Sex, Nudity, and Cinematic Culture Shock

[Kasumi_Lee]

In case it's not entirely obvious from my presence on Literotica, I'm not a prude. Having said that, there are certain conscious and unconscious assumptions we bring to cinematic viewing experiences based on the genre of the production we're watching. You wouldn't expect any childish humor in a psychological horror film or John Wick-style gunfights in a romantic comedy, and to a lesser extent this is true of how much graphic sex one expects to see. I love seeing naked bodies grinding together in passionate on-screen lovemaking as much as the next person, but it's not the sort of thing I expect to see in most films or TV shows that I watch.

I recently had my first introduction to the Phillippines' school of cinema in the form of a film called AFAM ("A Foreigner Assigned to Manila"). The film is in Tagalog and there were no subtitles, but the dialog was peppered with enough random English phrases for me to follow along. Daisy and Hazel are best friends who each go through a breakup and are recommended to try a new dating app for Filipinas seeking foreign (usually White) boyfriends. They each find an AFAM boyfriend and invite them to the hotel where they work . . . only to discover that they're dating the same man.

So Daisy and Hazel spend most of the film fighting over Jamey (or "JJ" or whatever his name his) and trying to sabotage each other while Jamey does what I imagine most men would do in this situation and enjoys being the center of attention. Three quarters of the way through, Daisy and Hazel reconcile and agree to share Jamey, consummating their reconciliation with the most epic hottub threeway I've ever seen outside of a porno. It's one long menage a trois scene that swaps between close-up shots and slowly spinning drone-cam footage.

That's not how the film ends, but no spoilers here. The point I'm making is that I was shocked, albeit in a strictly non-judgmental way, by how much sex and nudity there was in a film that's meant to be a romantic comedy. If you'd shown me the sex scenes in isolation and told me they were clips from a porn film, I'd have wondered why they're so shy about showing the crotch, but the bare breasts, booties, and full contact humping would have convinced me. In fact, the opening scene features Daisy and Hazel lezzing out in the shower together.

I certainly don't have any issues with two women (or two men) taking extra good care of each other, but this sort of naked shower scene isn't the sort of thing I would have expected to see in a Western rom-com - maybe I've been watching the wrong movies - not to mention the Philippines is still a deeply Catholic country, which makes the girl-girl scene extra interesting. I haven't decided to become a Philippines movie buff, but a cursory glance at some of the other Tagalog films suggests that this level of graphic sex and nudity is just par for the course.

I'd be interested to know what people's thoughts are on graphic sex and nudity in mainstream film and TV around the world and the cultural differences that play into them.

 

[THBGato]

I remember being in France as 14 year old on a school exchange and being shocked at the presence of nudity (always female) on day time TV, including in adverts.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

Well, if we’re really honest, there’s a lot of RomCom in any good sex.

That said, societal attitudes have shifted considerably. HBO is renowned for full frontal nudity, common billboard ads would have set my grandmother off in a set of vapours, breastfeeding in public in N. America has only recently become acceptable (seriously?). Of course, it’s not all one society, but many small ones. No doubt the Philippines are ahead of our curve.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

I remember watching the first episode of Money Heist which was dubbed into American, but I was watching the English subtitles anyway. They showed a woman and a man waking up, getting out of bed without the L-shaped Hollywood sheet, and they both wandered about naked then got clothes on.

I instantly realised this was a European programme, at the same time the partner realised the voices and the mouths didn't match so the show must be dubbed. Found the original (Spanish) and it made much more sense.

The UK is somewhere between northern Europe and the USA when it comes to acceptance of nudity. I hate that communal single-sex changing rooms and showers are getting rarer so kids don't get to see a range of real bodies, and saunas wearing swimsuits are just wrong, but at least we don't have items like 'breastfeeding covers' - instead the law says anyone may breastfeed wherever a baby may legally be present, and to suggest they should go elsewhere is sexual harassment. Usually you'd just get cafe staff compulsively offering you more glasses of water!

