FRESH FILM
NOW PARTNERS WITH SYDNEYCAFES AND WESTCOASTCAFES


fReShmag.com.au
sydneycafes

westcoastcafes


editor:
Adam Frontier

sydney writer:
Bryn Tilly
melbourne writer:

Tanja Bulatovic
perth writer:
John Hartigan
freshmag address:
PO Box 217
Paddington, NSW 2021
media@sydneycafes.com.au

Links

Stop The War

Sydney Rental Prices
Earth Repair

Live 8 Live
Make Poverty History
Anti-Slavery
Act For Tibet
PETA
Dugongs

Disinfo
Truth Uncovered

Friskodude
Alternet
Move On
Greenpeace
Stop The War UK
Refugee Action
Aljazeera
Amnesty International
Michael Moore
Fluoride News
Boycott Bush
Adbusters

America: Right or Wrong?
Organic Wine in Australia
Nova Magazine
Clean Food Organic Guide
Geofeat
World Wildlife Foundation
Wilderness Society
Veggie Friendly
State-Sanctioned Killing
Saddam - Final Verdict
Australian Migration Agency
Adam Connors
The Meta-Coach
Thoughtful Outsider
New York Escort's Confessions
Sex in the Cinema
Asian Sex Gazette
Central Station Records
Lotus Music
Devilry and Dharma
Eikan
Alexa
Sydney Mardi Gras
Migrate to Australia
Perth Artists & Exhibitions
Inner Light Journeys
Staypuff


 

 

 

 

 

 





Bryn Tilly writes on the
world's hottest current
cinematic trend ...


Actual Sex in
Mainstream Cinema



Sex in the cinema has been around for donkey’s years. In fact, ever since moving pictures first started being produced and distributed early in the 20th century there were blue movies (also known as stag films, skin flicks, etc). But sex in the cinema maintained two separate paths. There was the soft core and the hard core. The soft core (nudity and simulated sex) has been focused in the mainstream, while the hard core has remained underground. Well, that is until the early 70s.

In 1972 a film called Deep Throat (arguably the most profitable film ever made – it cost $24,000 and by mid-73 it had made $5 million) became the first hard core movie to play successfully to mainstream audiences in respectable cinemas. In fact it was around this time that the term “porn chic” was coined, referring to all the hip and trendy couples that were seeing the film in droves.

This release spawned a short and intense period where independent adult movies were being distributed and screened theatrically, and making profit. Other titles included Behind The Green Door (72), The Devil In Miss Jones (73), Resurrection Of Eve (73), and High Rise (73).

It wasn’t long though before producers realised they could make more money by releasing two versions of the same film; an R-rated version and an X-rated. Flesh Gordon (74) and Alice In Wonderland (76) were two such examples.

These two films were in fact two of the most expensive adult productions of the time, until Caligula was released in 1981.

It was the explosion of the home video market in the late 70s that quickly killed the theatrical adult movie. But it made perfect sense. Audiences could now safely indulge, privately or with guests, in whatever aroused their fancy, and not have to squirm in the narrow seats of a darkened cinema in close proximity to total strangers.

Cinematic sex however remained as potent as ever. And it was during the mid-70s that hard core sexuality crossed over into the mainstream.

Nagisa Oshima’s In The Realm Of The Senses (1976 - pictured), a Japanese period piece about an S&M relationship between a servant girl and her master, broke new ground with its depiction of intense physical love.

Outside of the adult movies mentioned earlier, this was the first time wide audiences had witnessed fellatio, cunnilingus and intercourse in such graphic detail (although the Swedish films Thriller (74) and Breaking Point (75) had splashed sleazy graphic sex prior to this).

In The Realm Of The Senses was, however, an art film and its international distribution was limited. But because of the director’s passionate conviction, the strong production values, and the powerful, emotive acting, the film received high praise from the critics - and to this day remains a cult classic. Even Madonna has been quoted as calling it the most erotic film she’s ever seen.



When Penthouse magazine produced Caligula (pictured) the bar was raised. But it came at a difficult period. Ronald Reagan was US president and conservatism was being forced upon America. The film was released in two versions; R and X-rated. Neither of which made much money.

Despite sporting lavish production values, cavorting Penthouse Pets, distinguished stage actors (albeit some of them unaware they were acting in a hardcore movie), and based on a fascinating, yet controversial historical figure, Caligula’s on-screen decadence returned a flaccid response from the public.

