Pretexts for nudity in film  

From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia

Revision as of 19:59, 25 April 2017

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Filmmakers rely upon pretexts to project larger-than-life nakedness on the silver screen. Since the audience will not accept nudity for nudity’s sake, without at least the pretext that characters’ nakedness has, if not redeeming social value, narrative purpose, screenwriters offer excuses (or “reasons”) as to why a nubile young woman happens to doff her clothes in this or that particular scene. These excuses are often lame, but the pretext, no matter how flimsy, is what moviegoers need to assuage their qualms about watching a barely-out-of-her-teens girl take it off.

Here are the excises for nudity that pretends, at least, to be non-gratuitous:

• Advertisements
• Bathing or showering, see also bathing women in art
• Body painting
• Corpse
• Dressing (or undressing)
• Filming a nude scene
• Flashing
• Hazing
• Leeches or ticks
• Mannequins or dolls
• Massage
• Medical examination
• Mermaid or other naturally naked half-human creature
• Modeling
• Mooning
• Nudism
• Protest
• Rape
• Religious rite (e. g., Wicca)
• Restroom use
• Sex
• Skinny dipping (nude swimming)
• Spanking
• Statues or other nude art
• Strip poker
• Strip search
• Sunbathing
• Topless beach
• Voyeurism

Notes from a deleted Wikipedia article

1950’s

As the following summaries of nude scenes indicates, in the movies of the 1950s, the rationales for movie sex and nudity included.

• servicing the opposite sex as a gigolo or a prostitute
• being a harem girl
• documenting the nudist lifestyle
• sunbathing in the nude
• engaging in incest
• seeking sexual variety through hedonism
• acting as a sexual predator or seductress

The summaries of these movies are based on those at The Greatest Films’ “Sex in Cinema: The Greatest and Most Influential Erotic / Sexual Films and Scenes” .

Sunset Boulevard (1950)

A screenwriter (William Holden) with financial problems becomes a gigolo to a silent screen actress, Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson).

Era Lui!... Si! Si! (1951)

Sophia Loren appears as a topless harem girl; she also appeared topless in the Two Nights With Cleopatra (1954).

Garden of Eden (1954)

This film has a single theme: a documentary of nudists enjoying the nudist lifestyle at a nudist club.

And God Created Woman (1956)

Brigitte Bardot sunbathes, lying naked on her stomach in front of a hanging sheet.

Peyton Place (1957)

New England townspeople indulge themselves in adultery, incestuous rape, frigidity, skinny dipping--and gossip; Lana Turner plays the neurotic, over-protective single mother of sexually-curious teenager Allison Mackenzie (Diane Varsi), and Hope Lange plays a teen who is raped by her stepfather (Arthur Kennedy). Based on the novel by Grace Metalious.

Sweet Smell of Success (1957)

A gossip columnist, J.J. Hunsecker (Burt Lancaster), takes an obsessive, somewhat incestuous interest in his 19-year-old sister (Susan Harrison) who has a forbidden romance with a young singer, Steve Dallas (Martin Milner); there is also a homosexual connection between Hunsecker an Sidney Falco (Tony Curtis).

The Lovers (1958)

This French film features adultery by a married woman and shows her bare breast) and simulated orgasm during oral sex. It was declared obscene, but the U. S. Supreme Court overturned the lower court’s decision.

The Immoral Mr. Teas (1959)

This movie is about a delivery man, Bill Teas, who can imagine women unclothed in everyday situations.

Pillow Talk (1959)

The main characters, played by Doris Day and Rock Hudson, shared a party telephone line and were constantly on the telephone as a split-screen implied that they were together and involved sexually when they really weren't.

Suddenly Last Summer (1959)

Although Gore Vidal's original screenplay alluded to homosexuality, cannibalism, pedophilia, and incest, these elements were toned down; nevertheless, the movie featured Catherine’s (Elizabeth Taylor) luring of beach boys home for her homosexual cousin Sebastian’s enjoyment.

1960’s

As the following summaries of nude scenes indicates, in the movies of the 1960’s, such excuses for nudity in film included.