Usually one frame of a TV show is enough to show if it's UK or US - there's a much narrower range of appearances on US TV, with more obvious makeup.

 

[AchtungNight]

I grew up in the 1980s and 1990s and was allowed to watch all sorts of R-rated movies featuring nudity and love scenes. Dirty Dancing, Pretty Woman, White Sands, The Terminator… My first exposure to full female nudity was an Italian film called Mediterraneano featuring Natassja Kinski. My first exposure to lesbianism was Basic Instinct, followed by Bound. I enjoyed the exposure of love and nudity more than anything else in the films. It made me into the writer I am today.

 

[Kasumi_Lee]

I grew up in the 1980s and 1990s and was allowed to watch all sorts of R-rated movies featuring nudity and love scenes. Dirty Dancing, Pretty Woman, White Sands, The Terminator… My first exposure to full female nudity was an Italian film called Mediterraneano featuring Natassja Kinski. My first exposure to lesbianism was Basic Instinct, followed by Bound. I enjoyed the exposure of love and nudity more than anything else in the films. It made me into the writer I am today.

Sharon Stone was so hot in Basic Instinct! I've seen my fair share of sex and nudity in films, but I've always associated those things with "serious" films (however one defines "serious") rather than more light-hearted films. AFAM subverted my assumptions by being the first sexually explicit rom-com I've ever seen.

 

[SimonDoom]

I've thought for a long time that there's an enormous unfilled space in cinema for real, erotic sex. I'm not sufficiently educated about cinema around the world to speak knowledgeably, but this is my view about the USA. In this country we have mainstream cinema, which tiptoes around real sex, and then there's porn, which shows everything but usually presents it in an exaggerated, cartoonish way. There's relatively little in between (as far as I know). It's possible that the market in the USA simply isn't ready for it, but I wonder.

 

[InterestedBlonde]

I've thought for a long time that there's an enormous unfilled space in cinema for real, erotic sex. I'm not sufficiently educated about cinema around the world to speak knowledgeably, but this is my view about the USA. In this country we have mainstream cinema, which tiptoes around real sex, and then there's porn, which shows everything but usually presents it in an exaggerated, cartoonish way. There's relatively little in between (as far as I know). It's possible that the market in the USA simply isn't ready for it, but I wonder.

Yes, I agree with this. I have never seen anything that truly gets it exactly right, although I'm not spending serious time watching and trying to sort it all out. It is a bit frustrating though.

 

[litfan10]

Don't forget The Brown Bunny with graphic oral sex by Chloe Sevigny or Kerry Fox doing the same in Intimacy.
Or for very graphic lesbian sex in a very serious movie there was Blue is the Warmest Color.
Also look at Tinto Brass' catalog of work (besides Caligula) such as Cheeky or Voyeur.
One thing that drives me bonkers is how a lot of serious anime from Japan will have very graphic nudity on the cover of the packaging but for the American market that is not acceptable so often the nudity is covered by blood. Compare the Japanese cover of L.A. Blue Girl to the American version. One is a porn fest the other a gore fest. Consider the message here - violence is more acceptable than nudity. Crazy.

 

[OffNSFW]

I've thought for a long time that there's an enormous unfilled space in cinema for real, erotic sex. I'm not sufficiently educated about cinema around the world to speak knowledgeably, but this is my view about the USA. In this country we have mainstream cinema, which tiptoes around real sex, and then there's porn, which shows everything but usually presents it in an exaggerated, cartoonish way. There's relatively little in between (as far as I know). It's possible that the market in the USA simply isn't ready for it, but I wonder.

There's a journalist named Kate Hagen who did some terrific research on this subject for an article in Playboy a couple years ago. The gist of it is that American cinema has actually regressed when it comes to its representation of sex and nudity in movies. (As of 2020, we were at our lowest ebb since the 1960s.) There's also a really good editorial, written by the terrific R.S. Benedict, in Blood Knife called "Everyone Is Beautiful and No One Is Horny." That one tackles the issue specifically from the perspective of the superhero genre.

(I have elected not to include links, lest I get into trouble.)

