Erotic Scenes in the 90s:
- Peter Greenaway's strange, strong, and powerful The
Cook, the Thief, His Wife and Her Lover (1990), with a mix of nudity,
sex, cannibalism - and more - set in an exclusive London restaurant
- the molding scene on a spinning potter's wheel, with a
lump of grayish clay, between the shared wet hands of Patrick Swayze and
Demi Moore in Ghost (1990)
-
Annette
Bening's method of "settling" her rent bill (the choice is either "the
lady or the loot") and her bare doorway seduction of John Cusack in The
Grifters (1990)
- seductive femme fatale Virginia Madsen's adultery
with con man Don Johnson, and a beautiful but troubled Jennifer Connelly's
bare skinny-dip in director Dennis Hopper's crime drama The Hot Spot
(1990)
- sultry Victoria Abril's infamous masturbatory bath scene
with the aid of a vibrating toy diver that swims straight into her crotch
in Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodovar's Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! (1990)
- the uninhibited, cross-country, hot love-making bouts
between sex-loving Laura Dern's Lulu ("Uh, oh. Baby, you'd better get
me back to that hotel. You got me hotter than Georgia asphalt") and
Nicolas Cage's Sailor in David Lynch's Wild at Heart (1990)
- the last explicit sex scene between Mickey Rourke and then-girlfriend
Carre Otis in Zalman King's controversial Wild Orchid (1990)
- Madeleine Stowe's moonlight skinny-dip with Ed Harris in
China Moon (1991)
- Theresa Russell as a cynical, low-rent hooker in Ken Russell's
Whore (1991), a film that originally was rated NC-17
- sexually-uninhibited Laura Dern's bedtime lesson on the
'birds and the bees' for a young 13 year-old Lukas Haas in Rambling Rose
(1991)
- Geena Davis making love to handsome and muscular Brad Pitt
in Thelma & Louise (1991)
- Sharon Stone's exhibitionistic panty-less leg-crossing
that intimidates the cops questioning her during an interrogation, and a
scene of oral sex (in the 'director's cut' version) between Michael Douglas
and Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct (1992)
- the scene of a sexually deviant and crippled Peter Coyote
licking milk off the chest of a totally-nude Emmanuelle Seigner in Roman
Polanski's Bitter Moon (1992)
- the sight of Madonna dripping hot candle wax on Willem
Dafoe's chest and other S & M sex scenes in Body of Evidence (1992)
- the perverse and grotesque sexual obsession of deranged
surgeon Julian Sands for 'Venus de Milo' amputee Sherilyn Fenn - including
the first view of the armless/legless woman in Boxing Helena (1992)
- the wild, illicit, and torrid sexual couplings of Jeremy
Irons with his son's fiancee Juliette Binoche in Damage (1992)
the
unrequited love scenes between Daniel Day-Lewis and Madeline Stowe in The
Last of the Mohicans (1992)- model-turned-actress Jane March as an amorous, underage
French schoolgirl in 1929 colonial Vietnam engaged in a forbidden inter-generational
and inter-racial affair with an older Chinese man (Tony Leung), and their
numerous explicit entwinings and couplings in the man's dark streetside
room in Jean Jacques Annaud's The Lover (1992)
- the erotic, inter-racial love scene in a Biloxi motel room
between Denzel Washington and Sarita Choudhury in Mississippi Masala
(1992)
- Jennifer Jason Leigh bathing and also pleasuring herself
in her bed in Single White Female (1992)
- Drew Barrymore's bloody shower scene in the weird horror
film Doppelganger: The Evil Within (1993)
- Demi Moore's and Woody Harrelson's love-making on sheets
covered with bills in Adrian Lyne's Indecent Proposal (1993)
- Penelope Cruz's young eroticism, when her breasts and
nipples are lovingly caressed and kissed in Jamon, Jamon (1993, Sp.)
