50 Shades of Grey joins a parade of movies that make sex a big turn-off.
It’s been difficult for the movies to get sex right. For every truly erotic and realistic coupling portrayed on the screen (see Blue is the Warmest Color for a recent example), there are countless films that either make the act look completely insane (Basic Instinct) or like something out of an ‘80s music video (see just about every film from that era featuring people getting busy).
And then there are those films that make sex look actively unpleasant.
Some do this on purpose, while others intend to arouse but instead only deflate whatever interest might have arisen. You can add the new, highly-anticipated adaptation of E.L. James’ shabby novel 50 Shades of Grey to that list, although it’s tough to say whether James and director Sam Taylor-Johnson were aiming to titillate or turn off. James’ story contrives to get awkward, mousy Anastasia (Dakota Johnson, the film’s one saving grace) into the arms of arrogant, secretly insecure, and creepy Christian (Jamie Dornan), but their first sex scene aside, there is little sexual chemistry between them and their BDSM relationship becomes not only lopsided but frankly disturbing.
So before we mentally flush the dreck that is 50 Shades of Grey out of our system, here’s a tally of movies that have made what should be the most fun two consenting adults can have look like something out of the Grand Guignol. We’ll point out whether that was the intent or not for each, and whether the film overall is worthy of your time, but in the meantime, you can put the box of tissues or helpful sex toy away: you won’t be needing them.
Last Tango in Paris (1972)
Cinema history was never the same after director Bernardo Bertolucci had Marlon Brando lube up Maria Schneider with butter for some backdoor action in this landmark film. Bertolucci’s tale of two strangers who meet in an empty apartment to essentially fuck the pain away does have an erotic charge to it, but that is swamped by the feelings of alienation and sexual violence that permeate Brando and Schneider’s doomed relationship much more powerfully.
We’d like to think that this was Bertolucci’s point, since he delivered a much more ecstatic view of youthful sexual discovery in 2003’s The Dreamers.
In the Realm of the Senses (1976)
Based on an incident that occurred in Japan in the 1930s, director Nagisa Oshima’s epic of sexual domination and degradation had its undeveloped footage sent to France to be processed lest it be seized by Japanese authorities. The film explores the relationship between a hotel owner (Tatsuya Fuji) and prostitute-turned-maid (Eiko Matsuda) as it becomes more sexually experimental and even dangerous, with an ending that is not for the faint of heart.
What it is not is sexy: the two lovers are far too damaged and obsessive for their activities to appear anything but desperate.
9 ½ Weeks (1986)
Mickey Rourke at the height of his initial fame and a fresh Kim Basinger get down to business in Adrian Lyne’s sexual humiliation epic. In many ways, 9 ½ Weeks is a direct ancestor of 50 Shades of Grey, from its wealthy powerbroker male lead to its predictably emotionally vulnerable female character. Just like the latter film, the initially impersonal relationship between the two gets complicated as feelings come into play.
But 9 ½ Weeks is also just as distancing as 50 Shades, and it doesn’t help that Lyne’s direction still feels shallow and exploitative. The heat given off from the two leads doesn’t stop this from being a slog, because its direction and script don’t have the intelligence to give the story any true depth.
Nekromantik (1987)
Shot on Super 8 with a less-than-shoestring budget by West German filmmaker Jorg Buttgereit, this story about a couple who indulge in necrophilia is about as nasty and disgusting as movies get. Graphic sex with (fake) corpses, mutilation, copious gore, and real animal slaughter (taken from documentary footage but still a dealbreaker) are all part of the festivities, packed into an almost unbearable 75 minutes.
There’s no mistaking the director’s intent here and not even a hint of anything erotic; this is about a particularly diseased offshoot of sexuality as it operates in tandem with a slow-motion mental breakdown. Of course horror fans revere it for its taboo-shattering scenario, even if there is little true filmmaking craft on display.
Boxing Helena (1993)
The directorial debut of David Lynch’s daughter Jennifer is tedious as hell, thanks to a lurid, stupid plot and a terrible lead performance from Julian Sands. He plays a surgeon whose obsession with a young woman (Sherilynn Fenn) leads him to hold her captive and amputate her limbs after he saves her from a car accident.
The sex scenes are like something out of the ‘80s, but Sands and whatever we do see of Fenn generate no heat whatsoever. If Lynch intended this to be a meditation on how obsession can turn quickly into cruelty -- well, the movie is certainly the latter.
