On movie sex and movie love...

Category: 1990s (Page 1 of 3)

Addams Family Values

  • YEAR: 1993
  • DIRECTOR: Barry Sonnenfeld
  • KEY ACTORS: Angelica Huston, Raul Julia, Christopher Lloyd, Joan Cusack
  • CERTIFICATE: PG
  • IMDB SCORE: 6.8
  • ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE: 75%

SEX SCORE: 5/5
✔️ Just so rewatchable!
✔️ I would definitely fuck the cast…
✔️ …and it did inspire fantasies. Gomez and Morticia are the archetypal #RelationshipGoals!
✔️ It has to be sex positive as this movie actively celebrates all types of love and sex between all types of people without shame! 
✔️ And it passes the Bechdel Test! 5/5 movie!!

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Bound

  • YEAR: 1996
  • DIRECTOR: Lilly and Lana Wachowski
  • KEY ACTORS: Gina Gershon, Jennifer Tilly, Joe Pantoliano
  • CERTIFICATE: 18 
  • IMDB SCORE: 7.3
  • ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE: 89%

SEX SCORE: 4.5/5

✔️ This is definitely rewatchable because it is just so much fun!
✔️ And I absolutely would fuck the cast! I’m Kinsey 0-1 but Tilly and Gershon are so fucking hot that I don’t think that matters!
✔️ This is a queer movie with female protagonists – of course they talk about more than just men! Clear pass.
✔️ I do think it’s sex positive – the sex is authentic and looks both hot and a lot of fun! 
❓ And I’m giving it a half mark for inspiring fantasies because they’re not very specific to this movie! But as I said, the sex looks hot and a lot of fun, and who wouldn’t want sex like that?

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Pretty Woman

  • YEAR: 1990
  • DIRECTOR: Garry Marshall
  • KEY ACTORS: Julia Roberts, Richard Gere, Laura San Giacomo
  • CERTIFICATE: 15
  • IMDB SCORE: 7.1
  • ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE: 65%

SEX SCORE: 5/5

✔️ This passes the Bechdel Test easily, but there are really only two named female characters so it’s good that they talk about a lot!
✔️ And it is rewatchable. It’s a classic for a reason!
✔️ I also would fuck the cast. Both Gere and Roberts are at their hotness peaks and are stunningly beautiful!
✔️ It probably did inspire fantasies too. Sex without kissing, sex on a piano, being so overtly and overwhelming desired…
✔️ And I think it is sex positive! It’s not a straightforward decision – sex is tangled inextricably with love but it sends good safe sex messages, it understands consent, and it shows that sex is pretty joyful and therapeutic!

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Body of Evidence

  • YEAR: 1992
  • DIRECTOR: Uli Edel
  • KEY ACTORS: Madonna, Willem Dafoe
  • CERTIFICATE: 18
  • IMDB SCORE: 4.5
  • ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE: 8%

SEX SCORE: 4/5

✔️ I would fuck the cast. Dafoe and Madonna are hot and look like they’re having a lot of fun. What more do we want??
✔️ I think it will inspire fantasies – I have certainly fantasised about wax play before and this is an undoubtedly hot movie!
❌ But it’s definitely not sex positive! Sexual, dominant and kinky women are dangerous, worthy of judgement and deserve to be punished. Not cool.
✔️ It does pass the Bechdel Test though! I read claims that this pass is a bit dubious but I think it safely passes this admittedly low bar!!
✔️ Is it rewatchable? That is the question. This is a bad film and I don’t think I’ll seek it out again but, to use the definition of the amazing Rewatchables podcast, would I stop scrolling if I flicked past it on TV? Would I turn it on if I saw it on the guide? I probably would!

