that was meant for filming with tungsten lights, and the daylight coming through a large apartment window resulted in the film's middle reel turning blue. According to Wheeler Winston Dixon, a filmmaker and scholar who attended the first screening of the film at Warhol's Factory in the spring of 1969:

"When the film ended ... I heard Warhol asking someone plaintively "Why is the whole second reel all blue?" So I told him about 7242, 7241, and the need to use the proper filter to balance the color when you used indoor stock outdoors, or vice versa. "Ohhhhhhh," said Andy. Long pause. "Well, I guess we should call it ''Blue Movie''."

Release

The film had a benefit screening on June 12, 1969, at the Elgin Theater in New York City.

While it was initially shown at The Factory, ''Blue Movie'' was not presented to a wider audience until it opened at the New Andy Warhol Garrick Theater in New York City on July 21, 1969, with a running time of 105 minutes. On its opening day in New York, the film grossed a house record $3,050, with a total of $16,200 for the week. Warhol received 90% of the gross, which recovered the film's $3,000 cost quickly.

The film was also screened at the Berkeley Repertory Theatre in California.

Reception

''Variety'' reported that ''Blue Movie'' was the "first theatrical feature to actually depict intercourse".

Journalist Dennis Cipnic praised the movie and Warhol's filming technique in ''Infinity'', the magazine of the American Society of Magazine Photographers. "The sex in 'Blue Movie' is, in fact, quite charming and a great deal more artistic than the embarrassingly phony gropings of panting actors which predominate in most commercial films," he said. Critic John Huddy of the ''Miami Herald'', who didn't like the movie, wrote "Cipnic should win a Pulitzer Prize for comedy—the most elaborate, best sounding justification for utter slop I've ever read."

Viva, in Paris, finding that ''Blue Movie'' was getting much attention, said, "Timothy Leary loved it. Gene Youngblood n LA film criticdid too. He said I was better than Vanessa Redgrave and it was the first time a real movie star had made love on the screen. It was a real breakthrough."

Controversy

On July 31, 1969, the staff of the New Andy Warhol Garrick Theatre were arrested, and the film confiscated. In September 1969, a criminal court ruled that the film is "hardcore pornography" and the theater manager was fined $250. Afterwards, the manager said, "I don't think anyone was harmed by this movie ... I saw other pictures around town and this was a kiddie matinee compared to them." In reaction to the controversy, Warhol stated, "What's pornography anyway? ...The muscle magazines are called pornography, but they're really not. They teach you how to have good bodies ... ''Blue Movie'' was ''real''. But it wasn't done as pornography—it was done as an exercise, an experiment. But I really do think movies ''should'' arouse you, should get you excited about people, should be prurient." ote – in "view all"/"page 327" – from the book text, "In a final defence of his methods, which were used in ''Blue Movie'' for the last time, Andy told Leticia Kent, [in a ''Vogue'' interview..."]

Aftermath

In 1970, Warhol published ''Blue Movie'' in book form, with film dialogue and explicit stills, through Grove Press.

When '' Last Tango in Paris'', an internationally controversial erotic drama film directed by Bernardo Bertolucci and starring Marlon Brando, was released in 1972, Warhol considered ''Blue Movie'' to be its inspiration.

'' Mona the Virgin Nymph'', an erotic film depicting explicit sex, also received a mainstream theatrical release in the United States in 1970. Shortly thereafter, other adult films, such as ''Boys in the Sand'', '' Deep Throat'', ''Behind the Green Door'', ''The Devil in Miss Jones'', and ''The Opening of Misty Beethoven'' were released, continuing the Golden Age of Porn that began with ''Blue Movie''. In 1973, the phenomenon of porn being publicly discussed by celebrities (like Johnny Carson and Bob Hope) and taken seriously by film critics (like Roger Ebert), a development referred to by Ralph Blumenthal of ''The New York Times'' as " porno chic", began for the first time in modern American culture and later throughout the world.

Revival

In 2005, ''Blue Movie'' was publicly screened in New York City for the first time in over 30 years. In 2016, the film was shown at the Whitney Museum of American Art in Manhattan.

See also

* Andy Warhol filmography
* ''Kiss'' (1964)
* '' Blow Job'' (1964)
* Erotic films in the United States
* Golden Age of Porn
* Sex in film

References

Further reading

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* James, James (1989), "Andy Warhol: The Producer as Author", in ''Allegories of Cinema: American Film in the 1960s'' pp. 58–84. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
* Koch, Stephen (1974; 2002): ''Stargazer. The Life, World and Films of Andy Warhol''. London; updated reprint Marion Boyars, New York 2002, .
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External links

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Blue Movie
' at the National Galleries of Scotland

''Blue Movie'' stars – Warholstars
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Images: Blue Movie – Andy Warhol

Images: New Andy Warhol Garrick Theatre

{{Portal bar, 1960s, Film, Society, United States

1969 drama films
1969 films
1960s erotic drama films
1960s pornographic films
1969 controversies
American erotic drama films
American independent films
American pornographic films
Films directed by Andy Warhol
Films set in New York City
Obscenity controversies in film
Films shot in 16 mm film
1969 independent films
1960s English-language films
1960s American films
Sexual revolution
English-language independent films
English-language erotic drama films
Films shot in New York City