• engaging in voyeurism
• showering or bathing
• engaging in prostitution
• being the subjects of gossip
• engaging in pedophilia
• documenting nudism
• lying in bed naked
• dramatizing Biblical scenes
• participating in group sex
• being raped
• skinny dipping
• wrestling nude

The summaries of these movies are based on those at The Greatest Films’ “Sex in Cinema: The Greatest and Most Influential Erotic / Sexual Films and Scenes” .

Peeping Tom (1960)

A voyeuristic and psychotic serial killer murders the nudes upon whom he spies.

Psycho (1960)

To please his dead mother, a voyeuristic transgendered motel owner kills a woman with whom he’s become infatuated. The murder occurs as she takes a shower. Based on the novel by Robert Bloch.

Spartacus (1960)

This gladiator movie contains a bathing scene between bisexual General Marcus Crassus (Laurence Olivier) and his submissive servant Antoninus (Tony Curtis) and a conversation full of double-entendres about eating oysters and snails.

Nude on the Moon (1961), Diary of a Nudist (1961), Blaze Starr Goes Nudist (1965), Bad Girls Go To Hell (1965), A Taste of Flesh (1967), Deadly Weapons

Doris Wishman, “Queen of Sexploitation Films,” produced many sexploitations films, including these and Deadly Weapons (1974), Double Agent 73 (1974), and A Night To Dismember (1983).

Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961)

Audrey Hepburn stars as Holly Golightly, a call girl.

The Children’s Hour (1961)

Due to censorship, the whispered student rumor of a lesbian relationship between two teachers was changed to an illicit, though heterosexual, love affair between one of the teachers and her colleague’s fiancé. Based on Lillian Hellman’s Broadway play.

Paris Blues (1961)

Sidney Poitier, as expatriate jazz musician Eddie Cook, and Paul Newman as trombone-playing Ram Bowen romance two vacationing American tourists: Connie Lampson (Diahann Carroll) and Lillian Corning (Joanne Woodward).

Splendor in the Grass (1961)

A movie with a bathtub scene.

Dr. No (1962)

James Bond (Sean Connery) engages in casual (implied) sex with Honey Ryder (Ursula Andress).

Lolita (1962)

This movie was controversial because of its suggestion of pedophilia between middle-age professor Humbert Humbert (James Mason) and pre-teen temptress, Dolores Haze, or Lolita (Sue Lyons).

Something’s Got to Give (1962)

Something gives: Marilyn Monroe, as married Ellen Arden, doffs the standard nude body covering for a nude dip in a swimming pool.

Cleopatra (1963)

The queen of Egypt (Elizabeth Taylor) has an affair with Roman Emperor Mark Anthony (Richard Burton).

Contempt (1963)

Brigitte Bardot appears fully nude as she lies face-down in bed.

Goldilocks and the Three Bares (1963)

Nudists cavort in a nudist camp.

Promises! Promises! (1963)

Jayne Mansfield as Sandy Brooks sings "I'm In Love" nude in a foamy bathtub.

Tom Jones (1963)

Tom Jones (Albert Finney) has sex with his mother, Mrs. Waters (Joyce Redman).

Kiss Me, Stupid (1964)

Songwriter (Ray Walston) hires a roadhouse prostitute, Polly the Pistol (Kim Novak), to impersonate his wife Zelda, to avoid the amorous attentions of Las Vegas crooner and playboy Dino (Dean Martin).

Marnie (1964)

A prudish woman (Tippi Hedren) becomes frigid after seeing her prostitute mother being sexually abused by a john.

The Pawnbroker (1964)

A breast-baring black prostitute (Thelma Oliver) cannot arouse Sol Nazerman (Rod Steiger) because he is tormented by the memory of Nazis raping his wife’s years before.

Darling (1965)

Diana Scott (Julie Christie) is a swinging London fashion model who pursues uninhibited sex; the film includes scenes of homosexuality, infidelity, and abortion, and the protagonist walks naked through an Italian palace.

Orgy of the Dead (1965)

Horror writer Bob (William Bates) and his girlfriend Shirley (Pat Barringer) spend a night in a cemetery for inspiration concerning necrophilia; Producer Ed Wood's friend Criswell stars as The Emperor of the Dead, the leader of the “twilight people,” surrounded by topless and naked, zombie-like, graveyard “creatures of the night” played by L. A. strippers) who execute a stripteases in the fog.

