Soon illegal, stag movies, or blue movies, as they were referred to as, had been produced underground by amateurs for many years beginning within the 1940s. Processing the film took appreciable time and assets, with individuals utilizing their bathtubs to wash the movie when processing facilities (often tied to organized crime) had been unavailable. Writing about the origins of underground cinema, Arthur Knight and Hollis Alpert explain that hardcore films have been shipped by boat from Argentina to private buyers, largely in France and England, but additionally in additional distant locations reminiscent of Russia and the Balkans. It is considered that the porn movie was born in France virtually at the same time because the cinematographic medium, however it was in Buenos Aires the place the clandestine production of those movies, often known as stag films or smokers, was capitalized. In accordance with Patrick Robertson's Film Facts, "the earliest pornographic motion image which might undoubtedly be dated is A L'Ecu d'Or ou la bonne auberge" made in France in 1908. The plot depicts a weary soldier who has a tryst with a servant lady at an inn.