- the scene in which Harvey Keitel is under the piano, finds
a hole in Holly Hunter's stocking and just touches her skin in The Piano
(1993)
- Julianne Moore, nude from the waist down, in a prolonged
argument scene with husband Matthew Modine as she attempts to hairdryer-dry
her wine-stained dress in Short Cuts (1993)
Sharon
Stone reprising her cool beauty and nudity alone in a bathtub - this time
in the obsessively voyeuristic Sliver (1993)- the dark, gorgeous sensuality of Creole-blooded Karina
Lombard in turn-of-the-century Jamaica in John Duigan's frank Wide Sargasso
Sea (1993), an NC-17 rated film
- Bruce Willis' full-frontal nudity, pool swim, and torrid
sexual escapades with lithe, provocative co-star temptress Jane March in
the erotic psychological thriller Color of Night (1994)
- Madchen Amick as a slinky, mysterious, scheming and malevolent
but gorgeous seductress in Dream Lover (1994)
- several nude scenes with well-endowed Alyssa Milano in
the erotic vampire thriller Embrace of the Vampire (1994)
- Atom Egoyan's truly erotic and compelling Exotica (1994)
with a young stripper (Mia Kirshner) catering to one of her troubled strip-joint
customers
- the scenes of love-making between real-life couple Alec
Baldwin and Kim Basinger in the re-made The Getaway (1994)
- the lusty, evil, sex-can-destroy-you femme fatale
Linda Fiorentino in John Dahl's modern film noir The Last Seduction
(1994) who makes love against a fence in an alley behind a saloon; some
memorable quotes: "You're my designated f--k," and "F--king
doesn't have to be anything more than f--king"
the
generous, free-spirited models who pose 'au naturel' for a controversial
Australian painter-artist, a blind handyman who makes a full-frontal nude
appearance, and the sensual naked swim of the beauties to sexually awaken
Hugh Grant's repressed wife (Tara Fitzgerald), who at one point appears
stark naked in church in Sirens (1994); with a vamping, Sports
Illustrated super-model Elle Macpherson in her acting debut (full-figured
and often disrobed) and Portia de Rossi - Helen Trasker's (Jamie Lee Curtis) clumsy strip-tease -
unknowingly - for her husband Harry (Arnold Schwarzenegger) in True Lies
(1994)
- William Friedkin's sleazy, psycho-thriller who-dun-it Jade
(1995) from screenwriter Joe Eszterhas featuring Linda Florentino, kinky
luridness, and aberrant sexuality
- the strong sexual content in Larry Clark's Kids (1995),
with several scenes of NYC teens (including Chloe Sevigny) engaged in promiscuous,
emotionless sex with lethal consequences
- alcoholic Nicolas Cage and lonely hooker Elizabeth Shue
- a tragic couple who have found each other in Leaving Las Vegas (1995)
- Demi Moore's revelation of her glistening breasts in a
bathing scene as the adulteress Hester Prynne in the freely-adapted The
Scarlet Letter (1995)
the
dry hump lapdance with fully-clothed Kyle MacLachlan, and the poolside oral
sex and thrashing lovemaking scene enhanced with champagne, the topless
dance audition, big-name nude dancer Gina Gershon's dressing room scene,
and numerous strip scenes and pole dances involving a leggy and gyrating
Elizabeth Berkley in director Paul Verhoeven's and writer Joe Eszterhas'
campy, prurient, and misogynistic view of the Las Vegas sex industry in
Showgirls (1995) - an NC-17 rated film- the sexy, sci-fi alien Sil (model Natasha Henstridge)
naked in a hot tub and looking for a suitable mate for reproduction in Species
(1995)
- the breathy Jennifer Tilly's and butch Gina Gershon's believable
lesbian relationship in the thriller Bound (1996), including Tilly's
tantalizing request for Gershon to feel her breast's tattoo, and her confession
before sucking Gershon's finger and directing it south: "Isn't it obvious?
I'm trying to seduce you...I've wanted to ever since I saw you that day
in the elevator. I know you don't believe me, but I can prove it to you.
