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Lasse Braun (born in Algiers, Algeria) is an Italian director, labelled as the Legendary King of Modern Pornography, who produced films with the motto Style in Pornography. He claims to have lost his virginity at age 8, with a 9-year-old Italian girl in the attic of his house.

He was the son of a diplomat, and attended law school. His doctoral dissertation, Judiciary Censorship in the Western World provoked controversy, and was promptly censored.

He was active in directing from 1961 to 1977, retiring on June 1977.

He is the father of director Axel Braun.

Historical background

Born into a wealthy, aristocratic Italian family, Braun was destined to become a diplomat, following in his father's footsteps. Having passed all of his Law exams at the State University of Milan (1956-63), he prepared the defense of his doctoral dissertation entitled Judiciary Censorship in the Western World, but its contents and underlying radical ideas provoked so much controversy that it was promptly dismissed. An MP from Denmark translated it into Danish however, thus laying the foundation for the legalisation of pornography in Denmark on 4 June 1969.

Braun places himself firmly in the tradition of 18th century pornographers such as Restif de la Bretonne, who was the first author to coin the word "pornography" in his plea for the institutionalisation of brothels in Le Pornographe (1769) and to describe a comprehensive range of sexual variations in L'Anti-Justine ou les Délices de l'Amour (1798) .
Another source of inspiration consists of the Priapistic rituals and orgiastic festivals of the Dionysus cult, as well as ceremonies in veneration of Aphrodite Πὀρνὴ (Porne), the goddess of Lust and patroness of courtesans. According to Braun, censorship itself is obscene, and the suppression of sexual desire by the political and religious establishment over the centuries has only led to psychological damage and frustration.
In his 740-page novel Lady Caligula, Braun goes against the grain by portraying Caligula as a brilliant character, instead of the deranged emperor described in Edward Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire and in I, Claudius.

Partial filmography

• Night and Day
• Possession
• Sensations
• Sin Dreamer
• Desire
• French Blue
• Body Love (music by Klaus Schulze)

He appeared as himself in the 2001 TV movie Ich der King of Porn... Das abenteuerliche Leben des Lasse Braun (Me as the King of Porn... The Adventurous Life of Lasse Braun).

Quotes

• "I believe pornography is at the center of the biggest cultural revolution of our century."