Repulsion (1965)

Carol Ledoux (Catherine Deneuve), a Belgian beautician left alone in an apartment, has psychosexual hallucinations.

Alfie (1966)

A lady‘s man (Michael Caine) plies his trade.

The Bible: in the Beginning (1966)

Michael Parks and Ulla Bergryd appear as Adam and Eve, respectively. Buttocks are shown, but in distant, unfocused shots.

Blowup (1966)

Fashion photographer Thomas (David Hemmings) has sex with his models; the film includes a simulated orgasm, a brief glimpse of pubic hair, and Vanessa Redgrave topless.

Belle du Jour (1966)

Parisian newlywed Sévérine Serizy (Catherine Deneuve) daydreams about gang-rape, becoming a daytime suburban prostitute.

Bonnie and Clyde (1967)

Bonnie (Faye Dunaway) appears nude, but Clyde (Warren Beatty) proves impotent.

The Graduate (1967)

Graduate (Dustin Hoffman) sees split-second flashes of Mrs. Robinson’s (Anne Bancroft) breasts as she seduces him; later, thet make love.

A Guide for the Married Man (1967)

A guide for the married man as to how to commit adultery, this film contains limited, brief nudity.

I Am Curious, Yellow (1967)

Full frontal nudity of both sexes, simulated sexual intercourse, and the kissing of the male's flaccid penis (fellatio) led to the U. S. Customs Department to seize this Swedish film as pornographic.

Valley of the Dolls (1967)

Three Hollywood wannabe actresses (Patty Duke, Barbara Parkins, and Sharon Tate) are corrupted by Tinsel Town’s movers and shakers. Based on the novel by Jacqueline Susann.

Inga (1967)

Ex-ballerina Marie Liljedahl plays a young virgin; scenes include nudity, masturbation, and sexual intercourse.

Barbarella (1968)

In this adaptation of the French comic strip, Barbarella (Jane Fonda) is sentenced to death by orgasm.

Candy (1968)

A naive young woman experiences bizarre sexual adventures. Based on the novel by Terry Southern.

Flesh (1968)

Bisexual hustler Joe Dallesandro hustles himself.

The Fox (1968)

Lesbian lovers Ellen March (Anne Heywood) and Jill (Sandy Dennis) make love in an isolated Canadian farmhouse until Paul Renfield (Keir Dullea) arrives and Ellen choses him over Jill, who is later killed. Based on the novel by D. H. Lawrence.

Greetings (1968)

This movie was the first to receive the X rating, although the rating was changed to R. Bare breasts and sex are prominent.

Hugs & Kisses (1968)

This was the first movie in which an extended full frontal view of female genitalia occurs as the film's main character Eva (Agneta Ekmanner) undresses in front of a mirror, wanders around the room, and looks at her reflection

if (1968)

This one has a shower scene that includes frontal male nudity; there are also scenes involving sex and homosexuality.

The Killing of Sister George (1968)

An X-rated film, this movie features lesbian lovemaking between Mercy Croft (Coral Browne) and Alice McNaught (Susannah York); later, it was released as an R-rated film.

Romeo and Juliet (1968)

Romeo (Leonard Whiting) and Juliet (Olivia Hussey) enjoy their honeymoon.

Rosemary’s Baby (1968)

Rosemary (Mia Farrow), raped by the devil, gives birth Satan’s beastly baby.

Therese and Isabelle (1968)

Two French schoolgirl classmates (Essy Persson and Anna Gael) fall in love,

Vixens! (1968)

Erica Gavin is a sexually driven vixen.

Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice (1969)

Two couples, Bob and Carol Sanders (Robert Culp and Natalie Wood) and their best friends Ted and Alice Henderson (Elliott Gould and Dyan Cannon) get to know one another during a weekend swinging trip to Sin City.

Easy Rider (1969)

A pair of biker drug-dealers enjoy skinny dipping and sex in a New Orleans bordello.

Medium Cool (1969)

This is the first mainstream American feature film to show full male and female nudity as sexual trysts abound.

