Money Shot: The Pornhub Story
Money Shot posits itself as a sensationalist investigative documentary when it’s more like a dull corporate video.
For those who don’t know, Pornhub is to sexual exploitation what McDonald’s is to fast food. It is not good for you, but it satisfies an instant craving and in the long run will be damaging to your wellbeing. According to Suzanne Hillinger’s Netflix documentary, Pornhub receives 3.5 billion visits a month and is the tenth most viewed website in the world. Its brand recognition makes it almost synonymous with Amazon and Coca-Cola and thus as cuddly an adult household name as Playboy. Mike Stabile, an advocate for the sex industry, calls it “the winking face of ‘naughty’”. Yet behind this global phenomenon, owned by MindGeek, a company based in Montreal, is something entirely more sinister: the monetisation of child rape.
Previously, Hillinger co-directed the Covid-19 doc Totally Under Control with the estimable Alex Gibney, but here she is swimming on her own. And in spite of its stabs at sensationalism, Money Shot is a surprisingly dull affair. Voyeurs will not be treated to anything as racy as can be found on such British TV platforms as Channel 4 and 5, so it’s largely a parade of talking heads and the usual social media blurbs. After a while that becomes extremely tedious. What the film needs is some cinéma vérité action (not of the sexual kind) or explosive personalities, but instead it comes off as a rather polite corporate video, with Kyle Scott Wilson’s music performing the dramatic heavy lifting. There’s little new to say here, other than that the porn industry is mired in corruption and that people are exploited. Many adult performers are now making a decent living in their parlours, thanks to the advances of digital technology and computer know-how, although Pornhub creams off the lion’s share of the profits.
In this instance, a dramatisation might have proved more riveting, particularly as Hillinger falls prey to the usual tropes of the documentary genre. Money Shot is more interested in spouting such buzz phrases as “search engine optimisation” and “data harvesting” than mere titillation. It’s not until the appearance of Serena Fleites that the stomach truly turns – this is a real person and she is justifiably traumatised. As a 14-year-old schoolgirl, Serena was persuaded by her boyfriend to make a naked video of herself. He posted it on Pornhub and it received 400,000 views, plunging the girl into a spiral of self-destruction, family breakdown, homelessness, drug addiction and two suicide attempts. Later, the video was uploaded on Pornhub again and on other websites, and Serena, aged nineteen, ended up living, alone, in her car. But then there are the defenders of the website, who see it as an easy way to make a living. Natassia Dreams (not her real name) says that, “if it wasn’t for porn, I probably wouldn’t be alive.” Certainly, there’s a provocative, soul-searching film to be made about Pornhub, but this isn’t it.
JAMES CAMERON-WILSON
Featuring Siri Dahl, Gwen Adora, Dani Pinter, Asa Akira, Cherie Deville, Serena Fleites, Nicholas Kristof, Natassia Dreams, Wolf Hudson, Mike Stabile, Allie Knox.
Dir Suzanne Hillinger, Pro Nicki Carrico and Suzanne Hillinger, Ph Iris Ng, Ed Alexis Johnson, Music Kyle Scott Wilson.
Jigsaw-Netflix.
94 mins. USA. 2023. UK and US Rel: 15 March 2023. Cert. 18.
