Hollywood sex scenes decline by 40%
- Thread starter CharlesAznable
- Start date
Sure I think my post covers that logic in my last sentence?
I wasn't arguing against inclusions.
In fact the article's framing is odd. Did they really track every piece of media to get these stats?
Maybe its not less sex but less media tackling sex as the theme or topic?
Very embarrassed to be on a forum full of these "it's never necessary" and "good, glad they're going away" takes. Sex is a part of human interaction and communication. There are active threads on this forum started by people feeling hurt and confused by what's going on in their sex lives. Acting like it's some verboten part of human life no one is supposed to ever see or talk about feeds right into the puritanical impulses of conservative culture, and I'll take a hard pass on that.
Even if the entire point of a scene or a piece of art is just to tittilate, that is okay. That's an okay feeling to have as a human being. There are many issues to talk about w/r/t sexualizing things inappropriately and treating actors the right way, but a blanket "never show it" sentiment is just sad to see.
Anyway, the decline surely has more to do with the extreme decline in the percentage of movies with an R rating, anyway, as the movie-going public got younger.
Compare the mighty red shaft on the left to the little red nub on the right.
I guess in 2020, we dealt with the pandemic by being 90s-level horny and then reverted to mean?
I should say I find the corollary more troubling -- that the % of G-rated movies is down, subsumed by PG and PG-13. As a father of 5-year-old twin girls, PG can and does go too hard. I like that 90s blend of ratings a lot better tbh.
I don't disagree with your statement but I am struggling with the idea that our personal need to to engage with sex also means that entertainment and media have to tackle it to a certain level?
What statistic would be acceptable as normal?
I think we are kind of stuck on this article saying its in decline but I question the methodology
And those people's opinions existing don't invalidate mine or the other people who feel the same way as me. Kind of strange to use other opinions existing as a "gotcha" dismissal of my own. If all opinions have equal weight, why is me expressing mine such an offensive thing to some of you? Some weird shit going on in this thread tbh. "Go watch something else" is one of the worst responses you can have towards someone's criticism of something. No, I'm going to watch what I want. And if I think one aspect of the movie is gratuitous or didn't belong, I'm going to say so.
Anyway, if you read what I'm actually saying in my full posts, I'm specifically talking about movies that would otherwise have been close to PG-13 action films that a teenager could watch with their family suddenly having a sex scene in the middle when they could have just faded to black. That happened pretty often when I was a kid/teen and watched more movies with my family. I'm not talking about Fallout or Game of Thrones here (though if we WERE talking about GoT, I'd have criticisms of those sex scenes too, but they'd be different criticisms).
Just because this article claims "hollywood" tackles sex less (and claims the demand is declining for content including it) I am not sure I am buying what they are selling
We live in an environment with more factors than just Hollywood entertainment when it comes to personal engagement with content about sex.
It's a very short article and it is kind of hard to have anything but a speculative conversation about its premise and what its claiming.
We live in an environment with more factors than just Hollywood entertainment when it comes to personal engagement with content about sex.
It's a very short article and it is kind of hard to have anything but a speculative conversation about its premise and what its claiming.
people really underestimate how much of the things they enjoy in film were done under awful conditions for women. if society was different at that time, much of it wouldnt have existed for them to even hail as a lost golden age tbhWe need to maybe find better examples of empowering on-screen sexuality than Paul Verhoeven.
Sharon Stone Says Paul Verhoeven Played Every Other ‘Basic Instinct’ Screen Test Against Hers — None Measured Up
Sharon Stone recalled Paul Verhoeven going to great lengths to help her audition for "Basic Instinct" alongside Michael Douglas.www.indiewire.com
This wasn't directed at me, but seriously, it's a rude ad hominem attack on someone who doesn't deserve it.
You make some good points elsewhere. Don't let them be lost by making crazy statements like this. As if there's even some known 'law' of what art is or how it works anyway.
