Daddy Knows Best 2

Once upon a time, I was among Sean Michaels' most loyal fans - I must have watched his classic early 1990s videos opposite Sarah Young hundreds of times. But in his 50s (and still acting on screen) as he took control of his career to produce his own projects, Sean turned to cynical exploitation subjects like this one (and his insulting EVIL CUCKOLD series), and has lost me.

It's a case of insulting the audience -a crime that greats like Jean-Luc Godard and overrated hacks like Tarantino revel in as part of their overall m.o. Certainly artists can be confrontational - most stand-up comics and angry playwrights like the late John Osborne fit that bill. But a porn performer like Sean is barking up the wrong tree -fans like me gave him an ongoing career (and membership in the 1,000-plus movies & videos club), so why pick on us.

Issue is not so much the obvious content and thrust of DADDY KNOWS BEST - it clearly concerns the lucrative (especially lately) market for underage-seeming girls being dominated and anally penetrated by the possessor of a big black dick. Is this racist? Is this misogynist? Such questions are basically irrelevant, because we're in the parallel world of Pornoland, where as long as one follows the letter of the law (papers proving the performers are 18 plus a meaningless assertion that the characters they play are also supposedly 18) then nothing else matters. Only the ka-ching of the cash register.

Penny Pax is the superstar to sample Sean's wares; she is a self-avowed fan of anal sex so no amount of scrunching up her face or otherwise pretending to be surprised will convince the viewer that she is being violated. Yes, that is the razor's edge operating in bottom-feeding porn like this - the creation of the illusion that one is watching something forbidden (e.g., in other videos: fisting, water sports, incest and other archaic activities once popular on screen in a niche way in the '70s) while simultaneously winking at the viewer to reassure us "it's all OK".

Sean's manner, taking on the role of a professorial type, well-dressed with suspenders that Larry King would be proud to wear, is smarmy enough to set the tongue-in-cheek tone desired.

Some of the other girls do an OK job, including familiar Asian star Mia Ryder and busty Rose Monroe, but Sean has cast a ringer here that got my goat. Jennifer Anderson is under 5 feet tall (equals jail-bait) and looks about 14, so when Sean has anal sex with her it looks like an amazing accomplishment. But she's not an actress, not even a performer. She doesn't emote during her segment and looks around at the camera and crew for help. Sure it's legal for Sean to shtup the poor girl, but how can he look himself in the mirror afterward?