Midnight Cowboy (1969)

A male prostitute, Joe Buck (Jon Voight) is befriended by a thief, Ratso Rizzo (Dustin Hoffman), who have a homosexual relationship.

100 Rifles (1969)

Raquel Welch showers under a railroad water tank, wearing skin-tight clothing, to distract Mexicans; she appears with Jim Brown in an onscreen interracial love scene.

Women In Love (1969)

Despite its title, this film features nude male wrestling between local mine owner Gerald Crich (Oliver Reed) and schoolmaster Rupert Birkin (Alan Bates) and is the first commercial movie to show male genitals.

1970’s

As the following summaries of nude scenes indicates, in the 1970’s, the excuses for depicting actresses in the nude included:

• involvement in orgies
• disclosing a sex-change operation
• performing a practical joke
• engaging in vampirism
• documenting instances of public nudity or human sexual behavior
• fantasizing about sex
• experiencing sexual awakenings
• engaging in satanic or pagan religious ceremonies
• masturbating
• having a December-May romance
• being raped
• skinny dipping
• sleeping (and sleepwalking) in the nude
• engaging in prostitution
• having a sexual affair
• competing in a contest
• acting in nude skits or plays
• exercising naked
• taking a shower
• dancing naked
• seeking to cure a sexual problem
• being subjects of sexual experiments
• retelling sexualized fairy tales
• recounting the lives of famous men and women
• satirizing older movies
• involving characters in sadomasochistic activities
• telling or retelling classic erotic stories
• personifying sex organs
• coupling women with extraterrestrial beings
• engaging in exhibitionistic or voyeuristic activities
• exploring one’s curiosity about homosexuality
• seeking sexual variety
• seeking the perfect woman

The summaries of these movies are based on those at The Greatest Films’ “Sex in Cinema: The Greatest and Most Influential Erotic / Sexual Films and Scenes”.

Beyond the Valley of the Dolls (1970)

A tits and ass (T & A) sexploitation spoof about sex, drugs, and rock and roll featuring orgiastic sex, bondage, gays, and lesbianism.

[The Christine Jorgensen Story]] (1970)

The film poster’s caption says it all: “I couldn't live in a man's body! Did the surgeon's knife make me a woman or a freak?” John Hansen played Christine. Based on Christine Jorgensen’s autobiography.

M*A*S*H (1970)

Brief full nudity occurs in the prank scene in which chief nurse Major Margaret ("Hot Lips") Houlihan (Sally Kellerman) is exposed to the 4077 Mobile Army Surgical Hospital staff, who want to see whether she is a natural or a dyed blonde.

Myra Breckinridge (1970)

In this film about man-hating transsexual Myra Breckenridge (Raquel Welch), Myra tries to seduce Mary Ann Pringle (Farrah Fawcett); later, Myra lifts her skirts to reveal her sex-change operation in front of a judge; originally rated X. Based on the novel by Gore Vidal.

Performance (1970)

Mick Jagger stars as Turner, a reclusive, washed-up hippie ex-pop-star living in a decaying London mansion with his two lovers: Pherber (Anita Pallenberg) and Lucy (Michèle Breton); in the film's most erotic scene, Pherber lies on a bed while talking to London gangster Chas (James Fox) and strokes her fur coat just above her naked crotch; the film contains homoerotic violence, explicit sex, and nudity.

Pornography in Denmark: A New Approach (1970)

The first mainstream, successful film with pornography in it, this documentary examines how Denmark became the first country to legalize pornography in 1967.

Hammer Studios’s The Vampire Lovers (1970), Countess Dracula (1971), Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde (1971), and The Satanic Rites of Dracula (1974)

These sexploitation films featured sex and nudity, vampire brides, lesbian overtones, and plunging necklines.

Woodstock (1970)

This documentary of the concert at Woodstock features nude concertgoers.

Zabriskie Point (1970)

Mark Frechette stars as a student radical who is wanted for killing a policeman during a student riot) and Daria Halprin, as an anthropology student, plays a real estate tycoon's lover and secretary who helps to build a development in the desert; the film contains a hallucinatory, fantasy lovemaking orgy sequence in the desert.

