I miss these movies, too. What made them for me were examinations / explorations of human desire and emotions ... sex, lust, obsession, an element of experiencing something natural yet wrong, something inside ourselves taken a little too far. It's a weird and interesting sensation.
Don't know why they don't make these types of movies anymore, maybe it doesn't appeal to the whole contemporary "feel good everyday! everything is normal and peachy keen!" mentality. Which I find utter bullshit. Life's interesting because it can skew in so many different ways.
― Spectrum, Saturday, 14 January 2012 04:15 (twelve years ago) link
yeah the way every hit movie these days is about people feeling good and peachy keen is really tiresome
― Jean-Luc Gohard (some dude), Saturday, 14 January 2012 04:18 (twelve years ago) link
yeah like doesnt the bad acting and questionable eroticism live in on megahits like twilight even today?
i guess thats a lot more prurient and moralizing (and no tits) but i mean
― goya.fr (Lamp), Saturday, 14 January 2012 04:22 (twelve years ago) link
haha 'even today'
LOL this thread
― incredible shrinking man on euphonium (Drugs A. Money), Saturday, 14 January 2012 04:36 (twelve years ago) link
Some dude otmfm abt peachy keenness btw
― incredible shrinking man on euphonium (Drugs A. Money), Saturday, 14 January 2012 04:47 (twelve years ago) link
I am pretty sure internet porn killed this genre. I miss sex in movies. Like unrealistic sex with lots of thigh high stockings and muted trumpets. These movies shaped a lot of my sexuality! I used to sneak downstairs to watch crap like this on Showtime when I was an adolescent. I said recently that trying to look and feel sexy is my motivation for about 75% of my actions. And it's totally true. I blame backlit sweaty sex scenes and Shannon Tweed.
― homosexual II, Wednesday, 1 February 2012 17:37 (twelve years ago) link
Also SHAME sucked and it wasn't erotic or thrilling
― homosexual II, Wednesday, 1 February 2012 17:46 (twelve years ago) link
downloading JADE right now.
― homosexual II, Saturday, 6 July 2013 04:36 (ten years ago) link
you are in for a treat, and the most 1995 movie cast ever
― christmas candy bar (al leong), Saturday, 6 July 2013 04:39 (ten years ago) link
as I stated a year ago apparently
― christmas candy bar (al leong), Saturday, 6 July 2013 04:42 (ten years ago) link
i was going to mention CHLOE but I mentioned it two years ago apparently
― Gukbe, Saturday, 6 July 2013 04:42 (ten years ago) link
what I am downloading right now
JADEFLASHDANCEBOXING HELENA
its going to be a great weekend
― homosexual II, Saturday, 6 July 2013 04:57 (ten years ago) link
omg all of LADY BEWARE is on youtube!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9L349DPyuU
― homosexual II, Saturday, 6 July 2013 04:58 (ten years ago) link
if I found a man who thought I was sexy in hair rollers and loved erotic thrillers I think I will have found my soulmate
― homosexual II, Saturday, 6 July 2013 05:01 (ten years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvJFgixTAxM
― """""""""""""stalin""""""""""" (difficult listening hour), Saturday, 6 July 2013 22:58 (ten years ago) link
is this the campiest genre ever
― Οὖτις, Monday, 21 August 2017 20:26 (six years ago) link
def the most erotic
― frankfurters take on new glamour in this gleaming aspic (bizarro gazzara), Monday, 21 August 2017 20:27 (six years ago) link
but, weirdly, NOT the most thrilling
― this iphone speaks many languages (DJP), Monday, 21 August 2017 20:29 (six years ago) link
heh
I just meant in the classic Susan Sontag "Notes on Camp" sense. They are p much never actually erotic or thrilling and the ways in which they fail, oh so seriously, at both, is truly a joy.