 

[StillStunned]

And that's where we as Lit writers come in. We combine artful storytelling with hot explicit sex.

Well, in an ideal world we do.

 

[Euphony]

I've thought for a long time that there's an enormous unfilled space in cinema for real, erotic sex. I'm not sufficiently educated about cinema around the world to speak knowledgeably, but this is my view about the USA. In this country we have mainstream cinema, which tiptoes around real sex, and then there's porn, which shows everything but usually presents it in an exaggerated, cartoonish way. There's relatively little in between (as far as I know). It's possible that the market in the USA simply isn't ready for it, but I wonder.

Lesbian porn by women for women is about as close as we come but it suffers the same authenticity troubles when the raison d'etre is as a marketable product.

Same with the only fan couples.

Even just a camera being conspicuously around alters people's behaviors and those tend to be low level/low ego stakes behaviors not sex.

We are, of course, doing a miserable job of translating that humanity to media but I wonder if it might just be one of the rare, ineffable parts of the human condition.

I've always felt to share in that experience (even vicariously) is a bit like reading fiction. You have to draw from your own thoughts, experiences, and human nature to draw much of anything from it.

Much of porn or "risque" mainstream fringe has gone to the visceral or relies too much on old, tired, sexual scripts (we kiss then she blows maybe he licks then they fuck blah blah bore)

Then stuff outside the script ends up quickly herded into fetish which has it's own arms race to the bottom. (one can want to kiss an ankle or nuzzle an armpit b/c they just love the nooks and crannies of the owner, not b/c it's an object they can get off on objectifying.)

Sex is the world's oldest commodity and we've industrial revolution-ed the shit out of it to the detriment of it's highest parts.

Consumers (for the most part) have been conditioned or just accepted this as the way it is.

The top lists here are rife with a la carte "plays only the (sexual) hits" stuff.

It's a perpetuating cycle.

 

[Yarglenurp]

I am the opposite of a prude.

However, I hate sex scenes in regular movies because I am too selfish and impatient to enjoy them. If I’m in charge of the remote, I will just skip past the sex scenes. If I’m not a part of it, then it doesn’t interest me. It’s like watching those eating videos. I can’t taste the food, why would I want to watch someone eat?

It’s probably the main reason I prefer erotica over visual porn. It’s much easier to imagine the scene and jerk off to that than to watch two (or more) randos fuck each other.

 

[AchtungNight]

I will be watching AFAM soon. Thx for the recommendation. It's funny how foreign countries often get way more explicit than the US in their sex and violence on screen. I recently saw an Indian film called Kill that was incredibly violent- and awesome.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Many years ago the Australian government set up a multicultural TV broadcaster, SBS. For a while it was deeply uncool - stereotyped as the home of news in Serbo-Croatian and the wrong type of football - and then people realised that a lot of the European films had far more nudity and sex than we were used to on the other TV stations.

In US-made stuff, cable and streaming seems to be the home of nudity. I was surprised a couple of years back by a series on Starz that had not one but two depictions of erect wang, the second in the context of male-male sex.

 

[AchtungNight]

Lately I’ve been playing a computer rpg called The Last Sovereign. It’s set in a fantasy world with a hero amassing a harem of succubi, elves, and other beautiful women to take on an Incubus Emperor. Surprisingly well-written, decent graphics and turn-based gameplay. Lots of nudity and explicit sex. Free on Steam for those who are interested, in development since 2009, complete as of earlier this month.

 

[Yarglenurp]

I will say that, end of the day, I don’t think it’s culture, but more like law shaping where the money goes.

It’s not like Americans are less interested in sex than the French. It’s rather that there are few important court cases and industry institutions deciding what is and isn’t considered obscene. 1,000,000 people getting killed in a meteor strike? PG-13. A woman’s nipple in view? Rated R. You want to make money? Don’t be rated R. Because then parents won’t bring their kids to the show to watch, streaming interest is down, merchandising and franchise rights are down, etc.

Here, we’ve got to make a distinction between the culture of a people and the government they’re saddled with.

