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No wonder, American puritanism is at a record high.
Nah if you want to watch porn you can just watch porn.
Access to adult content is never been easier so we don’t need half-assed versions in our film.
also, there’s some selection bias as the “top X grossing films” has included more and more childrens films over time as adult consumption of all content has moved out of the theatre and to the internet.
QED
No, it’s not. Has everything to do with sex scenes not adding anything of value to a film.
Might have something to do with movies catering more heavily to “Family” audiences (the functional death of the R-rate film in theaters) while TV shows cater more heavily to childless adults.
We’ve literally coined the term “sexpository” to justify injecting gratuitous naked time into our 8-12 hour prestige TV shows. We’ve also made these sex scenes a lot gayer, which rubs the Family Friendly crowd the wrong way but plays great with the 20-30 somethings who are all on board with it.
I think this is it. Most movies are trying to avoid an R rating and slide into PG-13, because PG-13 movies generally make a lot more money than R-rated ones because the audience is greater.
This is at least as true of action scenes, and it doesn’t stop them from bloating the run time of 90% of the movies coming out today.
Sex scenes and action scenes dont necessarily “bloat” movies if they are fun to watch. That’s the whole point, right? To be entertained?
Agreed, well placed and executed action or sex scenes can be used to great effect. They are also equally capable of adding nothing but wasted time. My point is that bad action scenes have been wasting plenty of time in movies lately, so a desire for tight films with no fat is definitely not the cause for the comparative dearth of sex scenes.
Jesus tap dancing christ.
WE HAVE PORN! INFINITE PORN!! 24/7 IN OUR POCKETS!!!
We used to find sex on film exciting, now if we get turned on we pause Netflix and hit the real stuff.
And that’s kids how you make an argument about capitalist suppression of sex. Netflix can probably get a 10% revenue boost if they just cut out all the “stimulating” sex scenes.
Good! it always looks “bolted on”, awkward, and doesn’t advance the plot
F in chat.
…because it’s not in the movie.
“I’ve I’ve been waiting for the right time to bring this up, but I feel like we need to address the elephant in the room, no?” . . . “where’s the dong?”
They saved all the dongs for The Boys.
All two of them?
This person clearly hasn’t found out about pornhub yet
This chart makes me wonder about cigarette smoking specifically. It feels like if you looked back 40 years it would be a “U”.
So sex is a vice now or just when its in a film?
It’s long been treated as a vice when practiced outside marriage. I disagree with that but it’s a thing
It’s due to easier accessibility to porn. It both reduces demand for the relatively timid sex scenes in films and also reduces their edginess/shock value.
I also think this is it. Sex scenes in movies used to have an effect on people. Now they just tune out and go get a snack and a drink or something until it’s over. Boooriiing. I will say, though, some filmmakers have been forced to get creative. That scene in Bladerunner 2049 was pretty hot. It didn’t even need to include anything gratuitous.
Shock value being non-zero desensitizes the public. I mean, this is a problem with everything today from action movies to software, so not sure if I can even find an example showing that this is a bad idea.
But they could, you know, go for subtlety and artful cinematography and acting, lights and colors, sounds and shadows.
But would be strange to expect that from sex when they don’t do that with central parts. Movies like “Blade Runner” and “Total Recall” are something unthinkable today.
Yeah, but I think sex scenes don’t need any shock value or compete with porn. They can depict the many ways sex influences people irl.
I wonder if it’s linked to the decline in sex in real life due to young people staying inside more and playing video games instead of socializing. I swear I saw an article about that at some point on Lemmy (or maybe Reddit).
People, especially young people are having sex less across the board because everyday life has become a crushing grind, not because of videogames and staying inside. People do choose to do those things instead of socializing… because they are burnt out from trying to meet rent, getting treated like shit at work and sitting in hours of traffic everyday.
Young people are still just as horny, they are just also very tired and sad.
Good
Sex scenes in movies are a combination of this weird shameful “I want to show I’m having sex but I can’t actually show it” and “It’s almost like porn if you removed all the porn.”
You’re really stuck in a pointless awkward middle ground that satisfies nobody. And 95% of the time it isn’t even plot relevant so you’re just wasting time. The decline basically just coincides with internet access to the masses.
You can show cute emotions of real people having a moment relevant to their arcs and the plot.
You won’t show anything of meaning in a mainstream movie, though.
I correlate it with the weird feelings that religion introduced about sex and let Al Pacino speak my feelings in Devil’s Advocate:
“let me give you a little inside information about God. God likes to watch. He’s a prankster. Think about it. He gives man instincts. He gives you this extraordinary gift, and then what does He do? I swear, for His own amusement, His own private cosmic gag reel, He sets the rules in opposition. It’s the goof of all time. Look, but don’t touch. Touch, but don’t taste. Taste, don’t swallow.”
Not all religion. (I know, this reads funny.)
There are Christian societies where this kind of repression doesn’t exist. It’s treated as something very important, though, and you show such feelings (in social perception) towards the person you want to have kids with, but without this strange contradiction.
Though most kinds of European Christianity are like what you said.