Carnal Knowledge (1971)

Two friends, predatory Jonathan (Jack Nicholson)and naive Sandy and (Art Garfunkel) are initiated into sex during college with, among others, Candice Bergen. Ann-Margaret appears as Jonathan's voluptuous wife, Bobbie

A Clockwork Orange (1971)

In a dystopian world of the future, rapes, an orgy, giant phallic sculptures and erotic paintings; and nudity are set to classical music and behavioral conditioning is used to prevent violence and sexual aggression of Alex (Malcolm McDowell). Based on the novel by Anthony Burgess.

The Devils (1971)

Sexuality is equated with Satanism in this adaptation of Aldous Huxley’s Devils Of Loudon as a womanizing priest, Urbain Grandier (Oliver Reed), faces persecution for his "diabolic possession" of the local nuns (including Vanessa Redgrave); a scene in which nuns masturbated over a life-size crucifix was cut prior to the film’s release.

Friends (1971)

An English teenage boy, Paul (Sean Bury) and an adolescent French girl, Michelle (Anicee Alvina), try to make it together once a baby arrives; this film contains controversial nude scenes between young performers--Alvina was only 17 when the film was released. (See Pretty Baby)

Get Carter (1971)

This film includes a telephone sex sequence with Anna (Britt Ekland) as she pleasures herself.

Harold and Maude (1971)

An inter-generational romance occurs between death-obsessed 19-year-old Harold (Bud Cort) and life-affirming 79-year-old widow Maude (Ruth Gordon).

Klute (1971)

An independent, high-class New York City call-girl named Bree Daniels (Jane Fonda), is threatened by her client-become-captor.

The Last Picture Show (1971)

Small-town Texans in the early 1950s explore love and sex in this film, which includes full frontal nudity during an indoor pool party during which teenagers skinny dip and town tease Jacy Farrow (Cybill Shepherd) is deflowered by her football-playing boyfriend Duane Jackson (Jeff Bridges) in the town’s Cactus Motel.

Macbeth (1971)

Based on William Shakespeare’s tragedy, this movie includes a nude sleepwalk by long-haired Lady Macbeth (Francesca Annis) and lots of non-sexual nudity (most notably of a coven of dirty, aged, and often deformed witches).

Straw Dogs (1971)

Dustin Hoffman stars as David Sumner, a bookish, mild-mannered American mathematician who is on sabbatical in a rural England town with his bride, Amy (Susan George); when local thugs (one of whom was an ex-boyfriend) rapes his wife, violent revenge follows.

Summer of '42 (1971)

A teenage boy, Hermie (Gary Grimes), is sexually awakened by a 22 year-old war widow (Jennifer O'Neill).

Sunday, Bloody Sunday (1971)

Straight businesswoman Alex Greville (Glenda Jackson) and middle-aged gay Dr. Daniel Hirsch (Peter Finch) both love the same young man, bisexual sculptor Bob Elkin (Murray Head); this is the first major motion picture to show two male characters kissing on the lips.

Walkabout (1971)

Two stranded British schoolchildren, (17-year-old Jenny Agutter) and David Gumpilil overcome the harsh climate of the Australian outback; portions of a nude swim in a natural pond, with full frontal nudity, was cut from the U. S. version of the film.

Cabaret (1972)

This X-rated musical featured many sexual flings (including bisexuality and abortions) involving a threesome (Liza Minnelli, Michael York, and Helmut Griem) in a decadent 1930s Berlin Kit-Kat Club that produced perverse stage shows.

Deliverance (1972)

At shot-gun-point in the woods, a sexually-perverted rustic (Bill McKinney) humiliates Bobby Trippe (Ned Beatty), forcing him to strip to his underwear before sodomizing him.

Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex( But Were Afraid to Ask) (1972)

Woody's Allen's film, based on Dr. Reuben's notorious, best-selling sex manual, includes seven comedy segments on topics such as bestiality, exposure, perversion, and sadomasochism.

Fritz the Cat (1972)

This full-length animation feature based on R. Crumb's underground comic strip includes naked characters, orgies, drug use, and foul language among cartoon cats and other animals.

