Sex in Cinema: Greatest and Most Influential Erotic / Sexual Films and Scenes

Sex in Cinema:
The Greatest and Most Influential
Erotic / Sexual Films and Scenes

Sex in Cinema: In the following collection, excerpted from the Mini-History of Sex in the Cinema at this site, here are some of the most significant milestones, and most influential and memorable sexual/erotic scenes and films on the big screen through cinematic history. Most of these films, with portrayals of sex and/or nudity, were considered quite erotic, groundbreaking, unique and/or controversial at the time.

HISTORY OF SEX IN CINEMA - INDEX (chronological by film title)

Sex in Cinema: Part 23
Greatest and Most Influential Erotic / Sexual Films and Scenes
(chronological by film title)
Milestone Films With Scenes That Were Especially
Notorious, Infamous, Controversial, or Scandalous

Movie Title

Brief Scene Description

Example

Turkish Delight (1973, Netherlands) (aka Turks Fruit)

Director Paul Verhoeven's frank, provocative, and controversial film about love, sex, intimacy and loss/death was nominated for an Oscar as Best Foreign Language Film (defeated by Truffaut’s Day For Night) , and in 1999 was voted as the "Best Dutch Film of the Century" in the Nederlands Film Festival; Rutger Hauer (in his screen debut) starred as promiscuous bohemian Dutch sculptor Eric Vonk involved in a fateful, tempestuous relationship two years earlier (told in flashback) with uninhibited partner/wife Olga Stapels (19 year-old Monique van de Ven), culminating with a reunion and tragic Love Story ending (a brain tumor); in this sexually-explicit yet non-exploitative film, Eric boasted: "I f--k better than God" and proved his prowess and one-track mind for sex with numerous partners (including a pre- There's Something About Mary incident with his zipper) but could not forget the real love of his life, Olga; controversial elements included Eric's violent revenge-fantasy, his collection of sexual mementos (pictures and pubic hair souvenirs), full frontal nudity of both sexes, raw sexuality (masturbation), feces defecation and examination, the deathbed scene of Olga's father, and harsh language

War Goddess (1973) (aka The Amazons or Le Guerriere Dal Seno Nudo - (The Warriors with Naked Breasts))

This was an early low-budget, exploitative campy Spanish/French/Italian sword-and-sandal feature from famed director Terence Young (known later as the director of three Bond films and Wait Until Dark (1967)); the costume drama was released in 1974 in the US by American International Pictures; it featured unclothed Amazonian lesbians (brunette French actress Sabine Sun - wife of the director - and buxom blonde Alena Johnston as butchy Oreitheia and Queen Antiope, respectively) who wrestled topless (and then fully nude with a liberal application of sacred oil) in a contest to determine the society's next queen leader; also, to provide progeny for the tribe, Antiope was forced to dutifully mate with Greek king Theseus (Angelo Infanti) - and uncharacteristically fell in love

The Wicker Man (1973, UK)

Director Robin Hardy's mysterious horror/thriller included the much-discussed scene of the innkeeper's sensual daughter Willow MacGregor's (Britt Ekland) singing, dancing, writhing naked and pounding against the wall of repressed, self-denying, devoutly-religious Christian, and virginal Scottish policeman Sgt. Neil Howie (Edward Woodward) to entice him; he was conducting an investigation on the remote island of Summerisle inhabited by pagans who worshipped older gods and practiced open sexuality (women dancing naked in a circle around a bonfire, couples copulating in a graveyard, fertility rites, frank discussions in school about phallic symbols, etc.), in a case about the alleged kidnapping of a 12 year-old school-girl; he learned about virginal fire sacrifices inside a giant, hollow wicker-constructed figure of a man, where he suffered his own fate - after not having succumbed to the fleshly temptations provided by Willow

Big Bad Mama (1974)

B-movie producer Roger Corman's low-budget exploitation cult film, a Bonnie and Clyde knock-off, starred 43 year-old Angie Dickinson (who wasn't yet famous for her TV role in Police Woman) as Depression-era Texan widow Wilma McClatchie who resorted to crime (bootlegging, armed robbery, kidnapping, and bank robbing) to protect and provide for her equally nubile and promiscuous daughters Billy Jean (Susan Sennett) and Polly (Robbie Lee); the film included an infamous in-the-sack scene with Southern hustler-gambler William J. Baxter (William Shatner) who made love to Dickinson from behind as she grabbed the bedstand

Caged Heat (1974)

Director Jonathan Demme's first feature made for producer Roger Corman's New World Pictures was a low-budget, B-grade campy sexploitation classic; it showcased various attractive and empowered tough women in prison and was designed for the 'drive-in' crowd; its most notorious character was McQueen (scream queen veteran Barbara Steele) - the wheelchair-bound, repressive, and semi-lesbian prison warden; Demme's film is now considered one of the best of its type - an "innocent females in prison" film, advertised as "White Hot Desires Melting Cold Prison Steel!"; it featured frequent exploitative shower sequences, showing off a nude Cheryl Rainbeaux Smith, Roberta Collins and Erica Gavin

Candy Stripe Nurses (1974)

