Finding Planet Porno: The Wild Journey of American Cinema's First Outlaw

He was the Porn Prince before uncensored sex ever became a mass phenomenon in American pop culture. His »Mona the Virgin Nymph« (1970), released without the names of the participants in the credits for fear of prosecution, is considered the kickoff of the Golden Age of Porn, inspired the eternal grindhouse classic »Deep Throat« (1972), and—following Andy Warhol’s »Blue Movie« the year before was the first commercial porn film to widely reach the raincoat crowd across the United States. The counterculture adored him, and his pool parties were legendary. With his brilliant parody »Flesh Gordon«, his name became legendary for a brief moment. Howard Ziehm brought sex to the cinema. Nothing more. Christian Genzel’s affectionate portrait of this cinematic pioneer is a wondrous journey into the post–flower power era, a time of grindhouse theaters and growing social and political awareness. Yet above it all hovers the subversive mischievousness of a filmmaker who was simply a little ahead of his time—and for whom a life without sexual adventure was never really an option