You can't believe what you'd see, but you can believe what you feel. I've
been thinking about you all day"
- the alternating kinky and depraved sex scenes (for example,
sex in a car wash) with gruesome car crashes, including Holly Hunter's revealing
of her nudity to James Spader after a car crash that fatally wounded her
husband in David Cronenberg's controversial film Crash (1996)
-
Ralph
Fiennes' erotic bath scene with Kristin Scott Thomas in The English Patient
(1996)
- both Ashley Judd and Mira Sorvino displaying extensive
nudity as two sides of the split personality of love-seeking Marilyn Monroe
in the made-for-HBO cable TV Norma Jean and Marilyn (1996), including
Judd in a recreation of the famous nude calendar shoot against a red backdrop
- a hot love-making sequence between sexy trouble-maker Ashley
Judd and Luke Perry in Normal Life (1996)
- Demi Moore as a stripper in Striptease (1996), a
mainstream skin-flick for which the actress was paid $12 million to bare
all
- the how-to's of the female orgasm revealed - lessons from
a tantric sex therapist for couple Sheryl Lee and Craig Sheffer in Bliss
(1997)
- Heather Graham as a receptive and naked Rollergirl ("I
don't take my skates off"), Julianne Moore as porn star Amber Waves,
and the revelation of Dirk Diggler's (Mark Wahlberg) 'main attraction' at
the conclusion of Boogie Nights (1997)
- director Mira Nair's Kama Sutra: A Tale of Love (1997),
a stunningly-beautiful tale of love set in 16th century India, with a seductive
Indira Varma as courtesan Maya trained in the art of love and her competitive
best friend Tara (Sarita Choudhury); the film was edited for its American
R-rated release, but uncut for video
gorgeous
Penelope Cruz' bold, topless love-making scene in Alejandro Amenabar's Open
Your Eyes (1997, Sp.), and another similar scene with real-life lover
Tom Cruise in the remake Vanilla Sky (2001)- the sensually-erotic bathtub scene of Jamie Pressly in
Poison Ivy 3 (1997)
- Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio making love in the back
seat of a car onboard the doomed, and Winslet's naked posing for the sake
of art in Titanic (1997)
- teen vamp Kathryn's (Sarah Michelle Geller) wet and slow-kissing
education of Selma Blair in the park in Cruel Intentions (1998),
and Blair's assessment: "That was cool!"
- Angelina Jolie as the wild, tragic supermodel Gia (1998),
with her daring, naked fashion-shoot behind a chain-link fence
- the romantic slow dance of Montana horse healer Robert
Redford with NY editor Kristin Scott Thomas in The Horse Whisperer (1998)
- the scene of Antonio Banderas' skillful fencing that undresses
beautiful opponent Catherine Zeta-Jones with a few swishes of his sword
in The Mask of Zorro (1998)
- the locked-in-a-car trunk scene when bank robber George
Clooney and federal marshal Jennifer Lopez exchange sexy quips and banter
in Out of Sight (1998)
- Joan Allen's acquisition of color after her first orgasmic,
masturbatory experience in Pleasantville (1998)
- Joseph Fiennes' unwrapping of Gwyneth Paltrow's bound torso
for naked love-making in Shakespeare in Love (1998)
- Heather Graham's and Robert Downey, Jr.'s dimly-lit, clothed
oral sex exchange in Two Girls and a Guy (1998)
the
lesbian scene and the passionate and extended, three-way menage a trois
sex scene between sexually provocative teens (including Denise Richards,
Neve Campbell and Matt Dillon) in the overtly-sexy and trashy 'guilty pleasure'
Wild Things (1998)- Kevin Spacey's fantasizing about teenaged cheerleader Mena
Suvari - when he envisions her opening her team jacket to reveal her breasts
and a cascade of red rose petals, and his discovery of her inexperience
when she becomes frightened after he unbuttons her blouse in American
Beauty (1999)
- the first sexual encounter - an extended lesbian love-making
scene - between gender-confused Hilary Swank and love interest Chloe Sevigny
in Boys Don't Cry (1999)
- the generous nudity included in the examination of the
lives of five exotic dancers in a strip club (including Jennifer Tilly and
Daryl Hannah) in the erotic drama Dancing at the Blue Iguana (2000)
- Katie Holmes' unexpected baring of her breasts for Greg
Kinnear in the thriller The Gift (2000)
- Larry Clark's follow-up (third) film about amoral, violent,
and drug-using youth, the compelling Bully (2001), with open, visceral
nudity; it was accused of being exploitative and leering
- the brief, highly-tauted topless view of Halle Berry casually
reading in a lounge chair in Swordfish (2001) for which the actress
was allegedly paid $500,000
- the passionate depiction of teenage lesbian love between
boarding school roommate seniors - the intense, wild-at-heart, striking,
and brash renegade tomboy Paulie (Piper Perabo) and the beautiful and voluptuous
Tori (Jessica Pare) in the melodramatic coming-of-age love story Lost
and Delirious (2001)
Halle
Berry's Oscar-winning performance as an emotionally-devastated widow who
begs prison guard Billy Bob Thornton "Make...me...feel...good"
before a raw and animalistic scene of love-making, including cunnilingus,
in Monster's Ball (2001) - two topless, exploratory lesbian love-making scenes between
pert blonde Naomi Watts and dark-haired femme fatale Laura Harring
in David Lynch's twisting Mulholland Drive (2001)
- Diane Lane's Oscar-nominated performance as a straying
housewife, with notable nude scenes of her love affair with a French bookdealer,
in Adrian Lyne's Unfaithful (2002)
- Meg Ryan's first nude scenes as a sexually-hungry teacher
in Jane Campion's erotic thriller In the Cut (2003)
The New Explicitness: Art and Independent Films
Famed director Stanley Kubrick's last film, an erotic, emotionally-involving
art-house movie, Eyes Wide Shut (1999), broke new ground by starring
real-life couple Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman as a super-sexy New York husband
and wife. Its most talked-about sequence was a heavily digitally-edited, masked
orgy with many naturally-endowed, almost-nude females, and Cruise's roaming
through a mansion's rooms filled with copulating couples.
