SAN FRANCISCO — Pink and White Productions has added Dietrich de Velsa's 1980 French gay adult feature "Equation to an Unknown" (Équation à un inconnu) to its streaming service PinkLabel.tv.
"This long-lost masterpiece of gay erotic cinema centers on a handsome young biker (Gianfranco Longhi) who rides his motorcycle through myriad of sexual encounters, from a soccer game’s locker room to a dreamy and unsettling orgy where the film reaches its melancholic peak," noted a rep.
The film is in French with English subtitles and "newly scanned in 2K from the original camera negative."
Directed with "absolute grace," the rep said, by the "mysterious Dietrich de Velsa (aka Francis Savel/Frantz Salieri), this former painter was also the owner and artistic director of one of the first transvestites’ cabaret of Paris, La Grande Eugène," said the rep. "Years later, he collaborated with Joseph Losey on 'Mr. Klein' (1976) and 'Don Giovanni' (1979). 'Equation to an Unknown' is his only film and stands without a doubt as a masterpiece and the best French gay adult film ever made."
The film has been "nearly impossible to see for decades since its original release" and was rediscovered by director Yann Gonzalez "during his research for the film 'Knife + Heart' (2018), which he got from Hervé Joseph Lebrun who had made 'Mondo Homo: A Study of French Gay Porn in the ’70s (2014)' and who was historical advisor for 'Knife + Heart,'" said the rep. "Gonzalez was so taken with the film, he tracked down the negative in a French film lab, commissioned a new 16mm answer print, and used this to create a subtitled DCP to share the film with a broader audience."
"This undiscovered erotic film is a labyrinth of all-male fantasies whose outstanding beauties always end up fading away while leaving their sensual protagonist dealing with his own loneliness," the rep added.
"Equation to an Unknown" is available on-demand with a PinkLabel Plus membership and à la carte at PinkLabel.tv.
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In related news, Pink and White recently announced the addition of titles by Australian "feminist erotic filmmaker” Anna Brownfield of Poison Apple Productions to PinkLabel.tv.