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Crash

  • YEAR: 1996
  • DIRECTOR: David Cronenberg
  • KEY ACTORS: James Spader, Holly Hunter, Deborah Kara Unger, Rosanna Arquette, Elias Koteas
  • CERTIFICATE: 18
  • IMDB SCORE: 6.4
  • ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE: 63%

SEX SCORE: 2.5/5

❌ Not only does Crash not pass the Bechdel test, it fails it spectacularly. While there are named women in the film at no point in the entire film do any of them talk to each other. There’s not a huge amount of dialogue in Crash, so when I rewatched it with the Bechdel test in mind, I was kind of imagining there might at least be a passing conversation about Ballard between his wife and Doctor Helen that I’d forgotten, but no; not a dicky bird.

But it is rewatchable? I’ve now seen Crash three times; once in 1997 when it (finally) came out in the UK, once when it was re-released on 4K in 2020, and once for this review. I think it’s an astonishing, bewildering film and I can see myself rewatching it again in future. However, it is very strong stuff, and while I can imagine watching it multiple times, there are many people out there who might not be able to stomach an entire first viewing. That’s entirely understandable – it’s creepy, the characters are on the surface unsympathetic and often repellent, and it’s all-round just very fucking weird. However, if you are a weirdo who likes weird things it may be entirely up your alley. 

✔️ I did want to fuck the cast! Okay, have you seen the cast of Crash? Firstly, James Spader. If you are at all into pervy men in real life then you are in all likelihood into James Spader: I don’t make the rules. However, those of us perverts who also fancy women are extremely well- catered to by this film, which features Holly Hunter with a sleek brown bob glacially smoking cigarettes, Deborah Kara Unger bending over a railing to show off her bare arse, stockings and suspenders and, famously, Rosanna Arquette in leg braces and black leather. I am not even into women smoking or wearing leg braces except for the duration of this film! But for those 100 minutes I absolutely am. And actually, even Elias Koteas performs the role of Vaughan – easily the creepiest character in the movie – with a degree of ‘strange, perverse sensuality’ (Cronenberg’s own words) that I’m… kinda into. I’m not proud of it!

But it did not inspire fantasies. Nooooo. Or… not on this viewing.

✔️ Yes, it is sex positive, almost to a fault. If we take as our definition of sex positivity as being anything that ‘affirm(s) the choices others make regarding sex, even if those choices are different from the ones we would make (as long as those choices are consensual)’ Although that said, some of the sex in Crash is a bit dodgy consent- wise: there’s one scene of open public fucking without regard for whether others on the roads have consented to seeing, and another where Vaughan and the Ballards are wandering around the scene of a multi- car pileup taking photos, posing next to injured bodies and generally being grossly intrusive. The scene is as disturbing as it sounds but the film and its director do not see fit to moralise and trust the audience to make their own decisions about that. 

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Beauty and the Beast

  • YEAR: 1991
  • DIRECTOR: Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise
  • KEY ACTORS: Robby Benson, Paige O’Hara, Richard White, Angela Lansbury, Jerry Orbach
  • CERTIFICATE: U
  • IMDB SCORE: 8.0
  • ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE: 94%

SEX SCORE: 3/5

✔️ As a film I’ve easily watched in advance of 40 times, it would be hypocritical of me to say it is not rewatchable.
❓ I want to fuck the cast in fantasy more than reality. Angry men in a scene, yes. Angry men in reality, no. However, Belle is an absolute babe. 
✔️ It did inspire fantasies. So very many. ‘If she doesn’t eat with me, she doesn’t eat at all!’ – do I have to say any more…?
❓ In some senses it is sex positive, mostly in the way it approaches consent, but love and sexual relationships are treated as something for adults, to be understood by adults- as Chip’s questions get brushed aside.
❌ A film with few female conversations leaves little opportunity to ascertain whether it passes the Bechdel Test. Belle is the only human female ‘character’ and only named woman in the film’s dialogue except Mrs Potts. Belle, Mrs Potts and the wardrobe (unnamed) have a conversation about Belle’s bravery for switching places with a man as a result of the actions of a man. Wardrobe also converses with Belle, but this time solely about how good she’ll look for a man.