 

[Wifetheif]

Korean movies can really surprise you. "Old Boy" has a plot reveal that NO Hollywood studio would touch. (And DIDN'T when they adapted it into a Will Smith project!) An obscure Korean film I like is "The Temptation of Eve: the Good Wife." Which opens with a guy banging this absolutely gorgeous Korean woman he just hooked up with and then the guy goes to a meeting with a friend he hasn't seen in a few years who says he wants our hero to trail his wife as he is suspicious that she is unfaithful. He slides across her photo and it's the babe he just banged! From there a plot worthy of Hitchcock unspools with betrayals, misunderstandings, and plenty of steamy sex. The ending while completely logical seems to come out of left field.

 

[Kelliezgirl]

There's a journalist named Kate Hagen who did some terrific research on this subject for an article in Playboy a couple years ago. The gist of it is that American cinema has actually regressed when it comes to its representation of sex and nudity in movies. (As of 2020, we were at our lowest ebb since the 1960s.) There's also a really good editorial, written by the terrific R.S. Benedict, in Blood Knife called "Everyone Is Beautiful and No One Is Horny." That one tackles the issue specifically from the perspective of the superhero genre.

(I have elected not to include links, lest I get into trouble.)

All stems from the PG-13 rating.
Back in the 80s you were going to get an R rating so there was no reason to hold back. Movies like the Breakfast Club had R ratings.
Now, R is considered bad for the box office so they tone it all down to make sure they get a PG-13.

 

[Rustyoznail]

Many years ago the Australian government set up a multicultural TV broadcaster, SBS. For a while it was deeply uncool - stereotyped as the home of news in Serbo-Croatian and the wrong type of football - and then people realised that a lot of the European films had far more nudity and sex than we were used to on the other TV stations.

In US-made stuff, cable and streaming seems to be the home of nudity. I was surprised a couple of years back by a series on Starz that had not one but two depictions of erect wang, the second in the context of male-male sex.

And don't forget those two Aussie soap operas I rarely got to watch - Number 96 and The Box. TNA on prime time TV in the 70's.

 

[Yarglenurp]

I also can’t get into a sex scene also because I just can’t shake the idea that it’s fake. Sex is just too intimate as a bond between two people… seeing a simulated version, whether complete simulation (in movies) or emotional simulation (in porn) just feels false and wrong to me.

 

[Britva415]

How about Season 2 Episode 4 of "House of the Dragon" which featured a completely explicit on screen cock in mouth. Not a coy little back-of-the-head suggestive camera angle. Erect cock. Inside. Mouth.

If that ain't a sign of the times a-changin', as far as media for American audiences goes...

 

[Yarglenurp]

How about Season 2 Episode 4 of "House of the Dragon" which featured a completely explicit on screen cock in mouth. Not a coy little back-of-the-head suggestive camera angle. Erect cock. Inside. Mouth.

If that ain't a sign of the times a-changin', as far as media for American audiences goes...

I won’t be impressed until I see a man fellate a dragon

 

[OffNSFW]

All stems from the PG-13 rating.
Back in the 80s you were going to get an R rating so there was no reason to hold back. Movies like the Breakfast Club had R ratings.
Now, R is considered bad for the box office so they tone it all down to make sure they get a PG-13.

This is a vital component, and it goes hand in hand with the consolidation of media and increased corporate influence in the storytelling process. When 90% of your entertainment is clone-stamped and traceable in one way or another back to Disney (or some other multimedia empire... but usually Disney), you're not going to see much in the way of risk-taking.

That's not to say that there aren't exceptions. But they're just that. No one's rushing out to formularize Poor Things, All of Us Strangers, Portrait of a Lady on Fire...

 

[Kasumi_Lee]

Consider the message here - violence is more acceptable than nudity. Crazy.

That double standard has always boggled my mind. Scenes of someone blowing somebody else's brains out with a shotgun or stabbing them in the gut with a sword? Meh. Scenes of naked Human adults or a penis penetrating a vagina?