The title "Adult Video News Awards 2005" actually makes very clear what this is about, but to those who have never heard of this ceremony, let me say that these are basically the Adult Film Oscars and this specific edition here is the one from 15 years ago, so a bit of an anniversary this year. However, they are obviously not half as famous as the Oscars what is also proven by the fact that back in 2005, they took place in January, but did not air before March, so the exact opposite of a live show really with a lot of time passed in-between. It ran for over 110 minutes, which certainly makes it one of the longer editions and the producer and director was Gary Miller as usual. He has been in charge as the man behind the camera for so many of these, actually still is nowadays I believe. This ceremony was already the 22nd edition, so already back in 2005, there was a great deal of history to those as it all started back in the 1980s, approximately when I was born. Alright, let me just do some brainstorming on thos 2005 edition about what i liked and what I did not like. They went by the usual formula to have two hosts, one of them being a comedian and the other being an adult film actress. All the other AVN Awards editions I watched the comedian was male, but this is the exception here because they went with Thea Vidale, who also returned to host in 2009. I must admit I have never heard her name before, but that is probably not a big surprise because first of all the vast majority of famous comedians is male and especially for many females, the adult film industry is still a bit of a taboo, so they did not get a big name. She was not too great either admittedly. Very vulgar as expected, but if she is mostly as unfunny as she was with her hosting here, then again I am not surprised I do not know Vidale. I mean even the good jokes she dragged way too log like when she talks to her co-host about everybody doing their own job. I don't mind the lack of political correctness, actually I appreciate that, but Vidale seemed a bit desperate here and there and her material simply wasn't good, also how she kept going on about anal on many occasions, almost every time she was on the screen. I hope I can use these words here and my review still gets approved, but hey it is an adult show right? So yeah, still a brave move by Vidale to accept the gig, even if it was not a success. Men certainly have an easier time with this kind of awards show. I mean I could perfectly imagine Robert Downey or Chris Pratt hosting something like this, but cate Blanchett? Never. Another thing I never like too much about these is that in-between there are shots of the audience and you see female adult film stars making out or exposing their breasts. It was not as often here as it was during other editions, but it happened and I am not a fan, even if that is of course subjective.
Also the bands playing during these shows are almost always male-only and this is true here as well. I thought the music was certainly among the better aspects of the show this time. Three bands were a lot, more than they usually had, but as the show was not considerably shorter than two hours, it is accurate. And at the end, everybody was dancing on stage again, which is also a nice tradition. I am a bit surprised they even got Smash Mouth to show up with their biggest hit, but yeah, the music is never a negative aspect with the AVN Awards. The other two i was not familiar with, but they were alright too. My personal highlight were the comedy sequences really. I thought Ron jeremy's with the violin was pretty funny, but perhhaps the best moment of the show that really had me in stitches was Randy Spears' elaboration on squirting (oh my this is so gonna get rejected). He got help there from Cytherea, but yeah I think it was all Spears and he proves that he actually has really good comedic timing and delivery, much better than 99% of other adult film actors in my opinion. Cytherea also won an award I believe and she was among the more stunning women of the night. Others I liked were Nautica Thorn who handed out an award and perhaps my favorite Angelica "Venus" Costello. Okay, I cannot really say a lot about the winners because I simply have not seen those films, but the final big award of the night went to "Bella loves Jenna" starring Belladonna and Jenna Jameson, two of the biggest stars of the industry. But I think this award did not dominate the show or anything. Jenna Jameson won another award though in a pretty weird scenario where they first announced accidentally a different winner and that one was already on the stage and had to leave. But definitely not without flashing her boobs on the way out. Only at the AVNs. Okay, what else? Obviously there is no intercourse during the show (they go far every year, but not that far), but we see many scenes from the nominated movies and winners and of course there you see everythign, so you don#t wanna watch this with your kids. My personal favorite Sasha Grey was not present here yet, she had her breakthrough later on. Oh yeah, overall it was pretty light show in terms of humor, but there were also more serious moments like the mention of a deceased member of the adult film community or a powerful statement by Black (gentleman) actor in favor of protections against STDs. One thing that many maybe not even recognized, but that I did not like at all was how on several occasions they said something like "some of the nominees are" and that is really really strange because it should be taken for granted that they all get mentioned, especially if they are not even shown in the audience. Who makes this selection even? Just not fair and this should definitely be changed for future editions if it hasn't already. I mean I cann see why they do not want to reduce the really large number of nominees because it is indeed an honor to just be nominated, but you still have to mention them all. For fairness purposes. Okay, that's pretty much all then I guess. I think this show started really poor, but got a little better the longer it went, so I would not say it is a failure, even if it is miles away from territory where I would genuinely consider giving it a thumbs-up and positive recommendation. Especially given the spectacular running time, there were simply not enough interesting moments and inclusions. I still urge everybody to see the Randy Spears skip I mentioned earlier. I'm sure somebody uploaded it somewhere. All in all, this one gets a thumbs-down and there have been better and worse editions of the AVN Awards in the past, just like it says in the title of my review. I also wonder if people who watch this genuinely cheer for certain nominees and have favorites they want to win just like at the Oscars for example. Okay, time to finish now (no pun intended!). Skip the watch. Ah I almost forgot Manuel Ferrara, who was the closest to a dominator that night. A french guy ruling the awards. His statement about his significant other when he accepted one award was fairly sweet though. Very prolific adult film actor and director I see. Now that is really all.
