‘Pirates’: the most expensive porn movies ever made
Few industries can say with as much certainty that the internet ruined it like the porn business.
As one can imagine, porn was an industry flush with cash for decades. It wasn’t exactly prestigious, but it was also undeniable. Porn was something that millions of people wanted, and it was behind a paywall that, unless you came across a dirty magazine in the woods or under your older brother’s mattress, couldn’t be negotiated.
Many, many people (mainly men) became extremely wealthy off the back of this, and for decades, the only thing that changed was people’s tastes.
Then, the internet happened. Suddenly, that paywall was extremely negotiable.
Because of this, looking at the moments when the porn industry was at its height seems like the dictionary definition of folly. The roaring 20s, but with more bodily fluids. Honestly, I’m not even talking about times when porn films made a break for mainstream acceptance with films like Deep Throat and Debbie Does Dallas. Those films were still made for budgets that typical skin flicks were made for at the time, and are each little more than thinly veiled excuses for on-screen fucking to occur.
Weirdly enough, I’m talking about a pair of films made shortly after the internet was changing the porn industry forever. A last, shuddering grasp for prestige and power from an industry about to be turned upside down. I’m talking about the 2005 film Pirates and its sequel, 2008’s Pirates II: Stagnetti’s Revenge. In a way, both these films should have been nothing special. Porn parodies have been made as long as parody has existed, and these shouldn’t have been anything different.
After all, these movies (and I’d like you to brace yourself for this) bear somewhat of a similarity to the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. I know, astonishing.
Anyone could imagine dressing a few porn performers up as pirates, sticking a camera in front of some three-wall sets and maybe teaching a few of your actors how to sword fight. Not like that. Well, maybe like that. However, for some reason, the people behind Pirates decided to make the film a fully-fledged action blockbuster that just so happened to be a porn film. Or at the very least, as much of a fully-fledged action blockbuster that just under a million dollars can get you.
Which, it turns out, is a surprising amount. Pirates looks cheap (it’s a porn film, of course it does), but it is also shot on location on Bounty II, a replica of HMS Bounty, an actual British merchant ship from 1787. The owners of the ship were told that the filmmakers were shooting a family adventure movie on the ship, and were not happy when they found out the truth. It’s got an all-star cast, and it’s even got fairly well-staged action sequences. Not like that. Well, actually, exactly like that. But also with fighting and all that.
All this led to a sequel produced three years later. Pirates II: Stagnetti’s Revenge (named for the villain of the first film) had a budget that several Hollywood pictures would kill for these days. At $8 million, it had over eight times the budget of 2026’s Obsession, for example. Ironically enough, though, these would be the industry’s last hurrah before the very thing these films are about ravaged it.
After all, what else changed the porn industry into what it is today other than piracy?