THE HEALERS on DVD features commentary & interview by filmmaker Eduardo Cemano, both of which are blatantly self-serving. While he keeps emphasizing how successful and funny this film was ("big in Canada"), the viewer is likely to disagree.
Basically what he has created and is so proud of is that mythical beast: a porn film with full hardcore action but photographed and edited to remove all XXX content (i.e., insertions, money shots). The crappy result is identical to fully hardcore films of the period, just cheating the paying customer out of the payoffs in each scene. This is a familiar practice from bowdlerized pay-cable showings (Playboy Channel or Showtime After Dark) of porn films in soft-core cuts.
So like his better, Joe Sarno, Cemano ("a nice Jewish boy from the Bronx" despite his Italianate stage name) makes hardcore porn films but insists on copping out by claiming he's not interested in doing so. This is not hypocrisy per se, merely self-delusion.
And the first delusion on screen in THE HEALERS is Cemano's belief in himself as a comic. The film begins with 6 minutes of unfunny shtick as the auteur, eyes closed and dominated by his Chico Marx hairdo, pours out drivel while pretending to hump a skeleton. He then proceeds to interrupt the film proper with such nonsense, making it extremely difficult to watch.
When he's not present we have porn actors ad libbing their way through an hour of burlesque sketch in the doctor/nurse vein. The humping is identical with boring XXX sex, only we don't actually get to see the private parts commingling (or a blow job for that matter).
Cemano claims a distinction between his cast and porn regulars, even claiming that his lovely discovery Margo was a one-shot, yet this isn't true: she starred in a far better (but just as sloppy) XXX film the same year THE TRIALS OF CHICKIE TETERAZZINI. And his favored-nation star Ultramax is one of the most familiar personalities on the NYC porn scene.
Even by the standards of improv porn (see: Shaun Costello), THE HEALERS fails, with cast often talking all at once, and nothing interesting happening. One exterior scene on the waterfront is dull, and the gimmick of patient Angel Spirit (great stage name) being mute until sex cures her is a yawner. Perhaps Cemano's only bold move is to have an orgy involving the Foursome (4 players who don't even bother with stage names) turn into them pairing off the wrong way: lesbian action is de rigeur for porn, but the two guys simulating sex together is a no-no.
With Cemano handling the camera, film is just a jumble as his desire to leave out incriminating explicit footage dominates over what he positively tries to include. Obviously he should have just bit the bullet, admitted defeat and cranked out another XXX title to go with his previous 1-day wonders.
In his interview he does own up to the obvious padding in the film, trying to put a positive spin on his blatant re-use of "highlights" footage to accompany a 7-minute final reel of credits and "curtain calls".
Basically what he has created and is so proud of is that mythical beast: a porn film with full hardcore action but photographed and edited to remove all XXX content (i.e., insertions, money shots). The crappy result is identical to fully hardcore films of the period, just cheating the paying customer out of the payoffs in each scene. This is a familiar practice from bowdlerized pay-cable showings (Playboy Channel or Showtime After Dark) of porn films in soft-core cuts.
So like his better, Joe Sarno, Cemano ("a nice Jewish boy from the Bronx" despite his Italianate stage name) makes hardcore porn films but insists on copping out by claiming he's not interested in doing so. This is not hypocrisy per se, merely self-delusion.
And the first delusion on screen in THE HEALERS is Cemano's belief in himself as a comic. The film begins with 6 minutes of unfunny shtick as the auteur, eyes closed and dominated by his Chico Marx hairdo, pours out drivel while pretending to hump a skeleton. He then proceeds to interrupt the film proper with such nonsense, making it extremely difficult to watch.
When he's not present we have porn actors ad libbing their way through an hour of burlesque sketch in the doctor/nurse vein. The humping is identical with boring XXX sex, only we don't actually get to see the private parts commingling (or a blow job for that matter).
Cemano claims a distinction between his cast and porn regulars, even claiming that his lovely discovery Margo was a one-shot, yet this isn't true: she starred in a far better (but just as sloppy) XXX film the same year THE TRIALS OF CHICKIE TETERAZZINI. And his favored-nation star Ultramax is one of the most familiar personalities on the NYC porn scene.
Even by the standards of improv porn (see: Shaun Costello), THE HEALERS fails, with cast often talking all at once, and nothing interesting happening. One exterior scene on the waterfront is dull, and the gimmick of patient Angel Spirit (great stage name) being mute until sex cures her is a yawner. Perhaps Cemano's only bold move is to have an orgy involving the Foursome (4 players who don't even bother with stage names) turn into them pairing off the wrong way: lesbian action is de rigeur for porn, but the two guys simulating sex together is a no-no.
With Cemano handling the camera, film is just a jumble as his desire to leave out incriminating explicit footage dominates over what he positively tries to include. Obviously he should have just bit the bullet, admitted defeat and cranked out another XXX title to go with his previous 1-day wonders.
In his interview he does own up to the obvious padding in the film, trying to put a positive spin on his blatant re-use of "highlights" footage to accompany a 7-minute final reel of credits and "curtain calls".