This R-rated soft-core sexploitation film was a mid-70s cult comedy - the last of the New World-Roger Corman variety, and a formulaic entry in New World's unofficial series; it was advertised with the tagline: "Playing doctor was never like this!"; it told about three high school girls working as volunteer hospital candy-stripers: Marisa (Maria Rojo), Sandy (top-billed Candice Rialson), and Dianne (Robin Mattson) and their under-age misadventures (a near rape, sex in a hospital's linen closet and patient's bed); most of the film involved their sexploits with a wrongly-accused Hispanic robber, a rock star, and a basketball player

Candice Rialson

Robin Mattson

Chinatown (1974)

Shared cigarette smoking between a couple had often been symbolic of the sex act in films during the Hays Code era; in a non-censorship era, on-screen couples could share a cigarette and be shown enjoying a smoke together following actual sexual intercourse; in this neo-noirish John Huston film, private detective J.J. Gittes (Jack Nicholson) and Mrs. Evelyn Mulwray (Faye Dunaway) leisurely smoked in a post-coital scene showing them naked in bed

Emmanuelle (1974, Fr.)

Emmanuelle 2 (1975, Fr.) (aka The Joys of a Woman)

Goodbye Emmanuelle (1977, Fr.)

The Emmanuelle Series: Fashion photographer Just Jaeckin was responsible for an endless classic series of soft-core, artistically-filmed, discreetly-photographed erotic cinema with an emphasis on "free love" and sex as a means of pretentious self-discovery - designed to appeal to audiences of both sexes; the non-hardcore but sex-filled film was designed to play in mainstream theatres where hardcore films had now been banned; the series, based on Emmanuelle Arsan's (actually real-name Maryat Rollet-Andriane) notorious novel of the same name, began with the sexually-adventurous and globe-trotting Emmanuelle (dark-haired Dutch actress Sylvia Kristel until she was replaced a decade later) in a variety of locales with different partners (male and female, either fantasized or real); this series played in normal theatres and became a franchise - it generated many sequels (official and otherwise unauthorized) and other direct-to-video and soft-core cable TV offerings into the 80s and early 90s

Emmanuelle (1974): in the first film, one of the highest-grossing French films of all time, the sexually-emancipated title character - who was in an open-marriage relationship - was almost instantly seduced in Bangkok on numerous occasions: by nude-sunbathing Ariane (Jeanne Colletin) beside the swimming pool (and later in the locker room and squash court), by uninhibited, topless teenaged girl Marie-Ange (17 year-old Christine Boisson) who pleasured herself openly (in her jeans shorts) while seated in a hanging wicker chair on the mansion's porch, and then by a pretty blonde female archaeologist named Bea (Marika Green); by film's end, Emmanuelle was exposed to opium addicts, lecherous drunks, and threesomes, and the film-viewer had seen an unknown actress blow cigarette smoke out of her vagina

Emmanuelle 2 - The Joys of a Woman (1975): the second film in this original series was highlighted by an extremely sensual bath-house scene with three female masseuses, featuring full-bodied massages (one performed by Laura Gemser) and pleasurable shampoos, and a love scene with the Ambassador's young daughter Anna-Maria (Catherine Rivet)

Goodbye Emmanuelle (1977) with Sylvia Kristel in her third film of the series
Emmanuelle IV (1984) briefly featuring Sylvia Kristel (in her last film of the series) with a sexually-awakened new younger identity (Mia Nygren) in Brazil
Emmanuelle V (1987) with Monique Gabrielle
Emmanuelle VI (1989) with Nathalie Uher

Emmanuelle (above)

Emmanuelle 2 (above)

Flesh Gordon (1974)

This was a mildly bawdy and silly, soft-core campy sci-fi film with spoofed characters (of the 30s superhero Flash Gordon serial) appropriately named Flesh Gordon (Jason Williams), Dale Ardor (Cindy Hopkins/Suzanne Fields) - forcibly stripped by Amazonian aliens, Emperor Wang the Perverted (William Hunt) and Dr. Flexi Jerkoff (Joseph Hudgins), and the planet Porno, a penis-shaped Stratos-ship, a cavern full of lesbians led by porn star Candy Samples as topless space queen Chief Nellie, a battle with a Penisaurus, also plenty of toilet humor, sexual innuendo, and frequent nakedness - warranting an X-rating; the film was so successful and humorous that an edited R-rated version was released for wider distribution to appeal to varied audiences and make more profits for the producers

Freebie and the Bean (1974)

Alan Arkin (as Bean) and James Caan (as Freebie) starred as two San Francisco rogue buddy-cops in this un-PC, R-rated parody of Dirty Harry cop films, by director Richard Rush; homosexuals were portrayed derisively and as cliches in this film (i.e., the evil, judo-kicking transvestite assassin in this film was shot down at Candlestick Park in the womens restroom by Freebie - who soaked up his own bloody wound with sanitary napkins)

Going Places (1974, Fr.) (aka Les Valseuses)