Body of Evidence (1993)
From Sliver to Jade to Showgirls, the ‘90s might go down in history as the lamest period ever for sex-based films. And one of the worst of the bunch has to be this turgid S&M affair starring Madonna as a woman accused of murdering her much older lover (by inducing a heart attack through sex) and Willem Dafoe as her attorney, who embarks on a sadomasochistic affair with her.
The film’s sex scenes are quite graphic but undermined by Madonna’s rancid acting and the general air of unpleasantness that covers the entire film like a wet, moldy blanket. Even candle wax enthusiasts will have a hard time staying awake.
Kids (1995)
Photographer Larry Clark kicked off his often ignominious career as a director with this harsh but riveting look at a group of Manhattan teens as they partake in sex and drugs with casual abandon during the height of the AIDS crisis. With its cast of then-unknowns (Chloe Sevigny and Rosario Dawson among them) and Clark’s documentary-like shooting style, Kids feels uncomfortably true to life and difficult to watch.
And beyond the fact that you’re watching actors who are just a few years out of childhood, the sex is disturbing because of the characters’ utter lack of emotional connection. Some of Clark’s later films, like Ken Park, were even more explicit in their handling of teen sex, casting an unfortunate shadow back over his debut.
Showgirls (1995)
A camp anti-classic, Showgirls was a disaster that left the careers of director Paul Verhoeven, screenwriter Joe Eszterhas, and star Elizabeth Berkley in disarray even as it became the highest grossing NC-17 movie ever at the U.S. box office (relatively speaking; it was still a bomb although it was a huge success on home video).
Verhoeven’s worst, most over-the-top instincts are given free reign here, while every actor in the cast turns in what must be career-low performances. As for the sex…take a look at Berkley’s ridiculous sex-in-the-pool scene with Kyle MacLachlan for some of the worst-looking intercourse ever filmed.
Crash (1996)
Sex has always played a crucial role in many of director David Cronenberg's films, usually mixed up (in his early days) with some kind of flesh-altering virus. Crash discards the latter in favor something both grittier and more unsettling: the psychology of people who need car crashes and their resultant injuries to arouse them sexually.
Controversial upon its release -- just as J.G. Ballard’s original novel was -- Crash benefits from Cronenberg’s clinical eye as a filmmaker: the characters (James Spader and Holly Hunter among them) may be getting turned on by crushed limbs and gaping, vagina-like wounds, but we certainly aren’t.
Shame (2011)
A powerful performance from the great Michael Fassbender is at the heart of Steve McQueen’s unblinking portrait of a man in the grip of sexual addiction. Not every film on this list is especially great, but this one is. Fassbender’s uncontrollable urges and the deep humiliation he feels about them are written all over his face, while his relationship with his deeply troubled sister (Carey Mulligan) is complex and perhaps unsavory.
These are deeply, deeply wounded people, and the copious sex in the film is a machine-like act, stripped of all pleasure and intimacy. The rictus-like grimace on Fassbender’s face as he reaches orgasm in a three-way near the end of the film says it all.
The Canyons (2013)
Much publicized because of its troubled production and star (Lindsay Lohan), Paul Schrader’s borderline amateur production is about bored young people fucking around (literally) in Hollywood. Starring alongside Lohan is real-life porn star James Deen, whose inability to do some real acting is matched only by his utter lack of chemistry with our Ms. Lohan.
The sex is about as hot as last night’s cold pizza and only the most obsessive fans will get any sort of charge at looking at Lohan, who actually acquits herself fairly well acting-wise. Despite that, however, The Canyons is all valleys and no peaks.
Nymphomaniac (2013)
Danish troublemaker Lars von Trier has always portrayed sex in his movies as an act of aggression if not outright war, and he threw himself fully onto the battlefield with this two-part exploration of a woman (a brave Charlotte Gainsbourg) who has lived a life of sexual abandon that has left her and others involved with her emotionally damaged.
Driven by Von Trier’s trademark combination of grim melodrama with pitch black humor, Nymphomaniac portrays sex as a joyless, loveless thing, with men especially little more than animals who need to fulfill a biological urge and wreck the women they encounter in the process. It’s a very watchable but very unsexy four hours about sex.
50 Shades of Grey is in theaters now, as if you didn't know that already.
