REVELATION PERTH INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL: Occasionally appearing as ragged and rough-hewn as the ageing porn star it chronicles, Richard Wolstencroft’s The Last Days of Joe Blow is a gritty portrait of a man in search of a fresh sense of self. Shot over three years, this jittery, impulsive work stays just this side of the censor’s good books, taking the viewer onto the set of several hardcore video shoots but keeping the goods largely out of frame. In every other respect it is a revealing, incisive account of a man at the crossroads.
Wolstencroft [has] an affecting on-camera relationship with the star
That man is Michael Tierney, aka the legendary woodsman Joe Blow, one of the superstars of the mid-2000s X-rated film industry. (Tierney has over 150 adult films to his credit, none of which have titles I’m comfortable publishing here.) Wolstencroft programmed Tierney’s 2000 film Evicted at the inaugural Melbourne Underground Film Festival and the long-standing relationship afforded the director access to the LA industry (where 'over 90 percent of the world’s porn is produced") and its personalities (Ron 'The Hedgehog’ Jeremy, William Margold, Bruce LaBruce, Andrew Richardson etc.), as well as an affecting on-camera relationship with the star.
Tierney’s Hollywood history is a fascinating one, and Wolstencroft does not skimp on the fascinating details. Michael’s uncle is the late, legendary tough-guy character actor Lawrence Tierney, who largely raised the tempestuous teen after the boy’s father (fellow actor Edward) passed away. The years with the notoriously short-tempered Lawrence (his exploits on the set of Reservoir Dogs are legendary; he once unloaded a shotgun at his nephew, as Tierney recalls) have clearly shaped and toughened Michael, whose level-headedness and grace with directors and co-stars has ensured the 48-year-old is well-liked amongst the industry’s key players.
In telling Tierney’s new journey, Wolstencroft also conveys a paradigm shift in the American adult film industry. The explosion of web-based porn sites has all but killed off feature-length, narrative-based movies, and naturally their legitimate distributors, who saw business boom with VHS and DVD over the last few decades, are now struggling. (One producer states, with delicious irony, 'I think all porn should be banned from the internet, if you ask me.")
The Last Days of Joe Blow loses some of its momentum during these broader 'state of play’ moments, however admittedly interesting the footage and facts may be. For want of a better term, this sequence is a bit dry; Tierney disappears from his own story for an extended period, in which several men made wealthy off porn bemoan how profits aren’t what they used to be.
When Wolstencroft refocusses on his subject (who’s now living a wayward life on the sinful streets of Bangkok) and revisits his themes of anguish and redemption, The Last Days of Joe Blow exhibits tremendous heart. Shots of a lone Tierney, shuffling along some of LA’s most anonymous sidewalks, evoke an everyman quality and melancholy; the fantasy life he created for himself is all but gone, and he must start over again. Wolstencroft’s moving work ultimately ends on a beginning and, whatever your opinion regarding the life of a pornographic actor may be, one can’t help but hope for the best for the guy.