The Last House on the Left (1972)

Two teenage girls, Mari Collingwood (Sandra Cassel) and Phyllis Stone (Lucy Grantham), searching for marihuana, undergo a relentless ordeal at the hands of a sadistic group of escaped convicts led by Krug (David Hess). The film contains scenes of torture, rape, disembowelment, and murder.

Last Tango in Paris (1972)

A grieving widower, middle-age and overweight American exile Paul (Marlon Brando) engages in a sadomasochistic relationship with a 20-year-old Parisienne ingenue, Jeanne (Maria Schneider); this film is noted for its anal intercourse scene.

Pink Flamingos (1972)

Transvestite trailer park matron Babs Johnson (Divine) literally eats dog feces in a competition to become the “World's Filthiest Person Alive”; the movie also contains a sequence of a shocking “chicken rape.”

Female Trouble (1974)

Divine plays a murderous rape victim; in one scene, Edith Massey, playing a fag-hag who dresses in skin-tight, leather dominatrix outfits, fondles Divine’s bare breasts.

Breezy (1973)

Edith Alice Breezerman, a troubled hippie, becomes involved in an intergenerational affair with a middle-aged, divorced, conservative businessman (William Holden).

Coffy (1973)

Pam Grier is an anti-drug vigilante who has frequent sexual liaisons.

Don’t Look Now (1973)

A married couple, Laura (Julie Christie) and John Baxter (Donald Sutherland), vacationing in Venice after the tragic accidental drowning demise of their daughter in England make love in their Venice hotel room.

The Harrad Experiment (1973)

This film, based on Robert H. Rimmer's 1962 book, concerns non-existent Harrad College, run by Professor Philip Tenhausen (James Whitmore) and his wife Margaret (Tippi Hedren); for one year in the experimental institution, two incompatible young student couples (Don Johnson and Laurie Walters, Victoria Thompson and Bruno Kirby) practice what they have learn about pre-marital sex and anti-monogamous behavior; this infamous R-rated film includes swimming pool nudity and nude yoga.

The Naked Ape (1973)

Starring Johnny Crawford as Lee, a college student facing the draft who becomes interested in his Erotic Poetry and Prose classmate Cathy (Victoria Principal), this sex comedy tries to explain the history of man's sexual urges.

Sleeper (1973)

In a dystopian future, Miles Monroe (Woody Allen) finds himself trapped in an "Orgasmatron," a substitute experience for sex.

The Wicker Man (1973)

A publican's sensual daughter, Willow MacGregor's (Britt Ekland), sings and dances while writhing naked in an attempt to seduce a repressed, devoutly-religious, and virginal Scottish policeman, Sgt. Neil Howie (Edward Woodward) during his investigation on a remote island inhabited by pagans who worship older gods and practice open sexuality.

Caged Heat (1974)

Frequent exploitative shower sequences, showing off Cheryl Rainbeaux Smith, Roberta Collins, and Erica Gavin occur in this women-in-prison movie.

Candy Stripe Nurses (1974)

Three high school girls working as hospital candy stripers have sex with a wrongly-accused robber, a rock star, and a basketball player.

Deadly Weapons (1974)

Chesty Morgan (billed as Zsa Zsa) stars as Crystal, who performs a striptease in a Las Vegas club to lure a cold-blooded hit man (one-eyed 'Hook' Larry, played by Gaylord St. James) to her room, where she drugs and smothers him with her deadly weapons (73-inch breasts) on the sofa.

Flesh Gordon (1974)

Plenty of sexual innuendo and nudity occur when Dale Ardor, Emperor Wang and Dr. Jerkoff visit the planet Porno.

Going Places (1974)

Small-time crooks Jean-Claude (Gérard Depardieu) and Pierrot (Patrick Dewaere) are obsessed with abusive sex during a wild, aimless journey in the French countryside in the company of beautician Marie-Ange (Miou-Miou), whom they seek to cure of frigidity; they are joined by ex-convict Jeanne Pirolle (Jeanne Moreau), who taught the two men, in a threesome, about sex. (The original title of this French film, Les Valseuses, literally means "testicles."

Ilsa - She-wolf of the SS (1974)

A Nazi concentration camp's sadistic commandant personally inspects stripped female prisoners and performs experiments on them.

