Skin Flick. 1999. Great Britain. Directed by Bruce LaBruce. 67 min.
Cinematography by James Carman. With Steve Masters, Eden Miller, Tom International, Ralph Steel. Produced for the adult film studio Cazzo Film, Skin Flick is simultaneously a work of pornography and a reworking of the genre that is disturbing and titillating in equal measure. The movie revolves around a gang of neo-Nazi London skinheads who lead a life of petty theft, queer bashing, and general thuggery—when not having passionate sex with one another. (The hypocrisy of the situation is lost on them.) Bored and broke, the crew decides to terrorize an interracial gay couple while they’re at home in their bourgeois flat, and the scenes that follow are not soon forgotten. “LaBruce has never been squeamish when it comes to leveling criticism at queer fetishism of race, class, and control,” the artist Scott Treleaven once wrote. “So is it repugnant? Satirical? If it weren’t for LaBruce’s trademark slapstick scenes, caustic commentary, and over-the-top porno flick stylings, it could even be dangerous.”