KING COBRA
US, 2016, 93 minutes, Colour.
Garrett Clayton, Christian Slater, James Franco, Kegan Allen, Molly Ringwald, Alicia Silverstone, Rosemary Howard.
Directed by Justin Kelly.
King Cobra is based on actual events and characters, 2005-2007, with a setting in the gay porn industry in the United States.
The title refers to Bryan Kocis, here called Stephen, played by Christian Slater, a closeted man who came out when exposed by friends, decided to make pornographic films for video release and online. He was commercially successful.
The film opens with an audition for a young man from San Diego, Sean Patrick Lockhart, with an ambition to be a porn star, creating his credits alias, Brent Corrigan (Garrett Clayton). Kocis takes him under his wing, thinking is 18 because of his false documentation. The young man is extremely self-confident, makes the film is (which are fairly explicit but also somewhat reticent because the film is American). He has a brief relationship with the director, also some liaisons with fellow actors. He is ambitious about money and threatens the director that he will walk out unless he gets a much bigger salary. However, he and his name are under contract.
He returns home to his mother, Alicia Silverstone. She is shocked but wants to support her son.
In the meantime, the director is somewhat disillusioned, gets advice from his sister (Molly Ringwald), auditions another young man but is exposed, accused by neighbour of being a paedophile, when Brent Corrigan’s true age is released. There are court cases, equipment confiscated, and the young man back home in San Diego wondering what to do.
In the meantime, there is something of a parallel plot. James Franco, one of the film’s producers, plays a gay pimp, Joe, in a demanding relationship with one of his young men, Harlow (Kegan Allen), and they decide to make a video company to get money, to buy cars. James Franco’s Joe is an excessively moody man, dominating Harlow who has bad memories of an obsessive and abusive stepfather.
They get the idea to employ Brent Corrigan who explains the contract situation.
What follows, and this is a true story, they invite Corrigan for a meal but he declines the contract. Joe and Harlow then decide to murder the director to get rid of him, a particularly brutal home invasion sequence, the director thinking he is auditioning Harlow and Harlow then viciously stabbing him and cutting his throat, Joe then suggesting that they set the house on fire.
Sean comes under suspicion because of the breaking of his contract but he goes to the police, goes to a meal with the two who boast about what they have done. He reports this to the police and the two are arrested. They are still in jail, life sentences. There are no exculpatory circumstances in Joe’s character – but Harlow, the vicious attack surfaced his anger at his stepfather’s behaviour.
Sleazy behaviour in a sleazy world. The director is, Justin Kelly, who based his screenplay on the book about the events, Cobra Killer, Gay Porn, Murder and the Manhunt to bring the Killers to Justice. Justin Kelly, has made several short films and features with gay themes, especially another film based on actual characters and events, I am Michael, with James Franco, focusing on gay conversion therapies with Christian motivations.