This thread needs more hugs (but no sex, unless it adds to the scene and an intimacy coordinator is present).
I don't have a good answer; it's probably not the kind of thing where there's an ideal statistic. But I'd say if it's part of human life there should be room to depict it, talk about it, engage with it realistically and honestly, and accept as part of ourselves. "Why include it?" Because we experience it, we have feelings about it, it's part of our stories with our partners, things happen during it that confuse and excite us, etc. It's an intense part of life to just "yadda yadda" over!
Yeah I agree, all this article does is take a slice from the "top 200 grossing" films from 2000 and last year and do a comparison, but in that time the % of R rated movies by market share has dropped from like 40% to 15%, replaced by PG-13 movies targeting a broader audience -- so, duh?
Saying "Scene A in movie B didn't work for me", it's fine and good. Like, in Abrams second Star Trek movie, it had the weirdest Alice Eve in her underwear scene ever, just a straight up "You nerds will like this, incredibly attractive woman in her underwear for no fucking reason" scene.
That's okay, scene didn't work for you. Going from that to "Sex and nudity is unnecessary and doesn't add anything to movies", well, for you, and other people will disagree. Let people have what they like as long as it doesn't harm anyone.
The baby-fication of movies continues.
I swear some of y'all just want movies with Ryan Reynolds/Dwayne Johnson delivering quips for 92 minutes.
I swear some of y'all just want movies with Ryan Reynolds/Dwayne Johnson delivering quips for 92 minutes.
That audience is definitely served if you seek it. The bravery and diversity of truly adult offerings tackling these topics and compelling ways are definitely out there
Pointing out that there aren't mass market consumption versions of these products is like.... I dunno. Do we need that specifically? As long as the medium isn't in decline to the point where people feel like they can't make this content and find an audience then I'm not sure I am overly concerned.
Not Ryan Reynolds, he managed to make a superhero movie with sex, and it completely ruined the experience...
Not that I don't think it's feasible that Verhoeven has, at points, crossed some borders with actors (he's pretty well-known for pushing his actors to the limits, ex. in Elle Isabelle Hupperts screams to "stop!" were real as she didn't expect the scene to be that realistic).We need to maybe find better examples of empowering on-screen sexuality than Paul Verhoeven.
Sharon Stone Says Paul Verhoeven Played Every Other ‘Basic Instinct’ Screen Test Against Hers — None Measured Up
Sharon Stone recalled Paul Verhoeven going to great lengths to help her audition for "Basic Instinct" alongside Michael Douglas.
However, the story that Sharon Stone was tricked into doing the panty-less shot is pretty disputed since multiple people who worked on the film have said that Sharon Stone definitely agreed to having her panty-less crotch in the shot for a couple of seconds. Verhoeven himself said he discussed the scene at length with Stone, including explicitly asking if she would be okay with what is essentially a close-up of her crotch on screen.
This entire story is a "he said, she said" situation and we'll probably never know what was actually discussed.
(On a personal note, I would also find it very weird if the crotch-shot wasn't very specifically in the script, considering it's the entire point of the scene)
Last edited:
Some would say they cant even make good movies!
very fuckin' weird to see people opining for the Hays Code. Ida Lupino, Otto Preminger, Billy Wilder, Sidney Lumet and many more didnt do the work they did to see the system regress like this.
But I guess people like the puritanical nature of the Catholic Church encroaching once again on the arts and humanities. A sad state of affairs for culture at large.
But I don't like sports! Why isn't everything made for me
Whatever the number of directors/writers/actors who wants to include those scenes in their movies. I just think putting any rules in filmmaking goes against the point of art
Then don't expect business models to adapt unless the underlying culture changes. They are inherently reactionary and usually don't do their subject matter justice unless by some happy accident they get a great team of creators to do their best work.
Technically, Disney did produce two of the most sex-heavy films of last year with Poor Things and All of Us Strangers.
