Sex and the Cinema

It brings a blush to some and a twinkle of mischievousness to the eyes of others. It can be colorblind in the most beautiful ways and is something shared by all races. Its versatility in emotion is unmatched. It can be soft and tender. It can be rough and raucous. It can be purely divine or it could be tragically hellish. It drastically affects the world in which we live and if you're reading this article, it's because people you know partake in the process. From the most feeble minds to our greatest thinkers, sex is something that has intrigued the entirety of humanity. Artists have used sex to explore the never-ending intricacies of the human condition, ranging from a comedy of errs to the pinnacle of passionate expression. The world of film, which is no exception, has had an interesting, if not convoluted history concerning human sexuality.\nThis semester I have been part of a Topics in Cinema class in which we are studying several older directors. Of the directors, there was one that I was unfamiliar with, and, save for the true cineaste, I'm willing to bet few others are familiar with his work. The director is Max Ophuls. Ophuls was an international director born in Germany and made films in France, Italy, Holland and the United States. He became notorious, especially within the world of quick-cut classical narrative style in Hollywood, for his long shots that often involved elaborate camera movement. Considering that his films were made pre-Steadicam, watching Ophuls' gorgeous takes are often breathtaking and mind-blowing. Ophuls ethereal camera became the visual metaphor for his most constant themes: love, making love and man's unending search to find it. Ophuls' films dealt with sexuality in a sophisticated, although often light-hearted manner. By today's standards, in which the words sophisticated and sexuality seem hopeless disparate, Ophuls' films can seem nearly trite and by no means scandalous. But for his time, in which the utterly restrictive Hays Code was the epitome of sexual repression concerning film, Ophuls' films were frank to the point of being banned in the US.\nIn 1999, Stanley Kubrick, who was influenced by Ophuls' work, released his last and arguably most notorious film "Eyes Wide Shut." Lambasted by the moral majority and certain critics alike for its explicit sexuality, "Eyes Wide Shut" seemed to open eyes to things some wished not to see. Practically channeling the darker spirit of Ophuls, Kubrick's film was a challenging and intriguing look into the darker recesses of human sexuality and the ways in which jealousy and hidden truths can corrupt the most seemingly stable of relationships. In the infamous orgy scene held in the Long Island mansion, Kubrick's camera is absolutely haunting, detached and moves around its characters like a demented Ophulsian dance sequence. Drawn for Arthur Schnitzler's novella "Dream Story," both Kubrick and Ophuls worked with Schnitzler's material, which was often intricately psycho-sexual.\nWhile Kubrick was busy "corrupting" the minds of any who dared see his film, a certain other film was exploring new horizons in masturbation with pastries along with the various female orifices that a flute could be stuffed. And no one was batting an eye. There seems to be a glaring contradiction with this. Stanley Kubrick, whether a critical success or not, had offered the public a very frank and honest film, one that was dealing with difficult and sophisticated sexual issues and the consequences that our sexual endeavors, both hidden and known, can carry. Our other film, "American Pie," was about four guys determined to lose their virginity by prom. I'll be the last person to say that I haven't laughed watching "American Pie." And, in a certain perverted way, its tone could almost be seen as relating closer to something like Ophuls, who loved the comedy of sexuality. But I believe the difference lies within the sincerity of the storyteller. With "American Pie", sex was little more than a thoughtless joke, something that was typically treated in a vulgar and inconsequential manner. With "Eyes Wide Shut" sex was treated with elegance and complexity, daring to challenge our minds.\nSadly enough, the gross-out teen sex comedy is definitely were the market has fallen and predominately what the studios are pushing out. In our alleged sexually-liberated society, and in taking film to be a reflection of the masses, one can't help but wonder and worry about what this says of our current concept of sex. In the hands of masters, in the works of Ophuls and Kubrick, sex was something to be in awe of, something both beautiful and frightening, moving from laughter to tears, an expression of passionate love to frenzied lust. Sex was as complex and as complete a representation of the intricacies of the human mind. Today, sex seems little less than a series of thoughtless follies involving super-hold hair gel, the pleasuring of elephants, and the consequences of choosing the wrong lubricant. All things considered, the monks may be on to something.