Bertrand Blier's French-style Easy Rider road film (the title literally meant: "testicles") included misogynistic, offensive small-time bohemian crooks sought by the police: Jean-Claude (Gérard Depardieu) and Pierrot (Patrick Dewaere) who were both obsessed with abusive sex during a wild, aimless, joy-riding journey in the French countryside in the company of beautician Marie-Ange (Miou-Miou) - a young disinterested hostage that they both wanted to cure of orgasmic frigidity during three-way sex in which they alternatingly took turns; the arrival of recently-released, empowered ex-convict Jeanne Pirolle (Jeanne Moreau) taught the two men - in a three-way - about love, before she committed suicide in their hotel room; the film was partially edited/censored for its US release

Ilsa: She-Wolf of the SS (1974)

This was the original film in a series of infamous, violent and shocking, so-called Nazi-exploitation films, all with the title of Ilsa; there were also three low-budget sequels including Ilsa: Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks (1976), Ilsa: The Tigress of Siberia (1977), and Ilsa: The Wicked Warden (1977) (also pictured); this sick and semi-pornographic film with abundant gratuitous nudity and gruesome incidents was shot on the set used for the Hogan's Heroes TV show after it was cancelled; Ilsa (Las Vegas showgirl Dyanne Thorne) was featured as the camp's over-the-top sadistic commandant who personally inspected stripped female prisoners (including cult starlets Sharon Kelly and Uschi Digard) and performed experiments upon them, as well as forced herself upon male prisoners and then castrated them

Ilsa: She-Wolf of the SS (1974)

Ilsa: The Wicked Warden (1977)

Immoral Tales (1974, Fr.) (aka Contes Immoraux)

Polish director Walerian Borowczyk's X-rated soft-core anthology film contained four different erotic historical tales/segments: (1) The Tide (La Maree) - featuring a 20 year old boy and his 16 year old cousin Julie (Lise Danvers) whom he persuaded to perform oral sex on him - timed to the rhythmic onrushing tides of the ocean, (2) Therese Philosophe - after being locked up in her bedroom, Victorian-era Therese (Charlotte Alexandra) was sexually awakened by masturbation with various objects, including a cucumber, (3) Erzsebet Bathory - a semi-historical account of mid-1500s countess Elisabeth Bathory (Paloma Picasso, daughter of the famous painter) who was obsessed with her beauty - and bathing in the blood of young, freshly-showered virginal girls - culminating with an orgy and bloody massacre in the countess' bedroom, and (4) Lucrezia Borgia - an account of Lucrezia Borgia (Florence Bellamy) involved in an incestuous 15th century orgy with her brother and her father the Pope (Alexander VI) - her brother took her from behind as she fellated the Pope

(1) The Tide

(2) Therese Philosophe

(3) Erzsebet Bathory

(4) Lucrezia Borgia

The Night Porter (1974, It./USA) (aka Il Portiere di Notte)

Co-writer and director Liliana Cavani's shocking and dark adult arthouse drama, typical of the boundaries-breaking films coming from Europe at this time, told about the unhealthy, twisted, sado-masochistic, co-dependent relationship (between abused sexual-slave/victim and oppressor during the Holocaust) that was rekindled between androgynous concentration camp survivor Lucia Atherton (Charlotte Rampling) and her ex-SS camp commandant-captor, torturer and lover Max Aldorfer (Dirk Bogarde) - who was encountered in-hiding and working as a night porter at a hotel in post-war Vienna twelve years later where she was staying as a hotel guest; they relived and reawakened their sordid past and master/slave relationship by reestablishing a tragic love affair after first startling chance meeting at a 1957 opera performance of Mozart's Die Zauberflote; in one sexually-provocative, visually-stunning scene, Max had perversely forced a bare-breasted Lucia to dress only in pants (with suspenders), lengthy black leather gloves, and Nazi headgear (subsequently a Nazi fetish costume often duplicated), and perform a seductive cabaret number; their relationship (of submission and subjugation) was now freely re-established until Max's former SS colleagues feared discovery and executed them both; the film about obsessive sexual behavior brought outrage and controversy by Jewish leaders, feminists, and Nazi concentration camp survivors who opposed the idea of seeking sexual gratification by abuse from a Nazi captor

Vampyres (1974) (aka Vampyres: Daughters of Darkness, or Daughters of Dracula)

This ultra-erotic horror/vampire film, typical of a slew of similar exploitative films in the 1970s, was much more extreme than the stereotypical Hammer Studios film, such as The Vampire Lovers (1970) and its sequel Lust for a Vampire (1971); this film's tagline clearly explained its ultimate appeal: "They shared the pleasures of the flesh, and the horrors of the grave!", capitalizing on the parallel connection between vampirism and sex, and eroticism and gore; Spanish director José Ramón Larraz's film told about a pair of gorgeous lesbian-bisexual, blood-lusting vampires, brunette Fran (nude model Marianne Morris) and blonde Miriam (ex-Playboy centerfold Anulka Dziubinska), who took passers-by on a foggy country road to their gothic castle, where they were fed, offered carnal sex, and then they killed their victims with knives in order to suck their blood

HISTORY OF SEX IN CINEMA - INDEX (chronological by film title)