DVDs: "OUT OF THE DARKNESS"

"Out of the Darkness" is a new DVD on porn featuring an ex-porn actress and now Christian who helps others out of the porn industry: Shelley Lubben; the founder of www.thekingsmen.us : Mark Houck; an Alfred Kinsey expert: Dr. Judith Reisman; and a psychiatrist: Dr. Richard Fitzgibbons.

Filmed in an up-to-the-minute documentary style (heavy on interviews), "Out of the Darkness" is neither visually graphic nor verbally explicit. It's pretty much a must-see. Shelley's entire life story is very enlightening. Mark Houck, addicted to porn as a young man, sought help and founded an organization to help others of of porn, and to fight porn. Dr. Judith has spent her life trying to publicize a very important piece of the history of the sexual revolution in the USA (namely the architect of it all: Alfred Kinsey--who was undeniably a pedophile and sexual pervert). Dr. Richard Fitzgibbons diagnoses some of the ills of the generations growing up with "porn as normal," and speaks about the antitode to porn: Theology of the Body.

There is frequent use of "old time" stock film footage and home movies* (sometimes repeated) and a little bit of a re-enactment (also repeated). The repetition gets old fast. There's a large black border around some of the old footage, but I'm assuming that's more because of the quality/dimensions of the footage than a stylistic choice. It doesn't bother me, and is almost a welcome change up.

A pleasing, but sometimes uneven technique is to have the camera angled in several different ways to really capture the emotions, moods (mostly reflective, but sometimes smiling) and facial expressions of the four interviewees (these four were a great choice). The camera catches what the words WEREN'T saying or COULDN'T say.

I would have prefered everyone to have the same color background rather than at least three different colors. Dr. Judith's black is super dramatic, Shelley's bright orange matches her sunny personality, Dr. Fitzgibbons' white is kind of neutral-feeling, and I don't remember what Mark's was. It jarred me a bit going from one to the other. I wouldn't have minded the technique of the interviewee's voice over their video when they weren't actually speaking used more or as a lead-in to the interviews.

The message of "Out of the Darkness" is dire and urgent, but it's also very much "all hope is not lost." "There's ALWAYS a way out."

Winner for Best Director, John Paul II Film Festival, Miami, 2011
www.jp2filmfestival.com

Order from: www.anteroompictures.com , 80 min.
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*perhaps royalty free?