Pleasure
The original score for “Pleasure” by Karl Frid is a combination of hip-hop and choral tones. That’s actually a pretty perfect duality for this narrative, as it combines rapturous emotional expression and fulfilling base desires. That makes a lot of sense, given how the film looks at a woman hoping to satisfy both in the American porn industry. It’s not for the faint of heart.
Bella Cherry (Sofia Kappel) has just come to Los Angeles from Sweden. Her goal? To become one of the biggest porn stars. She’s set herself up with an agent, and is currently living with three other women in the industry. We see her as she “pays her dues” in front of the camera, and gets an up-close look at how abusive the industry is to women, especially when they realize they might have pushed themselves too far.
The co-writer and director, Ninja Thyberg, is not shy about the explicit nature of the material. We do not get hard core action, but it’s close enough to make people uncomfortable watching it. Her secret weapon in this film is how she lenses everything from Bella’s perspective during the scenes of her on set. She objectifies both sexes, but treats men as props for Bella to use in pursuit of her dream. They’re also threats, though; there are some very rough moments of abuse and explicit situations. Each scene is built up, and plays out, individually; while there is certainly a cumulative narrative at work here, we do not necessarily see an emotional arc for Bella as each sequence and event builds to the individual she is by the end. Kappel gives a brave, uncompromising performance, and it’s only a structural issue that her character’s development seems halting rather than continuous throughout the film; she makes us feel every moment, for better or worse.
“Pleasure” centers in on the porn industry, but it could easily be seen as a condemnation of any entertainment industry that uses and abuses women, which is any entertainment industry. There’s a scene near the end that I cannot get out of my head. In it, Bella and her best friend go on a FFM threesome shoot, but the male ends up being an actor who harassed the friend earlier in the film. The shoot is contentious, but the aftermath is predictable. By that point, Bella is prepared to do anything to achieve stardom, and Kappel and Thyberg aren’t afraid of how unsympathetic that might make the character. She’s been on a mission since the first frames, and it’s all been about her pleasure. It might not be yours, but it’s worth trying to watch to see how the film challenges our conceptions of this narrative.
