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The issue isn't sex itself. It's putting a sex scene in most movies meant for adult audiences. Imagine if there had to be a shootout or extended martial arts fight in every romance movie or Hollywood just wouldn't fund it.
Use it where it makes sense, and leave it in the tool box when it doesn't.
It's fucking crazy to me that this is a hot take these days. I just want movies to be good. Throwing unnecessary sex scenes into a movie to drive ratings up usually does not achieve that.
Watching softcore porn with your friends and family is kind of undesirable.
Well yeah, I think this is universal. No one wants to watch a sex scene with their parents
I watched GoT largely with my parents. It shouldn't be that big of a deal. That said, does it add anything? I can watch as much porn as a I want whenever I want.
But can you watch it with your parents??
I have strong feelings about this because I miss horny comedies like American Pie, and sexy thrillers like Wild Things. I miss stuff like Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Boogie Nights, Office Space, Eyes Wide Shut, True Lies. They all had sex/nudity in a way that furthered the plot, or was just plain fun. All of the criticisms I see here sadden me:
• "It doesn't further the plot!!!"
It can absolutely be an important part of the story. See the examples above. Look at most of our ancient mythologies. On top of that I pose the question: Why does it have to further the plot?! Why does sex/nudity have to justify itself when tons of movies have gratuitous action scenes and violence that add nothing to the plot? 90% of John Wick is gratuitous violence that added nothing to the story (but I still love it). Our culture celebrates violence and we'll watch people get tortured to death without batting an eye - but if some tits show up on screen then suddenly everyone becomes a critic analyzing whether the story REALLY needed it or not.
• "I don't want to watch that with my kids/parents/coworkers/etc"
I agree. So don't. Some of my favorite movies are raunchy comedies or sexy thrillers that I would never want to watch in polite company. That doesn't mean they shouldn't exist! If art were constrained by what you wanted to display in front of your kids/parents/coworkers then our artistic & cultural landscape would be a much bleaker place.
• "We have easy access to porn, I don't need porn in my movies!"
The fact that you only equate sex/nudity to porn reveals a problem. Kids today can’t associate sex/nudity on a screen as art, or even just fun, anymore - because in their minds sex/nudity is inextricably tied to porn. The reality is sex/nudity can be fun, dramatic, scary, or funny depending on the context. It can have a place in many kinds of stories, and comparing it to porn is like saying "we have war documentaries so we don't need war movies." They are completely different things!!
• "It's usually cringey & not done well."
By that logic you could make arguments against a lot of different genres and classic story elements. I don't like the argument that because media these days sucks at doing something they should avoid it altogether. I think they should just do better. Movies in the 80s and 90s proved it can be done.
It’s disturbing to me that we’re culturally encouraged to find fun in violence but sex needs to be cordoned off to a containment genre and excised from mainstream art. I’m not saying it needs to be in every movie - but its been obvious for a while they’re going out of their way to avoid it, even in places where it would make sense or be fun. I want art to stop awkwardly excluding a major part of life. I want out of this "Everyone is beautiful and no one is horny" Twilight Zone multiverse that all our modern movies seem to take place in.
Sex is too important to be left to porn.
If violence doesn't further the plot then it shouldn't be in there either.
Nobody is saying you can't have sexy comedies. We're just tired of stupid shit like the mid-life threatening event romance scene. The timer on the bomb is literally counting down and they take the time to profess their love and it's not a comedy so I'm the asshole for laughing in the theater.
It's been ridiculous for decades and we're tired of it.
If violence doesn’t further the plot then it shouldn’t be in there either.
A lot of action movies would be very short. My poor kung fu movies would need to be cut down to about 15 minutes. Why can't we sometimes just have gratuitous things for the fun of it? Not everything needs to be high art.
We’re just tired of stupid shit like the mid-life threatening event romance scene. The timer on the bomb is literally counting down and they take the time to profess their love and it’s not a comedy so I’m the asshole for laughing in the theater.
I don't think that's an inherent problem with sex/nudity/romance, the problem is just bad filmmaking. With good writing/acting/directing/editing that exact cliche' scenario you describe could be done in such a way as to be genuinely funny, or touching, or sexy.
Sure. Sometimes. As a specific movie made for that. Not every single show and movie producers can cram it into.
Agreed. Too often it feels like they're just trying to check a box or fill time.
Great points! Personally for me I can do with less gorey violence. What I'm most interested in is good action sequences.
I would appreciate less violence too. It feels like since GoT they have to put some gory violence and some sex scenes into everything that is targeted at an adult audience.
The point really is not about fundamental opposition. It is about being oversaturated and hence tired of it. That is why it is annoying when it doesn't further the plot, is done cringey or well, seems like an attempt at being porn of some sort. That stuff worked in the 80s and 90s, when people still had to rent VHS. People being addicted to porn and harming themselves with their overconsumption but being in denial about it probably also adds in here.
Oh man, I wish I could give you more than one upvote. Thank you for this well reasoned defense of sex in movies.
It always hit me kind of weird that getting a sci-fi novel without sex required me to read YA
I remember watching the wolf of wall street on opening day with my parents when I was a teen.
Based on that experience, I agree, that was so awkward lol
So, way back in the day, when Borat was released, basically my whole household loved it. Then, Bruno was announced! Another movie from the same guy, excellent!
Wrong.
I took my mom to go see it. In theaters. I don't think I can really put into words the awkwardness of sitting through that film.
Bud, imagine your parents taking you as a teen to see Species (1995) because we all thought it was just some sci-fi alien movie…
I absolutely despise media that relies on sex for the plot. It just ruins it for me. I'm also not a teen.
You would hate most Greek mythology
And some religious texts.
Why is that swan leering at me...
Greecy
I've been saying this for so long. Don't get me wrong, some films do make sense to have sex scenes. But there are so many that either have hardcore (for TV) sex scenes or just random full nudity that makes it nearly impossible to watch with anyone other than my partner or close friends.
Like if I recommend a film or show to someone and completely forget that it had sex or even just nudity in it, it usually wasn't important to the story. On the other hand, it may have made sense to include in the film but it was so terribly done that I promptly blocked it out.
The other issue is that it has become increasingly difficult to find any shows that either don't include sex scenes, or don't have ridiculous levels of violence, or whatever else is difficult for me to deal with when I just want something easy to watch that's not a kid's movie (although kid's movies have their own set of issues).
Streaming services don't even make it easy to find something to watch - they show you the same stuff over and over, or they pretend that everything is in English when they include so many other languages in the selections. If I am unable to pay attention to the captions then I would prefer to have something in English without trying a bunch of different shows first. I mean I guess this is partly (mainly?) my fault since I've failed to learn another language despite years of studying. But I think it just irritates me that they lie about it more than anything.
Idk I am off topic now and this has turned into a really long comment that probably doesn't say anything that hasn't already been said in this thread.
Maybe find less prudish friends? There's nothing wrong with bodies.
That's a whole other conversation, if they were depicting healthy relationships then it would be a lot less of a problem.
Nah, it's useless filler meant to bring in a brain-dead sex deprived audience. Fuck it
So I've noticed that there are a lot of streaming movies and TV shows that match a lot of these patterns:
In that context it's no surprise younger people don't like sex scenes. It's basically a canary for a low quality show and extreme toxicity.