Through the 1980s and 1990s the porn underground thrived, while mainstream sex ducked and swerved, most of it ending up on the cutting room floor. It was the Europeans that continued pushing the boundaries. Still, it was peeks and flashes.

Dutch director Paul Verhoeven (later to go on to a more successful, but ultimately tamer, Hollywood career) had made several films where the portrayal of sex on screen had been adventurous and provocative, films such as Turkish Delight (73), The Fourth Man (83) and even Flesh + Blood (85).



Hardcore reared its head in several Euro productions; fellatio in Verhoeven’s Spetters (1981 - pictured), and Italian productions Devil In The Flesh (86), and The Man-Eater (99). Klaus Kinski thrusted convincingly in the French-Japanese bordello delve Fruits Of Passion (81). While Italian stylist Tinto Brass (who shot Caligula) caressed and fondled his own form of soft-going-on-hard titles such as All Ladies Do It (92) and The Voyeur (94).

It wasn’t until the late 1990s and into the 21st century that hard core sex in mainstream cinema started to become recognised as legitimately artistic, and with a wider appeal than ever before.



The French came out with guns blazing. Gaspar Noe’s I Stand Alone (97) and later Irreversible (2002 - pictured) had a dark sexuality burning fiercely and uncompromisingly.

Catherine Breillat’s misanthropic attacks; Romance (99), For My Sister! (01), and Anatomy Of Hell (04) all depict various levels of graphic sexuality; everything from bland oral sex to perverse penetrative sex. There was Life Of Jesus (97) with its bleak adolescent carnality. And then there was Patrice Chereau’s un-erotic Intimacy (01) with New Zealand actress Kerry Fox briefly putting a penis in her mouth.

In the Spanish/French romantic drama Sex And Lucia (01) the passionate, lusty behaviour of Lucia and her lover Lorenzo is refreshingly candid and imaginatively arousing. Although there is no actual sex, there’s a Polaroid or two peeked at which shows real penetration, and there’s something intensely erotic about this discreet explicit display.

Despite some films’ sexual content remaining intact, there have been many films which the censors, either here or overseas, have decided pushed the boundaries too far.



There was Baise-moi (Rape Me/Fuck Me) (2000 - pictured) which was banned in Australia due to its violent, exploitative violations. As was the Japanese prostitution degradation flick Tokyo Decadence (92) and, most famously, Pasolini’s notorious Salo Or 120 Days Of Sodom (76). Larry Clark’s Ken Park (02) with its dark auto-eroticism and ejaculation was also banned, and Lars Von Trier’s The Idiots (98) had a shot of penetrative sex cut from its Australasian release. No doubt director Gaspar Noe will eventually run into censorship problems at the level he keeps pushing!

But where is the line drawn? Who should decide whether one film is considered offensive, while another is considered of high artistic merit? And what are the criteria? Where does the line between pornography and art become successfully blurred?

Reality TV has a lot to answer for. With the demand for realism and fly-on-the-wall observation escalating, the craving for arousal and confrontation will creep higher and higher. And the ante can only be upped in two directions; sex and violence. Imagine a future where the two biggest shows on television are PornTV and SnuffTV. It may sound far-fetched, but versions of this kind of perversion are not far off.



But there is intelligence and imagination at work. With current maverick directors such as Michael Winterbottom (9 Songs - pictured), Vincent Gallo (The Brown Bunny), Lukas Moodysson (A Hole In My Heart), Jane Campion (In The Cut) and Penny Woolcock (The Principles Of Lust), the portrayal of graphic sexuality in mainstream cinema is continuing to be pushed. The content may be arguable, the intent questionable, but there is no doubt graphic sexuality has a place in mainstream cinema.

Michael Winterbottom argues that if you have a film about an athlete, he’s gonna have to do some running from time to time, so if a film is about a sexual relationship then graphic sex is demanded.

But, and herein lies The Rub, will the A-list actors ever allow actual sex to be a clause added into their contracts? Or is real sex on screen always going to be considered taboo for them, breaking the invisible rule between what is fiction and what is documentary?

This will only leave the brave indie actors, ex-porn stars, or exhibitionistic models to fulfill the adventurous screenwriters and directors attempting to add an authentic spice of life to cinematic sexuality.

That’s not quite true. There have been famous actors who have gone the extra mile, so to speak. In his early career Gerard Depardieu took his clothes off at the drop of a hat, and in some cases rose to the occasion; Going Places (74, known in France as The Testicles), and The Last Woman (76) directed by Marco Ferreri, who put sex and food on the same plate with carnal gusto in La Grande Bouffe (73).



