Through a bold examination of a porn genre rife with choking, slapping, degradation, and sexual assault fantasies, Hardcore spotlights porn producers and performers as they speak with jaw-dropping honesty about the cost of creating rape scenes, packaged for the pleasure of the masses. While society is immersed in an ocean of free porn, producers have taken drastic measures to keep profits flowing, embracing the creation of unapologetically violent content. But behind the veil of consent, the female performers lured into participating in these scenes are often inflicted with grave physical and psychological trauma. Through a bold examination of a genre rife with choking, slapping, degradation, and sexual assault fantasies, Hardcore spotlights porn producers and performers as they speak with jaw-dropping honesty about what it takes to create violent scenes—including rape—packaged for the pleasure of the masses.

Porn industry insiders reveal how producers cast aside ethical boundaries to create content which promotes the fantasy of sex with children. Among porn’s most popular categories is the teen genre, which often depicts underage girls. Amid pigtails, playgrounds, and teddy bears, grown men act out sexual fantasies with performers who are at least 18 in real life, but who are made to look and act like children. In brazen fashion, this film confronts porn industry creators with the critical question, “Is it ethical to promote the fantasy of having sex with children?” Their answers provide an unprecedented window into the soul of the porn industry.

Porn performers blow the whistle on the appalling lack of workplace safety measures, which puts them at risk for incurable infections like HIV, exposing a failed system that treats them like expendable commodities. Weeks after Cameron Bay took part in a public humiliation sex scene produced by a major porn company, she tearfully announced that she had contracted HIV. In Unsafe Sex, Cameron, alongside many other porn industry performers, blows the whistle on the appalling lack of industry safety measures, revealing how performers are at extreme risk of many incurable infections. The film investigates the porn industry’s rug-sweeping complicity in endangering the lives of performers who are, by design, kept in the dark until it's too late.