And then I want to say one thing - this contradiction already existed in Greek and Roman pagan religions. We tend to imagine those folks as some olive and fish smelling libertines, always half-naked. But even getting drunk (on a party, where everyone drinks wine) was considered something really shameful and hedonistic. Sexual morale was considered pretty important. Prostitution and non-obligating contacts would happen, but there’s no society without such.
Yes, but why? Sex is an important part of human life and relationships, it influences people’s behaviour and decisions, yet it’s being depicted less and less and often not in a satisfying way. So why doesn’t it get depicted in a meaningful and plot relevant way? A good recent example that it can be done is The Poor Things (sexuality is one of the main topics there and is depicted and talked about very openly).
I want Dennis Reynolds to direct. That way any sex scenes will show full penetration and actually be worth having in.
To hell with bra-on sex, duvet covering the lower half of the bodies sex, very dark room sex. Depict it artistically with full nudity and penetration. Show the sex in a way that people actually have sex.
That would be refreshing in a mainstream movie.
how about marionette sex? cause the extended version of Team America World Police has like 3 minutes of uncensored doll sex and it is hilarious
It reminds me about the sex scene from Family Guy
Ok I understand the comments here where people are saying they dislike sex scenes that don’t advance the plot. However there are certain movies where sex scenes are essential to the plot such as Boogie Nights. I can also think of examples like The Name Of The Rose where a sex scene is thematically improving the film (in my opinion).
Sex scenes in film/tv are hard to get right but I’d prefer if directors worked harder to capture/deploy them properly rather than a large facet of human experience disappearing during script interventions by producers and studios.
rather than a large facet of human experience disappearing during script interventions by producers and studios.
If sex is a facet of human experience then so is video games. Why don’t movies often show people playing video games? Perhaps we should treat the lack of gaming in movies as a serious issue too. /s
I know you said /s but I’ve thought similar things. I think it’s because unless it’s two characters playing couch co-op, then it’s not really social or character building. Even eating lunch together gives the characters so much more “business” to work with.
Drag was making a point about how not everyone likes sex, and calling it a “facet of human experience” is a little grandiose from that point of view. Drag used the video game equivalence to illustrate that point to heterosexual non-gamers. Drag likes to fuck dragons, but drag respects asexuals and thinks about how allonormaty affects them.
This makes no sense to me. What else would be worthy of being called grandiosely a facet of human experience if not sex? Sex has it’s olace among the importan experiences of human life - it’s how human life starts. It’s an important driving force, it influences people’s life, decisions, relationships, even lack of sex and the resulting frustration influences human behaviour. Asexuality is actually very interesting for the same reason - it’s a lack of something that most people experience. I wpuldn’t mind more films woth openly asexual characters. Falling in love is depicted very often even though there are aromantic people who don’t experience it.
What else would be worthy of being called grandiosely a facet of human experience if not sex?
Death. The reaper man comes for us all.
Yeah, sure, I didn’t want to say there are no other facetes, just that sex is one of the important ones. I wasn’t really askin :) The death and birth are kinda key, right?
Also breathing, eating, and pooping. There are millions more who do those things than who do sex.
Something about How To Plan An Orgy In A Small Town?
I agree, but the downward trend is from the 00s when directors would just hamfist sex scenes into movies and shows regardless of whether they’re relevant to the plot. I like to think we’re trending back to normality where sex scenes actually serve a purpose instead of being there just for the sake of being there.
I think we’re on the same page, but you gotta look at the data a little differently. The way I see it, if we’re cutting down on sex scenes that are unnecessary to the plot, then the number at the end is what’s left. That’s the number of scenes that do advance the plot, and the number isn’t 0.
The number is going down, it is not going to zero.
So, how about out of 20 movies, 18 cut the crap, and the other two put some fuckin effort into their sex scenes.
Boogie nights was high art.
Does this include Dutch movies?
Nobody wants to see that
You’ve clearly never seen “Zwartboek” or “Turks Fruit”.
Not bad.
Thanks for the recommendations. I was just joking.
One of my buddies is Dutch. I don’t know why but I just love dunking on Dutch people. They’re good sports.
My brain just go … when random awkward 30 second sex scene happens out of nowhere or they just start making out, kissing and moaning loudly then suddenly we are in the next scene and everything is back to normal. Why?
Unless the film is sexual in nature random full frontal nudity, stray tits, stray ass, visible privates always makes me so confused.
Naked is okay. Sexual is unneeded. Normalize body.
I sound like some brainswashing machine from 80’ movie xD Anyway, I am more rolling my eyes hard at current trend to insert romance everywhere than occassional, non-sexual nudity.
You’ve exactly put my thoughts into words in your first couple sentences.
Okay, but what makes it “random” to you? It’s art. Nudity in art has been around since art began—took a few years off for puritanical reasons, sure, but we’re all human, we all share having a naked body in common. And sex is the most natural thing. So to include it in art is just as natural.
Our attitudes toward it have changed. Why, though? What makes you feel awkward about seeing sex or nudity
I get art. But there are alot of nudity in the mainstream films that are not that. If i want to watch sex there is porn. If i want nudity in art those exist too.
