The Master of Suspense seems almost prudish in a modern context, particularly when it comes to the relatively tame first death in “Psycho.” But make no mistake: Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 serial killer shocker, featuring Janet Leigh at her most iconic, was groundbreaking at the time and remains compelling in context.Įvery cinephile knows the black-and-white sequence: a naked woman, traveling home after a tryst with her married lover, showers at a motel before a knife-wielding silhouette emerges from behind a plastic curtain and - in perfect rhythm with a section of screaming violins - savagely stabs her to death. CB “Psycho” (Alfred Hitchcock, 1960) “ Psycho” Everett Collection / Everett Collection (Later on, during the Siege of Babylon, there’s a kiss between two men.) Some of that libertinism would pop up again in Griffith’s later “Orphans of the Storm,” and it would carry on through the early sound era with Claudette Colbert famously taking a nude bath (though only seen from the back) in asses’ milk in 1932’s “A Sign of the Cross.” But even a couple of decades earlier, Griffith was pushing boundaries in his own right. Griffith’s “Intolerance” features a full-on orgy with women wearing see-through fabrics or bathing in the nude. Silent movies and early sound films have all manner of transgressive content. In the U.S., the self-censorship of the Hays Office wouldn’t come about until the late ‘20s (and wasn’t enforced at all until Joseph Breen took charge in 1934). It may surprise today’s viewers just how liberated many silent films are in their depictions of sexuality. All are movies that wouldn’t have the same artistic impact without these moments.Ĭhristian Blauvelt, Christian Zilko, Jude Dry, Kate Erbland, Ryan Lattanzio, and Samantha Bergeson contributed to this story. Below is an incomplete timeline of the nude scene throughout cinema history. The best nude scenes convey vulnerability, intimacy, eros, and so much more. One place to start that reassessment is to look at the history of the nude scene since the silent era. So maybe we should take nudity seriously again. Although, the unsettling reaction nudity can elicit in audiences is once again getting explored with some frequency in the horror genre see scariest scenes in the hugely popular “It Follows” and “Hereditary” for starters. It’s been a quarter-century since nudity was a central feature - and dramatic plot point - of what was then the most widely popular Hollywood film in decades: “ Titanic.” Bared skin in a similar manner in a top blockbuster in 2023 or any other recent year seems unlikely. Nudity is most frequently used in mainstream entertainment as a punchline. James Cameron Denies ‘Offensive Rumors’ He’s Working on OceanGate FilmĪt times, it can be difficult write about onscreen nudity in anything but jokey terms, especially since nudity has become a fixture of comedy. Are we somehow invading their privacy? Are they invading ours? What should we feel about this parasocial interaction, particularly when it is presented in an overtly sexualized context? So when nudity enters the (literal) picture, it complicates the relationship between viewer and viewed. It’s “content” that deserves an “advisory,” or something akin to “porn,” however the Supreme Court is classifying that these days.Īs many have noted, the very nature of the actor’s job demands the audience look at them. But the nude scene in movies is rarely discussed alongside a Canova marble statue or Manet’s “Olympia.” Movies blur the boundaries between “real life” and artistic indirection so thoroughly that people discuss nude scenes in movies as practically everything but art. The history of painting and sculpture is full of nude portraiture, which is regularly and comfortably classified as art. That line from Akira Kurosawa’s “Ikiru” sums up a lot of feelings people seem to have about nudity in film. So now we take a look back at some of the best paused moments in movies and relive the feeling of excitement we had when we first saw them.“That’s not art. So it's not just nudity, (although it's mainly nudity!) but there are moments that make us say 'What just happened?' and 'Did I really just see that?' Now we can answer those questions and enjoy those moments again. This leads to more in jokes, Easter eggs and many hidden gems that now layer our movies. The remote control is every movie fan's best friend as you can not only pause the movie but select the scene, change the speed and repeat any moment you wish. Today, with technology moving forward so much, it's easier than ever to pause your favorite moments. Then you would do the painstaking task of rewinding the movie and pressing the pause button at exactly the right moment in order to double check. In the golden days of movies, if something appeared on the screen such as a glimpse of celebrity flesh, you would first be in shock and think twice about what you just saw.
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