[travis travis]

Ok, I've been reading Henry Miller's Tropic of Cancer. If you've read Miller's work you know how he likes to get the feminists goats, and you can hardly find a page without the word cunt. However, if you have half a brain like me (don't laugh - I don't know what happened to the other half) then the shock content is pretty much totally in the background as you think of the philosophy of things

Anyway, with a book, it lies with the person to control the content, to interpret and to use it as the like.

With movies, it's a different story. I'm against nudity in a good story (on film), because it's always in poor taste. Reading a story doesn't entitle us to oogle a real human being's private parts. We're not being brought closer to the story, we're an invader, a leering pervert.

Easy example - American Beauty. Watched it tonight. There's no nudity in that movie that benefitted or added to my experiencing it, but most instances did make me uncomfortable and detract from my suspension of disbelief. Plus it kept me nervous and agitated the whole movie that someone's going to walk in when a nude scene comes up, and here I am trying to watch something for the story. I read the screenplay before I saw the movie, and I can tell you that reading the screenplay was a better experience and let me take the good message of the film without wading through the uncomfortable way they handled it (besides the rose motif is really stupid) but I mean - there's a difference between reading and intellectually thinking about the ramifications of a middle aged man hitting on a 17-year-old that looks like a 14-year-old, then having to see this visually, and knowing that a movie can do anything visually to you it wants. I'd prefer my freedom please, and to not have my dignity forcibly assualted.

[christian cox]

Yeah, I'm the same way. I see it as a private matter -- that basically I do not want to watch. I don't think I've seen a film where a sex scene made the story so much deeper, it was just there for to please the eye (as well as other things...). I think it's somewhat similiar with violence, although it's less of a private matter of course, but obviously not something that's necessarily good to consume yourself with through imagery.

I guess it just has to do with whether you are comfortable watching something, the fast-forward button on a VCR or DVD player is a good feature

[Pat]

Travis Travis, the fact that the movie offended you is probably a good thing. The romance was intended to make you feel uneasy. The fact that you read the screenplay and were comfortable with it on an intellectual level perfectly demonstrates how easy it is to overlook the visceral unless you're confronted with it in plain, visual terms. While I think the rose motif might have been heavy-handed, the visual metaphor it represents and its associated theme are very central to the movie.

There's a lot of visual sophistication in that movie --enough so that it's clear the director is making deliberate decisions how he wants you to interpret the story. Did you happen to notice the close visual parallels to American Gothic or Whistler's Mother? How about the deliberate selection of colors and color saturation in both households? This wasn't Beach Bimbo Car Wash, this was a well-crafted film. Unless you're willing to accept the director's lead and let him tell the scripted story layered with his visual narrative, you're not going to be challenged.

Besides, who cares if someone comes in and sees you watching something with a little nudity in it? You didn't make the movie. It's not like the movie is somehow reflective of your character and by watching it you somehow condone the behavior in it.

-Pat

[travis travis]

Pat,

I dunno, I guess what really bugs me is the beginning and end of the film, it really tries to set everything up as a man's spiritual awakening, but in the movie most (not all) is tempered by shock type stuff, and most of it sexual shock or sex talk shock. NOT that this isn't real, but what isn't real is such a tight focus on just that, sex becomes a huge theme and without much reason

It is a great movie for trying stuff though, whether I agree how they handled it or not... and it is a visually layered movie, but I prefer character and situation development to that any day

P.S. - Like Ricki himself makes clear as his philosophy in the movie, REAL LIFE, a plastic friggin bag, is so beautiful -- but the paradox of the filmmakers--why then are we being hit with instead this sort of dramatic fantasy?

[ December 01, 2001: Message edited by: travis travis ]

[Giant Hamster]

Oh Geez...Oh Fuck! Hahahahaaahahhahaha!

AHAHHAHAHAAHHAH!!AHHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAAHAHH!!!!!!

OH MY OH MY! HAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAH

Here you go your poor poor man: (oYo)

Nudity is something that should be cherished...not feared or disliked.

