''Fetishes'' is a 1996 documentary by
Nick Broomfield
Nicholas Broomfield (born 1948) is an English documentary film director. His self-reflective style has been regarded as influential to many later filmmakers. In the early 21st century, he began to use non-actors in scripted works, which he cal ...
filmed at
Pandora's Box
Pandora's box is an artifact in Greek mythology connected with the myth of Pandora in Hesiod's c. 700 B.C. poem ''Works and Days''. Hesiod reported that curiosity led her to open a container left in the care of her husband, thus releasing phys ...
, one of
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
's most luxurious
SM/
fetish parlours. The film contains interviews with professional
dominatrices and their clients including the New York filmmaker
Maria Beatty
Maria Beatty is a Venezuelan filmmaker who directs, acts, and produces. Her films are often made in black and white and cover various aspects of female sexuality, including BDSM and fetishism. She was inspired by expressionist German cinema, Fr ...
.
The documentary opens with
black and white
Black-and-white (B&W or B/W) images combine black and white in a continuous spectrum, producing a range of shades of grey.
Media
The history of various visual media began with black and white, and as technology improved, altered to color. ...
footage from an
Irving Klaw
Irving Klaw (November 9, 1910 – September 3, 1966), self-named the "Pin-up King",Pérez Seves, ''Eric Stanton & the History of the Bizarre Underground'', p. 28. was an influential Jewish-American merchant of sexploitation, fetish, and Hollywoo ...
film depicting models, including
Bettie Page
Bettie Mae Page (April 22, 1923 – December 11, 2008) was an American model who gained notoriety in the 1950s for her pin-up photos. , wearing
fetish attire. Nick Broomfield and his film crew then arrive at Pandora's Box on
Manhattan
Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...
's Fifth Avenue and are given a tour of the facility by Mistress Raven, including the dungeon and the medical room. The rest of the documentary consists of the following eight chapters:
*Slaves
*Mistresses
*Rubber fetish
*Wrestling fetish
*Corporal punishment
*Masochism
*Infantilism
*Socio-political fetishes
The film was produced in the
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...
and was originally made for
HBO
Home Box Office (HBO) is an American premium television network, which is the flagship property of namesake parent subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc., itself a unit owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The overall Home Box Office business unit is ba ...
. It was released in the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
on
DVD
The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kin ...
, (runtime 84 minutes, in colour), and more recently as part of Nick Broomfield's 'Documenting Icons' box set. A full, uncut version with additional archive material is also available in the UK.
See also
*
BDSM
BDSM is a variety of often erotic practices or roleplaying involving bondage, discipline, dominance and submission, sadomasochism, and other related interpersonal dynamics. Given the wide range of practices, some of which may be engaged ...
*
Fetishism
A fetish (derived from the French , which comes from the Portuguese , and this in turn from Latin , 'artificial' and , 'to make') is an object believed to have supernatural powers, or in particular, a human-made object that has power over oth ...
*
Rubberist
Rubber fetishism, or latex fetishism, is the fetishistic attraction to people wearing latex clothing or, in certain cases, to the garments themselves. PVC fetishism is closely related to rubber fetishism, with the former referring to shiny clo ...
*
Maria Beatty
Maria Beatty is a Venezuelan filmmaker who directs, acts, and produces. Her films are often made in black and white and cover various aspects of female sexuality, including BDSM and fetishism. She was inspired by expressionist German cinema, Fr ...
External links
Information about the documentary, including a trailerA Chat with Mistress Raven of Pandora's Box (NY Rock)*
Review of Fetishes, Nick Broomfield's documentary on Pandora's Box (NY Rock)*
1996 films
British documentary films
BDSM in films
Films directed by Nick Broomfield
1996 documentary films
Documentary films about sexuality
Documentary films about New York City
1990s English-language films
1990s British films
English-language documentary films
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