xp
― Οὖτις, Monday, 21 August 2017 20:31 (six years ago) link
this year during the erotically thrilling portion of our Thanksgiving Family Film festival I think we're going to cue up In the Cut and/or Body Heat (assuming I can find either tbh). Still never seen Far From Home or Poison Ivy (also hard to find)
― Οὖτις, Monday, 21 August 2017 20:32 (six years ago) link
Poison Ivy is HILARIOUS
― this iphone speaks many languages (DJP), Monday, 21 August 2017 20:34 (six years ago) link
this is not the kind of genre that gets deluxe Criterion Edition reissues, let me tell you
― Οὖτις, Monday, 21 August 2017 20:37 (six years ago) link
if you've ever wanted to see tom skerritt boning down with drew barrymore on the hood of a car then a) poison ivy is gonna be your jam and b) wtf is wrong with you
― frankfurters take on new glamour in this gleaming aspic (bizarro gazzara), Monday, 21 August 2017 20:38 (six years ago) link
Far From Home I remember as being very creepy. It's basically a budget Psycho and I bet I would find it hilarious if I watched it now.
― this iphone speaks many languages (DJP), Monday, 21 August 2017 20:39 (six years ago) link
in the Cut isn't completely worthless
― a serious and fascinating fartist (Simon H.), Monday, 21 August 2017 20:40 (six years ago) link
being directed by a woman def makes it a rarity in the genre
― Οὖτις, Monday, 21 August 2017 20:40 (six years ago) link
I think of erotic thrillers as kind of a parallel genre to my one of my other favorite "terrible" subgenres, the teen sex comedy. Both rooted in the medium's newfound freedom to crassly exploit sexuality but one was "serious" and geared towards "adults" while the other was willfully stupid and geared towards adolescents.
― Οὖτις, Monday, 21 August 2017 20:41 (six years ago) link
not quite sure which one is which there tbh
― frankfurters take on new glamour in this gleaming aspic (bizarro gazzara), Monday, 21 August 2017 20:42 (six years ago) link
I just realized that the "love interest" in "Far From Home" is one of the original Broadway cast members of Rent
― this iphone speaks many languages (DJP), Monday, 21 August 2017 20:43 (six years ago) link
would 'the big easy' qualify as an erotic thriller? presence of late '80s Ellen Barkin would point to yes, but idk.
― nomar, Monday, 21 August 2017 20:47 (six years ago) link
wikipedia has a handy graphic to help us determine the answer
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c7/Erotic_Thriller_Venn_Diagram.png/220px-Erotic_Thriller_Venn_Diagram.png
― Οὖτις, Monday, 21 August 2017 20:48 (six years ago) link
It's pretty clear that whatever is going on in Game of Thrones squeezes in there somewhere. Boobs plus thrills plus fantasy.
― Josh in Chicago, Monday, 21 August 2017 20:51 (six years ago) link
I need more labels on that Venn diagram
― this iphone speaks many languages (DJP), Monday, 21 August 2017 20:51 (six years ago) link
GoT is v erotic thriller-y
― Οὖτις, Monday, 21 August 2017 20:53 (six years ago) link
erotic thrillers tend to involve less shooting and more stabbing iirc.
― nomar, Monday, 21 August 2017 21:01 (six years ago) link
The Last Seduction is maybe the best and funniest one of these?
― nomar, Monday, 21 August 2017 21:02 (six years ago) link
Or Wild Things, at least as far as self-conscious riffs on erotic thrillers go.
xpost The shooting and stabbing is what makes them so thrilling!
― Josh in Chicago, Monday, 21 August 2017 21:02 (six years ago) link
Is the "psychological thriller" kind of the more reputable version of this genre? One that I remember really liking at the time was Final Analysis (saw it as a double feature with Memoirs of an Invisible Man!), with Richard Gere, Kim Basinger and the least subtle Hitchcockian pretensions this side of De Palma. I'm pretty sure it had some mildly steamy sex in it, but as it came out around the same time as Basic Instinct, that film quickly overshadowed it, though I remember thinking even at the time that FA was a lot more fun.
