Five erotic movies that pushed things deliciously too far
Cinema is a place where we can indulge our wildest fantasies.
If we want to pretend to be a cowboy, why not watch a western? Or how about a charming rom-com when you’re in the mood to daydream about meet-cutes and impressive declarations of love? Whatever it is, there is a film out there to suit your needs and allow you to experience a world far removed from your own.
But what if you’ve got more taboo fantasies, like cheating on a spouse, engaging in an illicit affair, or (and each to their own, I guess) getting off on car crashes? Luckily, the erotic thriller sub-genre has offered viewers transgressive and seductive stories for decades, often blurring the line between pleasure and pain and security and danger. If you’ve ever dreamed of getting involved in a high-stakes world of eroticism, these movies bring these fantasies to life.
The sub-genre appeared to boom in the 1980s and 1990s, with movies like Basic Instinct, Fatal Attraction, Bound, Body of Evidence, Dressed to Kill, and Body Double becoming popular. While many of these are great films, we’ve picked out five that we believe to be not only fantastic erotic thrillers but truly incredible and essential movies in their own right.
From Stanley Kubrick’s erotic masterpiece Eyes Wide Shut to David Cronenberg’s divisive body horror Crash, here are five tantalisingly provocative erotic thrillers you must see.
Five erotic thrillers to see before you die:
Eyes Wide Shut (Stanley Kubrick, 1999)
The final film Stanley Kubrick made before he died, Eyes Wide Shut, was his most erotic piece of work. However, Kubrick couldn’t simply make a movie about sex and relationships without exploring some complex psychological themes at the same time.
The film, starring Nicole Kidman as Alice and Tom Cruise as her husband, Bill, sees the latter get pulled deep into a web of conspiracy, uncertainty, and mystery after attending a sex cult’s masked orgy.
In one iconic scene, Bill attends the orgy, which begins with a terrifying ritual by the main leader, as ominous music and close-ups of the masked faces create an ominous atmosphere. It’s both erotic and scary, blurring the lines between sex as a form of pleasure and release and sex as an illicit activity associated with power and danger.
Belle De Jour (Luis Buñuel, 1967)
Surrealist artist and filmmaker Luis Buñuel made one of France’s most seductive pieces of cinema in 1967 with Belle De Jour, a movie that saw Catherine Deneuve play the sexually frustrated Severine.
Married to a man who doesn’t satisfy her needs, Severine begins working at a brothel to fulfil her most erotic desires. With surreal fantasy sequences of Severine’s twisted sexual wants – such as being covered in mud – the movie delights in the world of the bizarre, testing the audience’s propensity for the more unconventional side of the erotic.
The movie descends into thriller territory as Severine meets the jealous criminal Marcel. Although it doesn’t fit into the erotic thriller genre in the same way that a movie like Basic Instinct does – it’s much more surrealist – Belle De Jour offers a blueprint to the sub-genre that would subsequently blossom. Through its depiction of unusual sexual relationships and the erotic’s innate ties to danger and jealousy, Belle De Jour paved the way for a corner of cinema that is concerned with the psychological implications associated with sexual fantasies.
Blue Velvet (David Lynch, 1986)
David Lynch is no stranger to placing wildly erotic moments into his films, such as Wild at Heart, Lost Highway, and Mulholland Drive. You could pick any of those titles for this list, but Blue Velvet is perhaps most fitting, with its neo-noir atmosphere, gorgeous score by Angelo Badalamenti, and transgressive depiction of sexuality.
From Isabella Rossellini’s complex portrayal of the singer Dorothy Valens, who begins an unusual sexual relationship with Kyle MacLachlan’s Jeffrey, to Dennis Hopper’s terrifying performance as the sadistic Frank Booth, Blue Velvet firmly tangles up the meaning of eroticism with perversity and fear. It’s a must-watch if you like erotic thrillers, although it is perhaps one of the weirdest on this list.
Crash (David Cronenberg, 1996)
Body horror is intrinsically linked to eroticism, often offering us a unique take on the viscerality of sex and its relationship with our experiences as corporeal individuals. Thus, Crash, directed by David Cronenberg, stands as the go-to erotic thriller for anyone with a penchant for body horror – and for anyone who loves cars. In Cronenberg’s adaptation of JG Ballard’s story, a group of people sexually aroused by the danger and thrill associated with cars and potential crashes push their bodies to the limit.
The characters in Crash are on a constant search for a sense of fulfilment – something they can never achieve because it is clear that what they really want is that thrill of death. They chase each other on highways or even recreate famous car accidents, racing after the euphoric feeling of ecstasy that is found in both orgasming and teetering on the edge of dying.
La Piscine (Jacques Deray, 1969)
La Piscine, directed by Jacques Deray, takes us on a gorgeous summer holiday in France, where Alain Delon’s Jean-Paul and Romy Schneider’s Marianne are spending time together, lounging by the pool and making love. Yet, when an old lover of Marianne’s, Harry, arrives with his teenage daughter, played by a young Jane Birkin, events turn tense as jealousy and revenge come to dominate the holiday.
Shot in gorgeous colours, the bright blues of the pool and orange hues from the warm sun and the characters’ tanned skin emphasise a sense of dreaminess, which is contrasted by the nightmarish reality that descends on the holiday. La Piscine is a classic of the erotic thriller sub-genre, inspiring the great Swimming Pool by François Ozon.
