A perusal of the English movies turning 50 this year shows several examples of classic and camp. 1974 saw the release of Chinatown, The Godfather Part II, two Mel Brooks comedies (Young Frankenstein and Blazing Saddles), two Agatha Christie adaptations (Murder on the Orient Express and Ten Little Indians), three disaster films — The Towering Inferno, Airport 75 and Earthquake — as well as R-rated comedies (Flesh Gordon, Going Places and The Swinging Cheerleaders), erotic drama Julia and the grindhouse gem Wide Open.
That was the lurid ‘70s, one can always say superiorly. By the late ‘80s, the fear of AIDS punished all forms of perceived deviant sexual behaviour with boiled bunnies and ice picks. The Michael Douglas triptych of Fatal Attraction (1987), Basic Instinct (1992) and Disclosure (1994) all figured a man paying dearly for a momentary lapse of reason. Disclosure incidentally is so much fun for all its delicious ‘90s tech stuff including Douglas’ character being miffed at not heading the CD-ROM division!
A still from ‘Basic Instict’
Love and vengeance
Paul Verhoeven’s Basic Instinct, apart from doing away with underwear during interrogation scenes, was heteronormative with a vengeance; what with the psychopathic bisexual serial killer slicing up entitled rockstars.
Ang Lee’s Brokeback Mountain (2005) won Oscars for its portrayal of a love that cannot be named.
The fact that the love was between two cowboys, that ultimate symbol of American masculinity, upped the ante several notches. Ten years later it was Todd Haynes’ turn with Carol, based on Patricia Highsmith’s semi-autobiographical novel The Price of Salt.
However, both these movies and several others, still had that heteronormative slant. The lovers and their furtive love mostly did not have happy endings. Simultaneously, there was a depressing sexlessness in mainstream movies with Tom Cruise as its patron saint. And to think that Cruise had starred in Stanley Kubrick’s exquisitely erotic Eyes Wide Shut!
A still from ‘Eyes Wide Shut’
As the millennium turned 21 and adult, sex was back on screen. The credited presence of intimacy coordinators on set ensures that no one is being exploited; Sharon Stone has repeatedly said she was not aware that she would be revealing quite as much in the infamous interrogation scene.
The second season of The Deuce, a show set in the porn industry in the 70s and 80s, was the first to have an intimacy coordinator, and since then Bridgerton, exploring love and heaving bosoms in an alternate Regency period, and the cult teen drug and sex drama Euphoria have followed suit. Michaela Coel dedicated her BAFTA for the hard hitting I May Destroy You to her intimacy coordinator.
Apart from the much-needed weighty discourses on sex and sexuality, there have been films and shows that show sex as all kinds of fun. From Sex Education, which looks at horny British teenagers and their elders at Moordale High, to Minx set in the world of adult magazines, sex is out there and everyone is having a jolly time of it.
A still from ‘Sex Education’
Shows like Sex/Life, which follows the fantasies of a suburban housewife and Obsession, where Richard Armitage stars as a respectable surgeon whose life gets derailed thanks to a pash for a mysterious young woman, follow the ‘90s erotic thriller template with sweat, grunts, groans and impossible contortions. Fatal Attraction’s Adrian Lyne got into the act with another Highsmith adaptation, Deep Water (2022), with Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas playing weird games with each other when Affleck’s character was not rhapsodising about snails.
And then there is the casual approach to sex on screen best embodied in the blistering forehand delivered by Luca Guadagnino in Challengers. The movie explores the life, love and sexualities of three tennis players, Tashi, Patrick and Art played by Zendaya, Josh O’Connor and Mike Faist respectively. The tennis and the sex are explosive and interchangeable. Tashi leaning back to watch Patrick and Art make out, with a satisfied smile at her handiwork, sets the tone for the great-looking film.
Realisation, normalisation
The Sandman spin-off series, Dead Boy Detectives, while not about sex, features Edwin’s sweet realisation of his sexuality and a not-so-nice dating experience for Jenny, who runs a niche butcher shop, when her date turns out to be a stone cold killer. The Cat King’s attraction to Edwin is naughty and nice .
Highsmith was way ahead of her time, as always, by giving a somewhat happy ending to The Price of Salt. We follow in her illustrious footsteps with the normalising of sex of all persuasions.
A still from ‘Fatal Attraction’ (2023)
If, however, you wish to go old school there is always the ‘90s. Fatal Attraction was rebooted into a vaguely vanilla show and now there is a reboot of that other shocker from the ‘90s, Presumed Innocent, with Jake Gyllenhaal playing Harrison Ford’s Rusty Sabich. Saucy does not begin to describe it.