Immoral Tales (1974)

Four erotic historical tales make up this collection: The Tide (La Maree), which features a 20-year-old boy and his 16-year-old cousin Julie (Lise Danvers), whom he persuades to perform oral sex on him, timed to the rhythm of the incoming surf; Therese Philosophe, which recounts the sexual awakening via masturbation of Victorian Therese (Charlotte Alexander) after she is locked in her bedroom; Erzsebet Bathory, a semi-historical account of mid-1500s countess Elisabeth Bathory (Paloma Picasso), who bathed in the blood of virginal girls; and Lucrezia Borgia, an account of Lucrezia Borgia (Florence Bellamy), who was involved in an incestuous, 15th-century orgy with her brother and her father, the Pope (Alexander VI).

The Night Porter (1974)

When concentration camp survivor Lucia Atherton (Charlotte Rampling) encounters her ex-SS torturer-cum-lover, Max Aldorfer (Dirk Bogarde), working as a night porter at a hotel in Vienna twelve years after the war, she resumes their twisted relationship.

Young Frankenstein (1974)

Elizabeth (Madeline Kahn) has an encounter with the monster (Peter Boyle) and his "enormous schwanstucker"

Barry Lyndon (1975)

A love-making scene between opportunistic Barry Lyndon/Redmond Barry (Ryan O'Neal) and Lady Lyndon (Marisa Berenson) and other scenes of the profligate lifestyle of Irish rogue Barry and his newly-wed wife during bath-time were deleted.

Night Moves (1975)

Melanie Griffith appears naked twice, once during a midnight swim scene, and there are sex scenes between Moseby (Gene Hackman) and Paula (Jennifer Warren) and with his estranged wife Ellen (Susan Clark).

The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975)

Openly bisexual transvestite Frank N. Furter (Tim Curry) seduces Janet Weiss (Susan Sarandon) and Brad Majors (Barry Bostwick).

Salo (1975)

Pasolini's work, an art house film based on the Marquis de Sade's 120 Days of Sodom, ran into censorship problems for its depiction of atrocities for four months committed upon a group of teenagers by Fascists in World War II Italy--including rape, degradation, torture, sexual and physical humiliation and abuse.

The Story of O (1975)

Corinne Clery plays the title character, a French fashion photographer named O, who is trained in bondage, discipline, and sadomasochism at a bizarre country retreat where she must always be sexually available.

Alice in Wonderland (1976)

Kristine DeBell stars in this pornographic version of the well-known fairy tale.

The Autobiography of a Flea (1976)

A Victorian period comedy of love and lust is told from the perspective of a flea in the private place of a beautiful young woman named Belle.

Carrie (1976)

This tale of extreme sexual repression includes a locker-shower room full of naked high school girls on which terrified Carrie (Sissy Spacek) experiences her first menstruation and cruel teasing by other classmates. Based on the Stephen King novel.

In the Realm of the Senses (1976)

A sexual affair between gangster businessman Kichizo (Tatsuya Fuji) and one of his servants, former prostitute Sada Abe (Eiko Matsuda) in mid-1930s Japan involves explicit shots of fellatio and penetration, a wide variety of sexual positions and sexual acts (some in close-up), the depiction of autoerotic asphyxiation, and (a Japanese taboo) female pubic hair.

The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976)

An extraterrestrial humanoid, Thomas Jerome Newton (David Bowie) has sex with his New Mexico hotel worker, girlfriend Mary-Lou (Candy Clark), who pees down leg at the startling revelation of his androgynous Anthean form; their sexual encounters (with full frontal nudity of Bowie and Clark was cut from the film's initial release) shows that the alien secretes a semen-like goo.

Allegro non Troppo (1977)

In this animated, sexually-explicit version spoof of Walt Disney’s Fantasia, two nude Adam and Eve-like individuals created out of clay are accompanied by a diabolic snake that tries to tempt them to eat an apple, but it is thwarted by commercials featuring breasts and nude women.

Bilitis (1977)

Bilitis (Patti D'Arbanville) experiments with lesbianism, both with a schoolgirl friend Helen (Catherine Leprince) and, on holiday, with an older family friend Melissa (Mona Kristensen).

Chatterbox (1977)

A hairdresser who has a talking vagina named Virginia.