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Indecent Proposal

  • YEAR: 1993
  • DIRECTOR: Adrian Lyne
  • KEY ACTORS: Demi Moore, Robert Redford, Woody Harrelson
  • CERTIFICATE: 15
  • IMDB SCORE: 6.0
  • ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE: 35%

SEX SCORE: 2/5

❌ This fails the Bechdel Test – I believe that Diana is the only named female character, which isn’t really good enough…
❌ And I don’t think it is rewatchable. It simply wasn’t good enough and my fantasies of the premise are better than the film!
✔️ Despite their flaws, I do want to fuck the cast…except Woody Harrelson…
✔️ And it did inspire fantasies. Of being bought and being sold and CONSENSUALLY treated as an object!
❌ Finally, it isn’t sex positive. There was too much ambiguous consent and odd sexual dynamics to get a mark for positivity!

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The American President

  • YEAR: 1995
  • DIRECTOR: Rob Reiner
  • KEY ACTORS: Michael Douglas, Annette Bening
  • CERTIFICATE: 15
  • IMDB SCORE: 6.8
  • ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE: 91%

SEX SCORE: 2/5

✔️ This does pass the Bechdel Test, but it’s one of those passes where the exact conversations that qualify can be listed so it’s not a strong pass!
❌ But I don’t think it’s rewatchable. I don’t mean that it’s not good – I enjoyed it a lot – but I don’t think you could pick it up halfway through and watch from there, and I don’t know that I’d go out of my way to see it again
❌ And I don’t want to fuck the cast. Sorry Michael Douglas, you’re still not for me, although this is much closer than any other movie you’ve done!
✔️ It is sex positive! The plot essentially revolves around whether it is appropriate for the President to have a girlfriend, but any opposition to the relationship is appropriately judged!
❌ It didn’t inspire fantasies so is only getting 2/5, which feels low for a movie I enjoyed. But I simply don’t want to fuck the American President – either in real life (MY EYES!), in the movie or in fantasy.

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The Craft

  • YEAR: 1996
  • DIRECTOR: Andrew Fleming
  • KEY ACTORS: Fairuza Balk, Neve Campbell, Robin Tunney, Rachel True
  • CERTIFICATE: 15
  • IMDB SCORE: 6.4
  • ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE: 55%

SEX SCORE: 2.5/5

✔️ Of course, this passes the Bechdel Test!

✔️ And as much as I was scared of it as a teenager, this really is rewatchable.

❌ But I don’t want to fuck the cast. In many ways, I wanted to be the cast, but I didn’t want to fuck them.

❓ Did it inspire fantasies? I think I will give it a half a mark as there is so much that I wanted, but I didn’t want it for sexual reasons. Well, not directly anyway!

❌ And it isn’t sex positive. Sex is a source of trauma and conflict for all of the girls, and I don’t get the impression that any of them have had a positive sexual experience.

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Contact

  • YEAR: 1997
  • DIRECTOR: Robert Zemeckis
  • KEY ACTORS: Jodie Foster, Matthew McConaughey, Tom Skerritt
  • CERTIFICATE: PG
  • IMDB SCORE: 7.4
  • ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE: 65%

Today’s guest post is written by Charlie X (they/he), a blogger I have only recently started reading and who shares the most incredible photos! Follow them on Twitter @CharlieXblog. They have chosen to look at Contact through a Freudian psychoanalytical lens and it is fascinating…

SEX SCORE: 2.5/5

✔️ Contact passes the Bechdel Test.

❌ But Charlie did not want to fuck the cast. (I probably would…)

❌ And we both agree that it didn’t inspire fantasies. It’s not really a movie about sex!

❓ Which is why it’s difficult to say whether it’s sex positive or not. There are no red flags but no are there positive attributes either…

✔️ But is is definitely rewatchable! If only because there are a lot of strands to pick at and lots to think about.

As always, this contains spoilers so watch the film before you read on…

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