― the general theme of STUFF (cryptosicko), Monday, 21 August 2017 21:09 (six years ago) link
Just saw "Body Heat" for the first time. Pretty blah, imo, except for Ted Danson's eccentric lawyer. Can William Hurt act? I could have sworn I've seen him act, but not here. Not sure Kathleen Turner is acting here, either. Was that intentional? Anyway, if you are going to riff on "Double Indemnity," it does not behoove you to do so dumber and duller.
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 25 August 2017 01:31 (six years ago) link
Can William Hurt act?
In the same sense that John Wayne acted. I'm pretty sure he altered his normal personality somewhat when the camera was rolling, but sometimes it is hard to tell any character he played from any other character.
― A is for (Aimless), Friday, 25 August 2017 02:36 (six years ago) link
Soft in the Middle: The Contemporary Softcore Feature in Its Contexts by David Andrews.
Soft in the Middle demonstrates that softcore's under-the-radar success and pervasive cultural devaluation may be understood in terms of the "postfeminist" strategies employed by successive generations of producers and distributors, each intent on overcoming obstacles to the mainstream distribution of pornographic material. Softcore and its American precursors became more "feminized" and "female friendly" as their distribution widened, a process hastened in the 1980s by the industry's transition to private, non-theatrical modes of distribution and exhibition (e.g., home-video outlets and premium-cable networks). One of the byproducts of this development is that contemporary softcore has frequently resorted to what are arguably anti-male or "misandristic" attitudes and depictions. Clearly, the genre challenges traditional assumptions about pornography, including those held by feminists on both sides of "the porn debates."
The Erotic Thriller in Contemporary Cinema by Linda Ruth Williams is another but I think it leans a bit more toward the mainstream side of the genre.
I recall one film with appalling hair metal style.
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Friday, 25 August 2017 03:03 (six years ago) link
Expecting these films to be genuinely good (ie better than Double Indemnity!) is maybe not the best approach.
Xp
― Οὖτις, Friday, 25 August 2017 03:14 (six years ago) link
― Οὖτις, Monday, 21 August 2017 21:37
https://www.eurekavideo.co.uk/classics/wild-orchid
Close enough.
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Friday, 25 August 2017 03:21 (six years ago) link
My favourite is probably Disclosure, although that might be too big-budget/message-y to really count--it's at the Merchant-Ivory end of the spectrum.
― clemenza, Friday, 25 August 2017 03:45 (six years ago) link
Was the genre pretty much invented by Body Heat? I can't think of anything earlier than that.
I spent a week interning with the Manchester Evening News, and one day I went to a screening with their film critic. I don't remember what we saw, nothing very good, but I was impressed by the bonhomie of the small circle of local critics. It seemed like a pleasant little club. The guy I was interning with had seen Sea of Love and another critic asked him about it. "It's well done," he said. "It has Ellen Barkin bonking -- so, you know, that's always good."
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Friday, 25 August 2017 04:35 (six years ago) link
So I have basically thought of erotic thrillers ever since as "Ellen Barkin bonking" movies.
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Friday, 25 August 2017 04:36 (six years ago) link
"in the cut" is great! wayy more going on than the typical skerritt fodder and it includes mark ruffalo memorably saying about an ex that she "had no sense of cock"
― illegal economic migration (Tracer Hand), Friday, 25 August 2017 09:36 (six years ago) link
Wld say that it stretches back at least as far as the Lana Turner Postman Always Rings Twice, in the 1940s (from a novel by James M Cain of course, also the author of Double Indemnity, the obvious inspiration for Body Heat). Also, the European Giallo of the 1970s definitely established the template/formula of violent murder and softcore sex/nudity.
― Gulley Jimson (Ward Fowler), Friday, 25 August 2017 09:57 (six years ago) link
the typical skerritt fodder
poor tom skerritt - you bone drew barrymore on the hood of a car in one movie and you're suddenly the male shannon tweed
― frankfurters take on new glamour in this gleaming aspic (bizarro gazzara), Friday, 25 August 2017 10:14 (six years ago) link