Castings 2: Sexy Starters Review

CASTINGS 2
Private
Directed by Pierre Woodman
Starring: Karina, Aliza, Kirsten, Barbara Doll, Veronica Bella, Pierre Woodman and others

The welcome conversion of Woodman's ever-intriguing Castings series to DVD continues apace with this second edition providing the historical perspective on more wannabe porn stars who placed themselves in front of Pierre's probing lens. Some of course, made it. Others, perhaps repelled by the ruthless Frenchman's intrusive questioning, merely flash their bodies for the camera in a fleeting dalliance with stardom and then return, one might say wisely, to the real world.

This series features a mixture of roughly-shot castings footage, hardcore scenes and Woodman's infamous initiations - I have said it before and will doubtless say it again, the quality is not all it should be, so be aware of that. Anyway, let's meet the girls…

Barbara Doll
Subsequently quite a star, Barbara appears here as a smiling 22-year-old secretary, eager to make it into the business. She has more of an idea of what is expected than most of the young things who wander, like Bambi in the headlights, into the glare of Woodman's inquisition. Barbara has already done one scene, and quite readily strips for Woodman, evidently proud, and rightly so, of her lovely body. She's blonde, pretty and confident, and her burgeoning talent is illustrated with a clumsily edited hardcore scene, of execrable picture quality, in which David Perry takes her and the superbly slim, leggy Lolita. Naturally both girls get their bottoms invaded and indulge in some girl-girl contact till Barbara takes David's cock from Lolita's ass and strokes him to climax.
Interview: Paris 1993. Sex scene: The Golden Triangle, Indonesia 1993

Veronica Bella
The English audio provides a dubbed translation over the original sound (I'd prefer subtitles) so I was slightly caught out at first when Veronica somehow speaks, in English, with a horrible drawling English accent clearly at odds with her Hungarian origins, an accent I initially thought was the overdub, but is in fact the unfortunate result of her work as an English translator. She also has a blunt, forthright manner that is, in combination with this incongruous accent, somewhat disconcerting. She speaks almost as though she's reading out her responses - she isn't, but it just seems odd. Sexually, she's experienced enough, can't take her eyes off the "fucking exciting" magazines she is given to look at, and has, despite some protestation to the contrary, a fair idea of what this business entails, and so she's hardly the little ingénue. She is, as you may be aware, quite an attractive brunette, and any prejudice aside, she looks pretty good naked!

It's interesting that Veronica only seems to have done a couple of magazine shoots for Private, no more videos, and made her name in movies for other people, particularly in Italy and reputedly in somewhat controversial circumstances, one might say! This may be related to her uncharacteristically shy confession about having a lesbian fantasy. A couple of "backstage" views of photo shoots in progress are of more academic than erotic interest, and the resulting photos are supplied among the extras.
Interview: Spain, March 1994. Photoshoots: Private 125, Sex 04.

Inga
A quite amazing transformation has taken place by the time Inga is seen in action during a photo shoot where she happily has sex with four of Europe's worst dressed men. All dolled up, blue eyes sparkling, smiling for the camera as she takes their come on her face. Again, this perhaps has limited erotic appeal, but is quite captivating. It was hard to imagine the pretty but most ordinary girl (who Woodman insultingly claims has a prominent nose - possibly true, but being fat, hairy and sweaty never stopped Pierre from putting himself on screen) performing such dirty deeds with such ease. The tall, slender Russian shop assistant is so shy she covers herself up after stripping for him, and is quite reserved in answering his standard questions. But in the end, there she is, taking it all ways and perfectly illustrating the magic of Private, a magic, and I am beginning to understand why, some people feel has long since been allowed to disappear.
Interview: Moscow, May 1994. Photoshoot: Pirate 28.

Kirsten
Plain but pretty English brunette Kirsten is eighteen and has been travelling to broaden her experience. She has a pleasant easy manner about her, and is quite relaxed about Woodman's questioning, willingly revealing the details of her relatively experienced sex life, though she often finds it hard to figure what he's on about! She reveals a trim, slim body with nice boobs, and before you know it she's into a potentially fearsome initiation at the hands of "workmen" Le Castel, Versace and Perry, in which she readily performs the anal (and DP) that in interview she professed to dislike, or more accurately hadn't tried. I am not sure if her stated dislike for come in her mouth has anything to do with the fact that most of the guys' ejaculate ends up on each other's penises in various ways, rather than on this game young woman.
Interview: England, November 1994. Sex scene: Triple X Video 1, England 1994.