Shortly
afterwards, female French director Catherine Breillat presented the notorious,
sexually-graphic drama import titled Romance (1999) (with no MPAA rating,
although it undoubtedly would have been an NC-17 rating with its full frontal
nudity and explicit sex including masturbation, oral sex, and penetration)
- it marked a turning point in the candid depiction of non-pornographic sex
on screen. It recounted the tale of a teacher named Marie (Caroline Ducey)
who sought out physical fulfillment and erotic sexuality from someone other
than her boyfriend - a studly Paolo (porn star Rocco Siffredi), although she
also revealed masochistic tendencies.
Other
controversial mainstream films that would have been NC-17, all released unrated
because of graphic sex (and sometimes violence), included Wayne Wang's The
Center of the World (2000), Darren Aronofsky's Requiem for a Dream
(2000) with a simulated group-sex sequence involving Jennifer Connelly,
and the French export Baise-moi (2001) (aka Rape Me). The latter film
featuring both graphic sex and violence (that engendered a ratings controversy)
was co-directed by feminists Virginie Despentes and Coralie Trinh Thi, and
starred porn actresses Karen Bach and Raffaela Anderson as two 'bad girls'
on the road.
Patrice Chéreau's bleak French arthouse film Intimacy (2001), her first English-language film, was noted for extremely graphic and explicit sex scenes, heretofore unseen. It was the first theatrically-distributed film to depict the act of fellatio. It portrayed a married woman's (Kerry Fox) engagement in a series of once-weekly, Wednesday afternoon, emotionally-apathetic, physical encounters with emotionally-cold and lonely, divorced bar manager Jay (Mark Rylance). This controversial film exhibited their sexual couplings, with numerous, unflattering and raw, wordless sexual encounters.
Director Alfonso Cuaron's sexy Mexican film Y Tu Mama Tambien (2001) (And Your Mama Too), a frank, bold
and life-affirming, erotic coming-of-age road film, displayed generous amounts
of both male and female nudity of two sexually-obsessed, 17 year old males
and their older adulterous cousin's wife Luisa (Maribel Verdu) on a car journey
to a non-existent paradisical beach. The traumatic reversibly-told Irreversible (2002, Fr.) included a shocking, real-time 9 minute rape scene (endured by star Monica Bellucci).
Other controversial and graphic works from fearless and provocative
director Catherine Breillat included the shocking coming-of-age film Fat Girl (2001)
- a painful look at the awkwardness of adolescent sexuality, Sex Is Comedy
(2002) - about a female film director shooting a sex scene, and Anatomy
of Hell (2004) - featuring a prolonged, demystifying study of the heroine's
naked body over four nights by an indifferent gay stud rescuer (Italian porn
star Rocco Siffredi), who describes his reasons for being repulsed.
Bernardo Bertolucci's explicit film of sexual discovery and intimacy, The Dreamers (2003) was the first NC-17 rated film in 6 years. Writer/director/star Vincent Gallo's criticized independent
film The Brown Bunny (2004) brought boos at the Cannes Film Festival
and tremendous derision (and further broke down the division between pornography
and erotica) with its actual hard-core scene of fellatio being performed in
the film's final minutes between Gallo and real-life former girlfriend Chloe
Sevigny in the role of Daisy. Gallo refused the NC-17 rating, and instead
opted for having it unrated. Michael Winterbottom's 9 Songs (2004, UK) included many instances of unsimulated sexual intercourse between the two leads. And Trey Parker's un-PC Team America: World Police (2004) displayed puppets having sex.
John Cameron Mitchell's Shortbus (2006) had the widest release of any film showing unsimulated sex, and was screened at the Toronto Film Festival and in theaters nationwide, including mainstream cinemas and multiplexes in malls.
For further information, see this site's extensive: Sex
in Cinema: Greatest and Most Influential Erotic / Sexual Films and Scenes.
