WE DEVOUR STORIES about the sex lives of others for the inordinate pleasure of discovering their similarities to, and differences from, our own; the sex lives of insects are no exception. The acts portrayed in Isabella Rossellini’s short-film series Green Porno (2008–2009) are a multifarious sampling of nature’s diversity—yet they are entirely enacted and narrated by Rossellini herself, who, dressed as a male insect, screws inanimate paper representations of her mates. In “Fly,” for example, Rossellini penetrates her “costar” with the lusty abandon of a sex maniac who bangs at “any opportunity, any female!” After this line, the camera lingers on the face of the cardboard fly and then cuts back to Rossellini, as she continuously thrusts. It’s anything but natural—it’s porn. It is thus a charming surprise that Green Porno’s power lies in what porn all too often lacks. What is best about Green Porno is what is best about sex: It can be joyful, surprising, goofy, guileless, funny, and fun. Even the scenes wherein the male star expresses outright terror and loses his life are delicious. The denouement of “Bee” rivals those found in classical tragedy. “I would die . . . without my penis . . . I would bleed to death” are the bee’s final words, and, while undeniably hilarious, there is something oddly antibathetic about this swan song, as it takes us from the ridiculous to the sublime.
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