Aliza
No sooner has blonde Russian Aliza, an attractive and much more glamorous, for want of a better word, girl than most of Woodman's prey, started to flip through some Private magazines in her interview, than a message appears onscreen stating that a battery breakdown prevented Woodman completing the casting - I often wondered how frequently this sort of thing happens, but why bother including it - and that she was strongly opposed to doing adult movies. Yet, surprise, surprise, here she is taking part in hardcore photo shoots and a sex scene. After some non-porn glimpses of a trip to Australia, she's seen convincingly portraying a man-eating vixen who devours estate agent Richard Lengin as he shows her an apartment's spectacular Parisian views. This clip, taken from Aliza's cover-girl role in the Tower, has terrible picture quality and seems to have been truncated in editing for this movie, so perhaps the following "on set" look at a photoshoot is a better opportunity to admire Aliza's fulsome curves and sexy smile.
Interview: Moscow, September 1994. Photoshoot: Pirate 30. Sex scene: The Tower, Paris, November 1994. Photoshoot: Triple X 5.

Karina
The heart of any Woodman casting is the scene where some "lucky" young lady has to submit herself to the ultimate test - sex with Woodman himself! The heart-breaking subject of this initiation is an eighteen-year old sweetheart called Karina, who appears both totally naïve and younger than her stated age. She's the cover girl, but be aware that her outfit in the cover pic is only worn in a photo set (supplied), not during the very basically shot casting session.

There's so much I could say about this scene, much of it more appropriate to a psychology essay than a porn review, but in essence what happens is that a young Russian virgin is deflowered in a dingy muscovite apartment by a fat French pornographer, captured from a single angle by a tripod-mounted camera of dubious quality. Sounds terrible? But somehow it is brilliant.

Part of me was saying, "just go home" as the initially reluctant Karina struggles to come to terms with what she is being asked to do, but the other half was saying "take the money and get your kit off!" In many respects, I am glad she did: watching this girl arching her back, her thin body flexing, upstanding breasts rising and falling with deep breathing, as Woodman carefully at first, then with increasing vigour, drives his dick into her pussy and her ass gives the impression of witnessing something at once illicit and yet strangely, somehow, perfectly natural. One thing is certain - for good or ill, Karina's life wouldn't be the same after meeting Pierre Woodman.
Interview & Initiation: Moscow, June 1997.

Olga
To round off, a straightforward interview with lovely young Hungarian brunette Olga, who to Pierre's evident relief is only too happy to reveal her slim body. He can't have had a high success rate that day. She appears not to have done any further work for Private.
Interview: Budapest, December 1993.

Overall
Bearing in mind the flaws of this product (see the DVD comments below for more), it's important to emphasise what this is all about. It's very much a DVD for fans who wish to gain some insight into the workings of Woodman's operations, to see natural, eager girls as they make the first tentative steps into porn.

It's worth remembering that the earlier clips (say 93/94), in Russia especially, represent real incursions into virgin territory in certain respects. When you see the likes of Jenna Haze or Aurora Snow in movies today, sure they're cute but they know all about porn, about DPs and facials and all that nasty stuff. Woodman was on a mission to bring you the kind of girls that you simply could not imagine in porn - fresh girls, often with minimal sexual experience, getting into all manner of naughtiness for your viewing pleasure.

Sheer exploitation? Perhaps, but to me this is fascinating on several levels, though I can appreciate the point of view that Woodman's less-than-varied questioning can become repetitive. But it's the infinitely varied reactions of the girls that make this worth watching. One thing I do wonder is, where are the ones who just come in and say "I don't care, I'll do whatever you want, just show me the money!" Woodman must have had some of them, yet they are strangely absent - only in Karina's scene is the prospect of potential earnings openly used as a means of persuasion. Maybe he just turns girls like that away, but I doubt it. More likely, I suppose, he is trying to sell you this fantasy and I am a sucker for it, but what the hell. Castings 2 is certainly not for everyone, but I can't help watching.

DVD Comments
Again, be aware that the picture quality on the castings, which are mainly from before the ready availability of digital camcorders, is of strictly amateur grade, not the pixel-perfect standard that DVD porn fans have become used to. Perhaps worse is the quality of the excerpted scenes from Private features. The quality on these is simply atrocious - grainy, unstable colour with a second-generation duplicate look about it. Did they master this DVD from a VHS cassette? Whatever, whether or not you find the castings engrossing, it's quite likely the picture quality will be a serious impediment to many viewers' enjoyment.

The menus are exceptionally well done, however, and each girl's profile in the extras section is directly linked to her casting scene - a neat touch - and most have individual, high quality photosets provided. There are also details of the productions and magazines each girl appears in. A short featurette with behind the scenes views from Woodman's globe trotting shoots is interesting, but all in French and again the quality is poor. Trailers, DVD-Rom catalogue and a wealth of subtitle and language options round out the package, but again I wish they'd have original sound with accurate subtitle translations rather than overdubs.