Legend has it Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie’s improvised love-making was on a very closed set in Don’t Look Now (1973 - pictured), apparently Jack Nicholson and Jessica Lange were doing a lot more than knocking plates off the kitchen table in The Postman Always Rings Twice (81), Jean-Hugues Anglade and Beatrice Dalle were supposedly adding a lot more heat than just the film lights at the beginning of Betty Blue (86), and Mickey Rourke and (ex-wife) Carre Otis’s sweaty encounters in Wild Orchid (90) were, rumour has it, genuinely slippery.

Ultimately context and conviction is what will sing the truest in the morality battle of real sex in cinema. Mainstream films that incorporate actual sex into the narrative, that isn’t being portrayed purely for gratuitous effect, will continue to be recognized and applauded. Ideally the theatrical films depicting actual sex will be designed for intensely erotic and graphically sensual purposes (both light and dark in tone), leaving the underground adult industry to continue to produce videos for purely pornographic gratification ie for getting your rocks off in the privacy of your own home.

So turn off the lights, and long live the new flesh!

- article by Bryn Tilly
bryntilly@yahoo.com

For more on "actual sex" in Sydney itself, click here.

 

© 2006 FRESHMAG.COM.AU


FRESH EATS
 

Alliance Francaise Cafe
Aria
Art Gallery Cafe
Badde Manors
Be Mine Cajun Creole
Bistro Lilly
Blue Orange Cafe
Brown Sugar
Cafe Blue
Cafe Bones
Cafe Ella

Cafe Hernandez
Cafe Mint
Cafe Pacifico Sydney
Cafe Sel Et Poivre
Carissimo Italian
Cherubini
Chikyu-ya
Christo's Pizzeria

Civic Hotel Sydney
Del Pescatore
Dov Cafe Potts Point
Epoque Belgian
est
Fat Duck
Fellini Cafe
Fifi's
Fin
Fishface
Flavour of India
Flavour of Peking
Forty One
Fratello Paradiso
Freshwater
Friends Restaurant
Gino's Cafe Fremantle
Grand Pacific Blue Rm
Grappa
Grumpy Baker
Gusti Cafe
Halo Cafe Perth
Hugo's Lounge
Inside Out
Jaspers
Jonah's
Ju Ju
Kamogawa

King 143
Kingsley's Steakhouse
La Goulou
La Grillade
Longrain Surry Hills
L'otel Darlinghurst
Lucio's Paddington
Marque
Messinas Restaurant
Milson's
Monza Cafe
NV Cafe
Oscars Cafe
Orleans Cafe Perth
Pablo's Vice
Pool Caffe
Portofino's Restaurant
Quay
Quirk's Delicafe
Reflections Restaurant
Riverbank Restaurant
Sailors Thai
Sean's Panaroma
Shimbashi Soba
Shun Tak Inn
Slice Restaurant
Spaghi Restaurant
Tetsuya's
The Summit
Toby's Estate Cafe
Uchi Lounge
Universal Cafe & Bar
Vultures Cafe
Will & Tobys
Wine Banc
XO
Yai's Thai Newtown
Ying's
Y's Japanese
Zaaffran
Zenith on Booth

 
 
 

Anti-War Insights  
Aromatherapy
  
Back Pain  
Bars  
Boat Share  
Bondi  
Cafes  
Cafes in Perth  
Clairvoyant Insights  
Comedy  
Corporate Trainers  
Dance  
DJs   
Dogs
  
Eco Homes  
Eco Shopping  
Ethics  
  Fashion  
Film  
Financial Services  
 Gay and Lesbian  
Glebe 
Healing 
Health  
Hotels  
Internet  
Iridology  
Japanese  
Juicing Machines  
Kings Cross  
  Madonna  
 Make-up Artist  
Mardi Gras  
Meditation  
Migration Advice  
  Music  
Naturopaths  
Nightclubs  
Opera  
Performance  
Performers 4 Hire  
Perth  
Photography  
Piercings  
Pilates  
Psychic Services  
Reiki  
Restaurants  
Restaurants in Perth  
Self-Development  
Sensi Sandals   
SEO Services   
  Sex  
Shares   
Shiatsu   
Shoes   
Short Jokes
   
Spirit-Counselling   
Shopping   
Social Pics  
Spirulina  
Sport - AFL  
 Sport - Cricket  
Theatre  
Transport  
Travel  
Vegetarians  
Walks  
What's On  
Wheatgrass  
Wholefoods  
Workshops  
Yoga  
Zoo - Sydney