Cinderella (1977)

Instead of a glass slipper, Cinderella (Cheryl Rainbeaux Smith) has a snapping vagina given to her by her gay, black drag queen fairy godmother (Sy Richardson).

The Deep (1977)

Wet T-shirt-wearing diver Jacqueline Bisset scuba dives during the film’s opening credits before emerging from the water to sit on the edge of the dive boat.

Demon Seed (1977)

Supercomputer Proteus IV (voiced by Robert Vaughn) begins to lust after Susan (Julie Christie), the wife of its creator, Alex Harris' (Fritz Weaver), eventually imprisoning her and, using a wheelchair with a prosthetic arm and hand named Joshua, probes her intimately with its metallic fingers as she is strapped to a laboratory bed and impregnates her with artificial spermatozoa that is followed by a full-term pregnancy that lasts only 28 days. Based on a Dean Koontz novel.

Young Lady Chatterley (1977)

Lady Chatterley becomes involved in scenes of eroticism in the bath with the chambermaid, in a car, and with herself in front of a mirror

Looking for Mr. Goodbar (1977)

By night a predatory female cruiser named Theresa (Diane Keaton) frequents New York City singles bars during the sexual revolution.

I Spit on Your Grave (1978)

After skinny dipping at the remote lakeside near the summer cabin that she has rented, writer Jennifer Hill (Camille Keaton) is raped repeatedly by four men.

Halloween (1978)

A psychopathological serial killer murders sexually promiscuous teens; his sister, played by scream queen Jamie Lee Curtis, escapes to be hunted in sequels.

Coming Home (1978)

Veterans Administration hospital volunteer Jane Fonda and combat-injured, paraplegic Vietnam War veteran Jon Voight have an affair.

National Lampoon’s Animal House (1978)

Misfit prankster "Bluto" Blutarsky (John Belushi) scales a ladder outside a sorority house to spy on undressed coeds.

Pretty Baby (1978)

Set in a 1917 New Orleans bordello in the red-light district of Storyville, with virginal 12 year-old Violet (Brooke Shields) as a child prostitute and her brothel mother Hattie (Susan Sarandon), both often photographed nude, this movie was controversial and led to reforms to safeguard children from pornographic use and other abuses by the entertainment industry.

Stay As You Are (1978)

Full frontal nudity and sex scenes occur as a middle-age man (54-year-old Marcello Mastroianni) has an affair with a much younger woman (19-year-old Nastassja Kinski).

The Stud (1978)

An orgy at a swimming pool involves Joan Collins as Fontaine Khaled, the wife of a wealthy businessman, and swinging on a swing while having sex with Oliver Tobias as London discothèque manager Tony Blake). Based on a novel by Jackie Collins.

An Unmarried Woman (1978)

Jill Clayburgh is nude with her husband Martin (Michael Murphy) in the opening scenes.

Being There (1979)

Exhibitionism and voyeurism lead to nudity and female masturbation.

Caligula (1979)

The most expensive pornographic film ever made, it was originally intended to be high art, with major stars (Malcolm McDowell as the Roman emperor, John Gielgud, Helen Mirren, Peter O'Toole), by Penthouse magazine's producer Bob Guccione from a script by Gore Vidal, Caligula included an orgy, masturbation, explicit sex acts, and lesbianism.

Hair (1979)

This anti-establishment, anti-war musical includes a scene in which the actors appear completely nude, and there is a scene in which Beverly D'Angelo skinny dips.

Hanover Street (1979)

Nudity is inevitable in the love triangle that forms among American pilot David Halloran (Harrison Ford), British nurse Margaret Sellinger (Lesley-Anne Down), and secret agent Paul (Christopher Plummer).

Hardcore (1979)

Religious businessman Jake Van Dorn (George C. Scott) seeks to find his misguided daughter Kristin (Ilah Davis), who has run away to California to join the world of the underground pornographic film industry.

H. O. T. S. (1979)

This is another teen comedy featuring sorority schoolgirls competing in a wet T-shirt contest and a topless football game.

10 (1979)

Bo Derek stars as Jenny, Dudley Moore's idea of the perfect woman (10 on a scale from 1 to 10).

See also

• Pretexts for nudity in art