Help Keep Independent 'Mumbleporn' Funded

You might have seen an episode of In Their Room, filmmaker Travis Matthews's often sexy series of videos inside the bedrooms of real live gay men. If you want to see any more--especially some with the scruffy, tattooed youth of London--get ready to pony up.

Matthews has posted a plea to Kickstarter for help funding the upcoming In Their Room - London, which he hoped to film in April. Also on the docket for the director is the upcoming release of I Want Your Love, his first feature film.

But why is this so different than every other person you've ever met who asks you for money to fund his film/marathon/album/birthday party/barn raising? Well, for one, Matthews is something of a pioneer. At least as far as lo-fi porn, or what he sometimes calls "mumbleporn," is concerned.

"With all of the sex I've ever filmed, I've tried to only, for the most part, show sex if it has something to do with a story or character or it just made sense," he said during a recent on-camera conversation he had with Weekend director Andrew Haigh for IndieWire.com.

Haigh agreed that sex, especially for the gays, is often misrepresented in film.

"Sex is always treated so weirdly in cinema, but it says so much about a character and a person. Either how they respond to sex, how they talk about sex, how they feel about sex, what they do," Haigh said. "All of those things are so representative of their character and I think people forget that sometimes. It's just in most films it's there for titillation."

He went on, "I think the whole aspect of intimacy is what's really important. Because in so many films when you see gay sex, it doesn't seem to be about intimacy at all. It's really odd to me. It seems like absolutely the opposite of what actually gay relationships and sex are like anyway. It is, of course, about intimacy, tenderness, and vulnerability."

Want to change that? You can donate to Matthews's new film project here.