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Originally Posted by genesim
I am not claiming I know the totality of what she is, but there you do get something from what is seen. I think you can get a lot from a person from a mere few sentences. I hear a lot of intelligence in her recordings.
I think with those parents, suicide was very evident. You can hear it the moment they rejected her one achievement which is the pictures she brought back to show her mom, and her mom refusing. That is unbelievable.
It is a tribute to what she achieved. Why not celebrate the art that she gave? She was a beautiful woman that did some pretty decent scenes. I actually argue that her acting wasn't too bad at all either.
Who is anyone to judge what an accomplishment is and what isn't? I think her main issue was not being cared about, not the fact that she did porn.
When did I ever say she was proud of what she did? Am I to judge what an 18 year old is proud of as indicative of how they would feel about their work later had they lived?
There are lots of actors that are not proud of their work. Some even hate their best art. However, if there is an artist that truly cares about their fans and wants to feel good about what they did...success at that art sure eases the blow. I think a lot of porn stars duck and change names because of what society judges them, not what they actually did.
While she was temporarily peeved at the same way she was judged, would she have perhaps changed her mind if she would have somehow gotten cleaned up and got out of her funk? There are some artists that look back at what they did and actually embrace it.
I think in the words of someone I know, I think more depressing would be that what she did accomplish would be for nothing. I think her story is very compelling to anyone that has felt lost, and in the end her art should be a big part of the story. I can identify with both. Feeling lost and prostituted is one thing, but knowing you have company, and the what you sold still has merit is something else.
What is wrong with feeling pleasure from her work? You really think that would bother her? While she may not have always enjoyed it, she also knew what it was for. Matter of fact in her early interview she says in an explicit way that it is the point of what she does. I can think of no better tribute myself. Should I put up her videos and cry? Should I just forget that she existed because she died?
She died a large part because she didn't have a great support group with her family. She died because she was addicted to drugs. She died most of all because she was young and did not experience enough with life.
I blame the people that judged her just as much as the society that allows this sick idea that filming sex is somehow terrible while wall to wall violence is just all good.
So is it a tribute to get glee from watching Bruce Willis cut someone's throat in a movie? Is it a tribute to get glee from from Black Sabbath playing an A chord? What about getting a rush from watching some skater land a triple axle.
I don't see much difference. Fucking is a natural act and being good at it is very exciting to watch. I guess one finds pleasure in a million different ways. I see it as absolutely a tribute.
But I will leave you with this. Can you imagine if you hated a job, hated going to it, maybe even wish you never did it, then years later people still appreciate your work. It ballooned into how many tributes, you had so many people say you were one of the most beautiful people they ever saw. You had an impact even after 30+ years of being gone. You awesome body still transports them back to a time, the sexual release you show still gets one through those days, and most of all you still feel sad that person is gone.
To quote a song:
"Funny when you're dead how people start listenin'"
I knew her art before she died, and I thought she was one of the most beautiful women in Penthouse. When she died it hit me like a hammer. Though not so much that I would forget all the things that gave me pleasure.
I gotta tell you, the only thing I can think about is where she was in the moment she died, what she said in those last recordings. I cannot imagine her no doubt thinking "I will show them", and then having people just show more and more pity as opposed to seeing her for what she gave?
She was fucking amazing looking and I for one am happy she did what she did. When her boyfriend said he didn't give a shit, or the parents still believing it was only for attention, there is such a severe disconnect, I think most people raised like that would at least feel lost and want to get the fuck away from that shit!
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I mean, I'm not trying to intentionally provoke an acrimonious response from you, or change your mind about her.
Clearly, I enjoy watching people fuck (on film, in pictures, simulated, penetration, whatever), so I'm not personally harsh toward those who perform in the medium simply because they are in the medium.
That being said, these images come at a price. They are sold for a price. The majority of the people who actually do fucking don't (or at least didn't back in Grant's day) reap the majority of the profits. Grant/Applegate struck me as a teenaged girl with a lot of problems before she went out to California. She ended up entering porn via a feeder agency for "models": that she willingly sought out the agency and willingly posed/performed didn't change the nature of the business model, which in the end is based on exploitation. Exploiting those who perform and exploiting the desires of the purchasers. To be sure, everybody has free will. Everybody has a choice to say no.
It could well be that Grant/Applegate was for a time proud of what she was doing, but it doesn't strike me that way. I could be wrong. It doesn't even appear that she had any long term plan other than living for the moment, since she blew through all the money she made. I think she stumbled into the business, was told by those who were exploiting her that she was "great" and "a star" and perhaps for the first time in her life felt that she was good at something. She brought her porn portfolio home to show her mother, who was understandably not thrilled at what her daughter was doing. She was subsequently shunned by her hometown. Doubtless there is a level of hypocrisy in the public attitudes toward pornography - in that the public shunning doesn't reflect the billions of dollars the industry generates - but for a farm belt small town 40 years ago, what Grant/Applegate was doing in California wasn't something a typical parent would encourage or celebrate. Her family did go out to California to try and extricate Colleen from the world she had plunged into, but legally there was little to nothing they could do since she was legally an adult. The only recourse they had was to let her know they didn't approve.
It is telling after Grant shot herself that it was her parents who were left standing by her hospital bed picking up the pieces. Not Bobby Hollander. Not her coke dealing boyfriend. Not the adult film studios who made the lion's share of the money for the films Grant appeared in (in point of fact, those studios went into overdrive churning out "tribute" films to Grant and making even MORE money in the wake of her death: Q. how much money do you think the Applegate family saw from that? A. Not even enough to pay for her hospital bills and funeral expenses). Those studios went on to the next new thing. Such is the nature of the business.
It was just a sad story. I can understand the desire to want to find some meaning out of all of it. Grant was a pretty girl. Had a pleasant demeanor on camera. Seemed like a nice albeit confused person. I don't see much meaning in her life or death beyond illustrating the old axiom regarding the life you live and the choices you make being tied to your fate. She wasn't capable of coping with the long term consequences of the capricious short term decisions she made, and I tend to doubt being involved in pornography was a net positive in her life.