I think in the case of an actor who felt pressure the entire time from a screen test onwards it's fair to say Verhoeven was exactly the worst person to ask Sharon about the scene. This is why intimacy coordinators exist now, involving someone who isn't financially incentivized to get actors to do what they want is essential even before scripts are finalized. So when it went bad at the end, yeah that's still on the director who likely had zero safety training and poor set control over the shooting conditions for Sharon in the moment. Think less about 'he said, she said' and more about the power dynamics at play in 2006, with men like Weinstein at the height of their power. Modern ideas of who is on an actor's side did not even remotely exist so "Paul asked for permission" isn't a powerful defense in his favor.
So if folks are being sincere in their desire for more sex scenes and can at least acknowledge (as so far few have) the agency problems this creates for the performers who make them happen, then all I ask is they select better champions.
All I'm saying is that this specific story is one that has been disputed by not just Verhoeven, but also others that were involved in the production of Basic Instinct. It's also the only allegation that I'm aware of that has ever been raised about Verhoeven.
Meanwhile, you have reports from Verhoeven's entire career of actors (male and female) praising Verhoeven for his professionalism and the way he tries to make actors comfortable in potentially uncomfortable situations (even if it goes to sometimes pretty weird extremes, like when he apparently filmed the shower scene in Starship Troopers naked to make his fully nude cast more comfortable).
As far as we know, Verhoeven and Stone are pretty okay with each other still as well, considering she was recently with Verhoeven in a documentary about the making of of Basic Instinct and Verhoeven has praised Stone very recently in interviews. Of course, that could all be played up for the press, but there's no real proof of any serious falling out.
I'm not saying Stone is lying about her experience, but I don't think it's necessarily right to say Verhoeven is part of the wider Hollywood problem of powerful men abusing their female stars because of one story that may or may not be fully true.
Seems strange to blame intimacy cooirdinators when from what I understand, when they do their job well it allows these scenes to exist by ensuring all actors are comfortable when performing.
At least that was my takeaway from interviews with actors who worked on the game Immortality. They gave a lot of credit to the intimacy coordinator there.
At least that was my takeaway from interviews with actors who worked on the game Immortality. They gave a lot of credit to the intimacy coordinator there.
Yeah, blaming intimacy coordinators is dumb. They are doing incredibly important work and specifically exist to make sex/intimate scenes safe and comfortable, not to create less of them.
If anything, it's simply because modern Hollywood skewers way more towards family-friendly movies than it did in decades prior. And in America that means "as much (bloodless) violence as you want, but don't even dare to show a female nipple".
If anything, it's simply because modern Hollywood skewers way more towards family-friendly movies than it did in decades prior. And in America that means "as much (bloodless) violence as you want, but don't even dare to show a female nipple".
It's item 7 on a list of 7 things that might be to blame. But it's also the only one you can point to and see a definitive answer instead of it being "maybe, I guess", so, it gest a bit more focus, even if it doesn't make much sense, unless intimacy coordinators are so expensive that films prefer to go without...
I remember watching Flodder with my parents and little sister as a kid. I think most people in this thread would get a panic attack thinking about that.
Buurman, wat doet u nu?
Yeah lol
But the Dutch in general definitely also got more prude over time
I mean, this is also a valid argument that we don't see being made nearly as much.
I don't think sex scenes or nudity are going anywhere in action films, they'll just be very specific. In older movies, like Terminator, it was just there, because it made sense to the people making the movie, today, it would be analyzed, group tested and eventually people would decide if having a sex scene made more or less money than not, and that's what they'd go with, want to make the movie seem more adult and not for kids and not like the MCU and other modern action movies, sex scene and aim for R, want the movie to attract the whole family, take it out and the rest of the rough edges, make it palatable for as big an audience as possible.
It's like doing a fade out and just implying "the titans won" in a movie about football.
Good.
Hopefully less gratuitous scenes just to have them for no reason, and only have nudity/sex scene when it is in line with the story of the film.
