Japanese university complains over use of campus for porn shoot

The prestigious Meiji University has made a complaint about a porno video that was shot on its campus in Tokyo.

As widely reported in the mainstream media this week, Meiji University’s gripe involves an adult video release that features a short “insert” scene with the star.

But keen observers were able to identify the campus shown in the background. We wonder how this came to the attention of administrators. Were they just searching for people talking about the college on social media? Or were they too watching the latest porn releases for, ahem, professional reasons?

The premise of the video is that a female college administrator working in the student support office drinks an aphrodisiac. Hot sex then occurs.

The video went viral on social media from around June 17, leading to (naive) speculation that a female administrator from a real college was appearing in porn. (These kinds of set-ups are common for AV in Japan, claiming the unnamed star works in a certain industry or location, but it is invariably just a scenario meant to appeal to particular fantasies. The “amateur” performers are almost always part-time porn stars who haven’t become famous yet to merit a credit in their own name.)

Meiji University is reportedly now consulting with police and lawyers over actions against the producers of the AV, which has been available for paid streaming since October 2019.

We tried to find the release on the usual Japanese platforms like MG Stage, but it seems to have gone — no doubt, in an effort to forestall a lawsuit. Fortunately, we could still find some highlights.

The performer is apparently Asuka Nakama (仲間明日香), formerly known as Karen Natsuhara (夏原カレン), who has been performing in porn on and off since 2009.

While university students in Japan consume vast amounts of porn, institutions are not supportive of their tastes. A college club that paid for top porn star Mana Sakura to come had to cancel the event.

On the other hand, Kyoto University once hosted a live shibari demonstration. It is also not unknown for genuine college students to work pretty much openly as porn stars, or for AV performers to be graduates of respected higher-education institutions.

Japanese porn is know for using certain locations, not least “that pool” — a particular swimming pool that became famous as the site for so much sex. It even inspired its own T-shirt.

Generally, a shoot will be done at a single location that the production company hires. More ambitious shoots may involve some other locations. A certain style of guerrilla-shot adult video does exist, perhaps most notably the “mirror truck” series of releases with a one-way window, so the people having sex inside feel like they are exposed to public view but passersby are none the wiser.

Some porn releases that focus on storylines of picking up an amateur on the streets start off somewhere like a certain district in Tokyo, filmed hastily and probably without permits. Recent examples include the AV filmed during the Shibuya Halloween street party and the Ebisu exploits of Saki Sudo, who was arrested for allegedly murdering her rich older husband.