Anything That Moves

It’s hard to imagine anybody getting sentimental about today’s pornography. Since the advent of digital it has been mass produced in such quantity, to appeal to such a plethora of tastes, that few people really bother about quality anymore. In the absence of (most legal) restraints, it has ceased to flourish, and whilst there are still a few truly inventive creators out there, most of it just turns up, does the job and leaves – there is little sense of craft. Go back to the Sixties and Seventies, when everything made on film was a serious investment, more often than not put together by professionals, and one encounters something of a golden age. It might still have been made, for the most part, with a crude purpose in mind, but it developed its own stylistic flourishes and a visual language with much wider influence.

Alex Phillips’ follow-up to the unforgettable All Jacked Up And Full Of Worms is a love letter to this type of cinema as much as it is a spoof. Central to it is a recognition of the joyousness inherent in sexual liberation and the best work of the genre. Though it is not, in itself, a porn film, and it has not been made for the same purpose (though one imagines that some of its vignettes might be used that way), it uses that visual language and many of the same structural and narrative elements. The focus is on bicycle courier Liam (Hal Baum), who sells sex on the side but remains a wide-eyed innocent with a boyish charm. His carefree life is about to go sideways as a pair of seedy cops begin investigating murders connected to one of his lovers – but who?

The tone is established early on by two scenes. In one, Liam has been hired by a teenage girl to relieve her sister of virginity, much to the consternation of their father. It’s a cute little nod to the tall stories one used to see in porn magazines, and it’s beautifully shot, with Liam skipping off into the trees afterwards in a nod the the naturist tradition which has a major influence on the genre. Somehow, Phillips has contrived to shoot on Kodak throughout, though it’s incredibly hard to get it processed now, and the resulting colours are just gorgeous.

The second scene concerns an encounter between Liam and a sixtysomething housewife played by porn legend Ginger Lynn Allen. Referencing one of her most famous scenes, it affectionately addresses the issue of ageing and its effects – real and perceived – on desirability. Allen may have a few more wrinkles than she used to, but the sense of fun that gave her real star power is very much still present, so she’s not lacking in allure. There’s a lot of heart in this scene and it establishes Liam as an endearing character whom we will – ahem – root for no matter what follows.

As the story evolves, Phillips keeps us close to Liam, which means that information about the murders becomes available bit by bit, only slowly coming to seem like a primary point of concern. He’s been bothered by cops before – and these cops are gloriously awful, marinaded in Seventies clichés – so he doesn’t immediately assume that what they say should be taken at face value. As reality sinks in, his happy-go-lucky life, full of playful escapades, gradually twists into nightmare. We understand this from his private conversations with his co-worked and sort of girlfriend, but also from Phillips’ increasingly uneasy visuals. The action shifts from day to night, the sex gets sleazier, and there is an increasing sense of the precarity of this life.

All of this is greatly enhanced by the score, which comes courtesy of Cue Shop, who previously worked with Phillips on Worms. It draws heavily on the traditional musical motifs of phonography and Seventies thrillers, seamlessly blending them into something that feels up to date and makes sense for the characters. The elegance with which the whole package is assembled will make viewers forget how unusual it is to have sex workers as protagonists and to spend time in that milieu without any outsiders present to moralise or get angstful about it. This is a liberating experience, both socially and in terms of what it offers to the imagination.

In light of all of this, the schlocky aspects of the conclusion come as a bit of a shock, but they’re also completely in keeping with the underlying genre elements. Setting two sets of narrative expectations against each other is an interesting way of presenting disordered thinking, and puts the viewer in a pleasingly uncomfortable position. It also gives Phillips room to play with heightened emotion, both directly and through the use of surrealistic motifs – yet even as it stretches the boundaries of the real, there’s a sense that Liam’s journey is careering into contact with the harsher, less yielding world in which most of us live. He is parted from his dream just as we will be when we exit the cinema or press stop. That doesn’t mean it isn’t worth dreaming again.

Anything That Moves was screened at the Fantasia International Film Festival.

Reviewed on: 26 Jul 2025