Retrostuds of the Past: Focus on Gino Colbert

I first encountered Gino Colbert in his youthful glory, in a spanking fetish film Bijou Video carries called Disciplining the Undisciplined Athlete. Gino, playing a short in stature boxer with a chip on his shoulder, and Michael Ryan spank each other.

Little did I know Gino was also a phenomenal director and producer with a multitude of porn films to his credit, including straight and bisexual ones. In fact, according to an interview in a February 25, 2004 issue of Unzipped, he even cast the legendary Jack Wrangler in several straight flicks.

He also worked with the famous straight porn actor and director Ron Jeremy on several pictures.

Gino was born in 1957 in Toledo, Ohio, and like many guys and gals from the Heartland, wanted to to to Holllywood to make it big in pictures. He ended up making it big in adult films, beginning in 1980, but eight years later made an extraordinary transition to directing. He is best known for directing Men in Blue, Blue Blake's final film appearance.

I culled some interesting tidbits from two interviews Gino did for Manshots magazine in October 1989 and December 1990. I'll let him speak for himself about sexual chemistry between actors in porn movies and also about Bijou's classic “story porn:”

“You have to hire people who like to suck and fuck and enjoy it. And if they don't, you're gonna have a dead sex scene. I'm hot because I like sex. In a sex scene, I really go crazy, the moment the clothes are off. Even if the guy is mediocre, I can get something out of him while acting.”

“I choose my actors by the chemistry techniques. I have to find guys who will work with other guys. I just can't put Guy A with Guy B and expect them to have a good time. It's a very personal thing – they have to have sex together, and one guy may not be turned on to another.... You learn all that by talking to them ahead of time and asking them straight out, 'What turns you on? What kind of guys do you like?' I focus on heat. I like my sex scenes hot, so you have to have the right chemistry.”

Manshots: “Is the younger consumer aware of the stuff that was made in the past?"

Colbert: I don't think so, because if it's a new consumer, chances are he only knows video. He doesn't know film. He doesn't know about the days when we were taking time to make movies. And a typical x-rated film, whether it be gay or straight, was shot over four days and the budgets were more … we're talking about five and even six figures. I remember one gay flick that was shot over a week, and it cost six figures – Centurians of Rome. And it's still on the market and it's doing well, because a lot of people claim the consumer doesn't care about the story, as I said earlier, but those movies that have the good stories and really went to town with the quality, those are the ones that are still on the shelf and still selling.”
 

Gino no longer acts, but he still directs and currently owns his own production company, Gino Pictures.

We recently remastered a mostly black-cast movie called Black Jacks; Gino produced the film, and he also is a performer, doing a couple of hot scenes with the black guys in the cast.

Check out more of our titles that feature Gino and also stand the test of time with their combination of hot sex and engaging stories.