On movie sex and movie love...

Tag: Mike Nichols

Closer

  • YEAR: 2004
  • DIRECTOR: Mike Nichols
  • KEY ACTORS: Natalie Portman, Clive Owen, Jude Law, Julia Roberts
  • CERTIFICATE: 15
  • IMDB SCORE: 7.2
  • ROTTEN TOMATO SCORE: 68%

SEX SCORE: 4/5

✔️ Yes. The cast are fuckable. All of them. Every single character. They’re awful but I would fuck them all without hesitation!

✔️And it definitely inspired fantasies – fantasies of love at first sight, fantasies of being wanted so intensely and destructively

✔️ Closer passes the Bechdel Test when Alice and Anna talk about photography at the beginning of the film.

✔️ I also think it’s rewatchable. It’s a stunning, enthralling and breathtaking film!

❌ But is it sex positive? Sadly, I can’t give Closer the mark. Sex is used as a weapon too many times…

Continue reading

The Graduate

YEAR: 1967
DIRECTOR: Mike Nichols
KEY ACTORS: Dustin Hoffman, Anne Bancroft, Katharine Rose
CERTIFICATE: 15
IMDB SCORE: 8.0
ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE: 86%

SEX SCORE: 2/5
❌ It fails the Bechdel Test – the two named women (and there are only two!) share two lines of dialogue at the very end of the movie, but they are about Ben so it fails!
✔️ But it is rewatchable. Whatever you might think of the sexual politics and disaffection, it is a beautiful, funny and interesting movie.
✔️ It did inspire fantasies. Not so much about the age difference or the seduction by a older, more experienced person but for the late night assignations at hotels, meeting and fucking and not speaking except to arrange the next meeting. Hot. So hot.
❌ I don’t want to fuck the cast though. Mrs Robinson is glamorous and beautiful and can really wear a pair of stockings but I’d rather be her than fuck her, and Benjamin is just too annoying to contemplate.
❌ This can’t be a sex positive film when so much sexually predatory behaviour is considered sources of comedy!

Continue reading