Mark Wahlberg, Burt Reynolds, Heather Graham, Julianne Moore
As for the penis, yes it was large, but let's remember that it was NOT real, and for those of you who rented the movie to see it, sorry. If you are planning to rent the movie to see it, watch the last five minutes. For those of you who want to see the whole seventies' thing, watch the first half hour. You want to see people do a LOT of drugs, watch the middle. But there's no point in watching the whole thing.
I liked the beginning of this movie a whole lot more than what came after the beginning. I found that an hour into it I couldn't help thinking 'when's this going to end?' or 'what's the point of THIS scene?'. The beginning of the movie had good music, good scenes, good acting, and excellent photography, something I don't usually look at in a movie. Everything just slowed down completely in the middle, jumping haphazardly from one character to the next, never explaining anything in between, and at one point, focusing the camera on Mark Wahlberg's character for a full five minutes with him saying...nothing. Again, What's The Point?
I suppose it all had some metaphorical meaning about the industry which they were in (that would be the adult film industry, people) and the general wildness of the late 70's early 80's, but for me it all added up to be an hour-long blah blah blah fest.
The last minutes of the movie are taken up by the happy reunion of everyone involved, like as jane said, a 'little porn family', and then the rivoting (sarcasm) scene with Marky Mark (oops, Mark Wahlberg) talking to himself (yet again) like he did through most of the movie. Then he unzips his pants, takes it out reverently, a lot like you would handle a newborn baby or a particularily cold bottle of beer or anything more important than anyone else's penis, talks to it, stuffs it in and leaves. Definately the most moving part of the whole movie (I had to get up and pee).
The acting, however, was on the whole, very good. I enjoyed Whalberg's performance of a naive 17 year old turning into a crack-addled prima donna of the porn business. I didn't want to shoot Burt Reynolds, and for Burt Reynolds, that's pretty good. Other performances that stand out: Scotty, played by Philip Seymore Hoffman (The really loud guy in Twister) who is the sound guy on all the porn films, and is in love with Dirk Diggler (Wahlberg). My advice: If you're a big 70's fan, this movie is great for the clothes and music alone. That is, if you don't pay much attention to the plot. Otherwise, hear about it from friends, it's much better that way. However, if you want to see a movie about naked guys, rent The Fully Monty it's much better.