Don’t you feel awkward watching two actors play pretend? Or having your 5.1 audio system start moaning in a film when you are not expecting those type of content. Random naked body parts i don’t mind those but often time you can remove those and nothing of value will be lost. So my question is why?
Do I feel awkward watching two actors act? No. Do you?
My point is, what makes you guys so uncomfortable with sex? Doesn’t that strike you as a little odd? Watching a movie with superfluous sex scenes with, say, your family, is definitely weird. But not because of the sex, but because you’re watching sex with your family there and that is awkward.
Everyone keeps saying “if I want to see sex, I’ll watch porn.” But that’s…such a weird take, I think. It’s not about getting turned on by sex scenes or trying to get off. It’s just a portrayal of a pretty massive part of life that everyone seems scared of or something. I just don’t get that.
When it comes to surprise sex scene yes. The whole thing is just awkward. But when i am watching a film and i am expecting it to happen then no.
Uncomfortable with sex? No. My point was I don’t want to be watching an action movie and get a surprise sex scene that last too long and add nothing to the story. Maybe i am weird but clearly i am not the only one that appreciate a good film without those unnecessary sex scene. Otherwise we wouldn’t be seeing a steep decline of sex in films.
Well I dunno if people not liking it is the reason we’re seeing a steep decline. If that were the case, we’d be seeing a steep decline in shitty movies. And that line is trending the other way.
I personally think it’s more a sort of return to Puritanism—in some respects. People are, in fact, very touchy these days. I mean, the intention is good in those touchy people. We want to see less exploitation, see less offensive or unequal treatment of people. And that’s great. But I don’t think sex in film is inherently exploitative nor does it necessitate unequal treatment.
But you know what else we’re seeing? A steep decline in young people having sex. Millennials were the generation having the least sex, until gen Z came along. Now they’re the generation having the least sex (in adolescence/young adulthood). I personally think there’s a connection there, too. We are more wary of anything that might get people upset—well, I say “we” but really I mean the capitalists. They want your money and will be as inoffensive as they think is necessary to get it. So really, what we’re seeing is a capitalist response to a seemingly more sensitive consumer.
And that’s just shitty all around. Thanks once again, capitalism.
Maybe it does all come down to whether you think most sex scenes are randomly inserted to sell the movie, or are actually connected to the plot or character development. Clearly there are both, and which dominates might be related to what each of us watches
I watch all kind of films and I have no issues with the latter. It is a good thing we are getting less of those unnecessary sex scene that add nothing to the story, plot or character development.
It’s just a portrayal of a pretty massive part of life that everyone seems scared of or something. I just don’t get that.
Perhaps if it was included for character development between two individuals, you might have a point. But a lot of time its just shoehorned and out of place. Also, for the record, its not a major part of life for many people, which creates even more disconnect.
Um yea. Sex is a pretty major part of everyone’s life regardless of whether they have sex or have ever had sex.
perhaps if you exclude IVF babies.
The proportion of people conceived by ivf and asexual through their lives, with no romantic interests ever, and no other connections to sex has got to be vanishingly small … more power to you if you are, but you can’t claim that’s the mainstream experience
Nudity can be art if it’s not graphic. Sex scenes are graphic.
I mean, isn’t that a matter of opinion? Puritans thought bare shoulders and exposed knees were graphic. There’s definitely a discussion of what type of sex on film is exploitative. But “graphic?” Look to other culture’s cinema. Routinely showing full nudity, men and women—not glorifying it or exploiting it, literally just a naturalistic exposure of skin—makes the story grounded in reality. And has a way of not fixating on it or exploiting it, but rather depicting people and just exposing bodies.
And also, we’re talking about nudity and sex being “graphic” while network television has us hacking up human bodies. That’s not thought of as too graphic but exposed breasts and genitalia somehow is? How backwards is that? That type of behavior, I think, creates your type of outlook, because it’s hidden away and thought of as “too much.” I’ve never cut open a body or shot someone, but I’ve definitely been naked and had sex. How do you square that?
i just want to watch a movie without uneasy scenes that ruin the entire experience
I’m okay with certain movies having them, I’ll just not watch those. But there are movies that you watch for other reasons that don’t need them at all, like the matrix for example.
I mean, I get what you’re saying but my whole point is how does sex “ruin the entire experience?”
I think many people feel uneasy because they were taught sex (and nudity!) is something naughty, shameful. It’s easy to feel that way when you grow up in certain culture and it’s a hard thing to break free of even when you’re adult and know better.
And yet in The Matrix, Trinity’s devotion to Neo is central to the plot, the sharp distinction between the gritty real world and colorful virtual world is central to the plot. Sex fits. (Unless you mean the newest sequel, that I haven’t seen)
(And yes, I give Carrie-Ann Moss bonus credit for that)
They’re American. Not comfortable around nudity
It’s purely in the film so producers can tell young actresses to get naked for the “job interview” cause it’s part of the film.
The fact that those useless sex scenes aren’t in films as often anymore is a good sign.Yes i am glad i am seeing less of those useless sex scenes. In my opinion implied sex is better than graphical sex scene most of the time. You don’t need to see them have sex to know that they did and it will get the point across just the same to the audience without all the awkward and cringey aspect that comes with two actors playing pretend.