Also the bands playing during these shows are almost always male-only and this is true here as well. I thought the music was certainly among the better aspects of the show this time. Three bands were a lot, more than they usually had, but as the show was not considerably shorter than two hours, it is accurate. And at the end, everybody was dancing on stage again, which is also a nice tradition. I am a bit surprised they even got Smash Mouth to show up with their biggest hit, but yeah, the music is never a negative aspect with the AVN Awards. The other two i was not familiar with, but they were alright too. My personal highlight were the comedy sequences really. I thought Ron jeremy's with the violin was pretty funny, but perhhaps the best moment of the show that really had me in stitches was Randy Spears' elaboration on squirting (oh my this is so gonna get rejected). He got help there from Cytherea, but yeah I think it was all Spears and he proves that he actually has really good comedic timing and delivery, much better than 99% of other adult film actors in my opinion. Cytherea also won an award I believe and she was among the more stunning women of the night. Others I liked were Nautica Thorn who handed out an award and perhaps my favorite Angelica "Venus" Costello. Okay, I cannot really say a lot about the winners because I simply have not seen those films, but the final big award of the night went to "Bella loves Jenna" starring Belladonna and Jenna Jameson, two of the biggest stars of the industry. But I think this award did not dominate the show or anything. Jenna Jameson won another award though in a pretty weird scenario where they first announced accidentally a different winner and that one was already on the stage and had to leave. But definitely not without flashing her boobs on the way out. Only at the AVNs. Okay, what else? Obviously there is no intercourse during the show (they go far every year, but not that far), but we see many scenes from the nominated movies and winners and of course there you see everythign, so you don#t wanna watch this with your kids. My personal favorite Sasha Grey was not present here yet, she had her breakthrough later on. Oh yeah, overall it was pretty light show in terms of humor, but there were also more serious moments like the mention of a deceased member of the adult film community or a powerful statement by Black (gentleman) actor in favor of protections against STDs. One thing that many maybe not even recognized, but that I did not like at all was how on several occasions they said something like "some of the nominees are" and that is really really strange because it should be taken for granted that they all get mentioned, especially if they are not even shown in the audience. Who makes this selection even? Just not fair and this should definitely be changed for future editions if it hasn't already. I mean I cann see why they do not want to reduce the really large number of nominees because it is indeed an honor to just be nominated, but you still have to mention them all. For fairness purposes. Okay, that's pretty much all then I guess. I think this show started really poor, but got a little better the longer it went, so I would not say it is a failure, even if it is miles away from territory where I would genuinely consider giving it a thumbs-up and positive recommendation. Especially given the spectacular running time, there were simply not enough interesting moments and inclusions. I still urge everybody to see the Randy Spears skip I mentioned earlier. I'm sure somebody uploaded it somewhere. All in all, this one gets a thumbs-down and there have been better and worse editions of the AVN Awards in the past, just like it says in the title of my review. I also wonder if people who watch this genuinely cheer for certain nominees and have favorites they want to win just like at the Oscars for example. Okay, time to finish now (no pun intended!). Skip the watch. Ah I almost forgot Manuel Ferrara, who was the closest to a dominator that night. A french guy ruling the awards. His statement about his significant other when he accepted one award was fairly sweet though. Very prolific adult film actor and director I see. Now that is really all.