MOVIE sex scenes have been the subject of furious debate since cinema began and can leave viewers hot under the collar for all the wrong reasons.
Martin Freeman and Jenna Ortega are the latest to find themselves in the eye of the storm over their racy scenes in Miller’s Girl, slammed as “gross” because of their 31-year age gap.
The 52-year-old Sherlock star plays teacher Jonathan Miller, who has a complicated fling with an 18-year-old student, played by Jenna, who is 21.
Viewers took to X, formerly Twitter, to vent their anger, with one saying they felt “uncomfortable” about intimate scenes between the pair.
But the film’s intimacy coordinator, Kristina Arjona, has insisted Jenna was very comfortable with the scenes and “very determined and very sure of what she wanted to do”.
And the scenes have nothing on these raunchy romps which caused controversy in the past…
Read more in Features
Nymphomaniac (2013)
The name is a bit of a giveaway, so it’s not surprising that Lars von Trier’s 2013 film, which starred Charlotte Gainsbourg, Uma Thurman and Shia LaBeouf, has a lot of sexual content.
In one shocking scene Gainsbourg’s sex addict character Joe sympathises with a self-confessed paedophile and gives him oral sex.
The sex scenes were so graphic in the movie that many believed the actors had actually performed the acts on camera.
Shia LaBeouf seemed to confirm this when he told a US chat show: “There’s a disclaimer at the top of the script that basically says we’re doing it for real.
Most read in Showbiz
“Everything that is illegal, we’ll shoot in blurred images. Other than that, everything is happening.”
In fact, von Trier used porn stars as body doubles, digitally adding images of their genitals to the bodies of the cast.
Crash (1996)
James Spader stars as a car crash survivor who develops macabre fantasies and meets a group of fetishists who are aroused by violent car accidents and horrific injuries.
In one graphic scene his character, James Ballard, has sex with an open wound on the leg of a disabled woman, played by Rosanna Arquette.
The movie, directed by David Cronenberg, was banned in parts of the UK but released in the US, with a rating of NC-17 – meaning no one under 17 could see it.
Critics condemned the sex scenes, and Cronenberg claimed Francis Ford Coppola, who was jury president at the 1996 Cannes Film Festival, tried to prevent Crash from receiving the coveted Palme d’Or.
However, it was awarded a Special Jury Prize by the committee and the director was booed by the audience as he stood up to collect it.
Pink Flamingos (1972)
John Waters’ cult movie sees trailer park mum Babs, played by Harris Glenn Milstead – better known as Divine – fighting to keep her title as “the filthiest person in the world”.
One scene, which was banned by the British Board of Film Classification, shows a chicken being killed during sex between Danny Miller’s character, Cracker, and a girlfriend.
And in another disturbing scene, Divine performs a sex act on Cracker – who is her on-screen son – as he declares his devotion to her.
The film was banned in Australia, Norway and parts of the US and was not submitted to the BBFC until 1989.
It was then released with these two scenes – and another, in which a man artificially inseminates a woman after masturbating – cut.
Intimacy (2001)
Brit actor Mark Rylance starred in the erotic drama Intimacy opposite Kerry Fox, which featured full frontal nudity and very raunchy sex scenes.
In one, Kerry gave Mark un-simulated oral sex. Many believed other sex scenes were also real, with one critic claiming that after an encounter between the couple that opens the film, “the spectator is left in little doubt that penetration has occurred”.
Rylance later said talk of the film’s unsimulated sex scenes in tabloids added stress on his marriage and “soured his life” for months.
He added: “It’s my mistake, but I felt [director] Patrice [Chéreau] put undue pressure on me on set to do that. And at that point I didn’t have the confidence as a film actor to say no.”
He now says he regrets the movie, recently telling the Guardian: “I found the making of the film and the subsequent publicity and personal attacks very, very painful. I wish I hadn’t made it.”
The Brown Bunny (2003)
Chloe Sevigny was dropped by her agent after appearing in this art house road movie with Vincent Gallo.
Gallo plays a motorbike racer who travels across the US in search of his long lost love, and ends with Sevigny’s character performing unsimulated oral sex on the actor.
After the film got a hostile reception at Cannes, Sevingny likened it to an Andy Warhol movie, but she parted company with talent agency William Morris shortly after and her career hit a slump.
In 2011 she told Playboy she might one day seek therapy over the role, adding: “The film is tragic and beautiful, and I’m proud of it and my performance.
“I’m sad that people think one way of the movie, but what can you do? I’ve done many explicit sex scenes, but I’m not that interested in doing anymore.
“I’m more self-aware now and wouldn’t be able to be as free, so why even do it?”
Blue is the Warmest Colour (2013)
In this flick Lea Seydoux stars as an art student who has a love affair with a teenager, played by Adele Exarchopoulos.
The film contains long and graphic sex scenes between the two women.
Critics accused director Abdellatif Kechiche of including gratuitous romps, with the New York Times’ critic Manohla Dargis pointing out the steamy scenes felt “far more about Mr. Kechiche’s desires than anything else”.
There were also claims that the sex was real, but Seydoux later revealed that the women used prosthetic moulds of their vaginas to make it look realistic.
The Cannes jury awarded the Palme d’Or to Kechiche and both the actresses, which had never been done before.
But Seydoux later claimed the director’s methods were “humiliating” and left her “feeling like a prostitute”.
Blue Velvet (2008)
David Lynch’s Blue Velvet split opinion, receiving both Oscar nods and a wave of protest.
The uproar centred on a scene in which Dennis Hopper inhales oxygen and then has abusive sex with Isabella Rossellini while being watched by Kyle Maclachlan.
The scene was slammed as misogynistic, with critic Roger Ebert saying Rossellini was “degraded, slapped around, humiliated and undressed in front of the camera”.
The Devils (1971)
The Ken Russell film was considered so blasphemous that the full version is still not available 50 years on.
The most controversial scene, known as the “Rape of Christ”, was a two-and-a-half-minute sequence which saw naked nuns sexually defiling a statue of Christ as a priest looks on and masturbates.
Warner Bros cut the scene before submitting the film to the BBFC.
Another, which sees a nun pleasuring herself with the charred bone of a martyred saint, was also cut.
Don’t Look Now (1973)
The classic thriller, set in Venice, centres on a couple played by Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland, who are grieving the death of their daughter in a tragic drowning accident.
But a scene in which the pair have sex proved a talking point for decades afterwards, with many believing it was so realistic the actors were doing it for real.
Speculation was rife for years and was reignited in 2011 when producer Peter Bart wrote in his memoirs: “My gaze shifted to the actors, and I was riveted.
“By their shifting positions, it was clear to me they were no longer simply acting: they were f*****g on camera.”
Furious Donald Sutherland denied the claims, stating that Bart wasn’t even in the room when the scene was shot.
Cinematographer Anthony B. Richmond confirmed the only people present were himself, the actors and director Nicolas Roeg.
9 Songs (2004)
The movie charts a 12-month love affair between a British climatologist and an American student, to the soundtrack of nine rock songs.
Widely seen as the most sexually explicit mainstream film to date, it includes several scenes of real sex between the two lead actors, Margo Stilley and Kieran O’Brien.
READ MORE SUN STORIES
The sexual exchanges between the two, shown clearly on film, include mutual masturbation, extreme close-ups of genitalia and oral sex, an on-screen ejaculation and a lingering shot of penetration.
Despite causing outrage, the film was released with an 18 certificate, prompting MP Ann Widdecombe to complain in the UK House of Commons and call on the Home Secretary to reverse the decision to release it uncut.