Hopefully less gratuitous scenes just to have them for no reason, and only have nudity/sex scene when it is in line with the story of the film.
Seems bizzare to compare a completely pre-covid sex output to 2023 when most shows were produced with lots of covid restriction in 2021-2022. Don't dispute they'res less sex, but that seems largely driven by safe-IP stuff rather than any change in taste.
wtf at the prudes on the and "only if it advances the story" people in this thread though.
wtf at the prudes on the and "only if it advances the story" people in this thread though.
I 100% believe this this the amount of threads on IP shlock on this forum. Its embarrassing.
Just off the top of my head, what about the sex scene in American Psycho where Bateman is watching himself posing in a mirror? Do you not think the display of his narcissism is an important moment in the film?
Let's talk a bit about Sharon Stone! We get to Paul at the end.
We need to maybe find better examples of empowering on-screen sexuality than Paul Verhoeven.
Sharon Stone Says Paul Verhoeven Played Every Other ‘Basic Instinct’ Screen Test Against Hers — None Measured Up
Sharon Stone recalled Paul Verhoeven going to great lengths to help her audition for "Basic Instinct" alongside Michael Douglas.
On that note I feel like one elephant in the room people are dancing around is maybe there's a decline of these type of scenes because stuff like #MeToo has become more known in the public concious and more of these scenes than people like to admit likely came about the exploitation of the actors.
Quick Game of Thrones comparison but Emilia Clarke came out about the fact that she was pressured in those early seasons of doing nude scenes against her comfort zone because "she'd let down her fans otherwise." It's not a coincidence that as she got more cache due to her character becoming so popular she then had more room to outright refuse doing them.
Which one? The one that demonstrates just how Dr Manhattan has lost his connection to even the people he cared about by creating duplicates of himself to be with his partner while he continues his real work, or the ones that demonstrate how Nite Owl needs his life as a vigilante to feel like a real man and overcome his intimacy issues and erectile disfunction?
Late to the party, but I gotta say I appreciate films more if there were no sex scenes.
Granted, I don't fully opposed of it, because those scenes could be 'good' if supported with enough context, more less.
I don't remember when was the first time I started to cringed & don't care about these in movies anymore.
As might as well replace those scenes into something better. 🙄🤷
The last Daniel Craig's Bond film was none of this & I fully grateful of it.
Still meh movie tho.
Granted, I don't fully opposed of it, because those scenes could be 'good' if supported with enough context, more less.
I don't remember when was the first time I started to cringed & don't care about these in movies anymore.
As might as well replace those scenes into something better. 🙄🤷
The last Daniel Craig's Bond film was none of this & I fully grateful of it.
Still meh movie tho.
The Nite Owl one which was longer and had people laughing because of the length and music. I'm gonna take a wild guess that the deeper meaning was lost because I recall most thinking it was just goofy asf. But Watchmen is a weird one in general so yeah.
I think it could easily be a case of one leading to the other. A generation of people raised on films that are (sorry not sorry) designed to be easily digestible by children not having the media literacy to understand that scenes of intimacy aren't necessarily "pointless" wouldn't be the most surprising thing in the world.
I think there is definitely a cultural shift, though, you're right. There is a weird breed of zoomer Puritanism; anyone who teaches younger people literature has noticed it.
Bond sneaking in on Severine showring in Skyfall was so fucking weird... (and context matters, she's was a former sex worker 'rescued' by a criminal, so surely the best idea would be to sneak in on her shower)
On the flip side, and underrated IMO, was the kiss Bond and Olga shared at the end of Quantum. Bond, still hurting from Vesper, shares ONLY a brief but passionate kiss with her. They helped each other out, but part ways on the mend and not ready to commit to anything. I thought this was bold and meant way more than a lot of the random fucks he's arbitrarily had in a lot of these movies.
Why show actors faking literally anything? In fact let's just roll the credits and go home