ACtually.....I don't really feel like writing to you. It would be a waste of my time seeing as I've most likely insulted you already with my message opening and what I say won't change your mind.

So, Mr.born with clothes on, I leave you with that.

I hope you get some underaged bootay someday.

[Pat]

Travis Travis, well at least you saw the movie and gave it a chance. It's not for everyone, I'll grant that. I will mention that I didn't find the sex all that gratuitous though --I felt it served a purpose and wasn't in there _just_ to shock. Maybe I'm just jaded, though.

-Pat

[klaivu]

Nudity is only natural.

[klaivu]

As for american beauty, i find it almost incredible that someone might be disturbed about the sex or nudity scenes in it..

[Steelwind]

I took the nudity of American Beauty as a way for the characters to better express their character. Thora Birch's character showed herself completely to that kid so he (and the audience) would understand how much he meant to her.

The almost-sex scene was to demonstrate (IMHO) how far the whole thing between Kevin Spacey and the chick (can't remember her name) had to go before he realized that she wasn't really what he wanted.

Hell, most of the time a steamy sex scene is used to illustrate how much the characters involved mean to each other. That's kind of difficult to get across to some slower people unless you hit them with a club about it.

What's your definition of the word 'pervert'?

Steelwind

[]Aratex[]

As for nudity in movies, I'm more or less apathetic. Yes, it usually is in poor taste, but it doesn't affect me. I can see it and ignore it and get on with my life.

I personally believe that nudity/sex/etc. is meant to be a man with a woman alone together and showing each other how much they care for each other. It's meant to be special. Public nudity, sex for money, nudity in movies, etc., etc. all detract from the point in my opinion. I feel that Americans, as a general rule, have cheapened nudity and sex so much that it's next to pointless.

[ToastyKen]

***SPOILER WARNING!***

Travis, I agree that most of the sex/nudity in the movie was for shock value, but what you may have missed is that it's the CHARACTERS who are exploiting it for shock value. In particular, Angela (Mena Suvari's character) spoke about explicit sex all the time, and it was shocking because SHE wanted to bed shocking. The movie was pointing out the difference between reality and what she wanted people to think was reality. In fact, in the final scene, I didn't find her nudity arousing at all, and I think that was kind of the point.. that she's a total novice at this in reality. So I feel that the sex-talk and the nudity were both done in a way that furthered the character and story.

Another movie, oddly enough, that does something interesting with its sex scenes in a way that furthered the characters is Desperado, the type of action movie where you normally expect a gratuitous, meaningless sex scene.

[the_monkey]

i dont mind nudity in movies, in certian cases. since we're all artists, we should (sooner or later) become comfortable with the human body, clothed and unclothed.

there is a fine line between art and pornography-to me that line is sexual content.

[Jabberwocky]

I think one nude scene done really nicely was in Titantic. Don't get me wrong I really disliked DeCrap-e-o. But how they set up the drawing before as the nude, but in the sex sence there was very little flesh seen. It was really nicely done.

[travis travis]

giant hamster,

you're the one making me laugh. I'm not any sort of a prude.

what I don't buy however, is hollywood bullshit. I'll tell you what hollywood bullshit is... take for example, how in a day in real life we are highly, highly unlikely to see anyone naked besides ourselves or someone we're in a relationship with maybe... but as an observer of a movie we almost always are sitting there watching a naked stranger. how does this make sense? And I think it's rarely done for artistic purposes, and mainly serves as a peep show and as something cheap that panders to the cheap nature in people.

I cherish nature and reality, but if you think Hollywood uses nudity with integrity and with purpose...

and even in a relatively intelligent and interesting film like american beauty, they had to err on the side irrelevant sexual themes instead of content that can stand on its own

[theresa]

it's no bs, depends on who you hang out with.

on another note, we're probably highly unlikely to see anyone naked if our names are travis snoggly wog poo brain.

HEHAH hybernating sacks line the streets during the holidays!!!!!!!$&94286

[Aura]

okay I guess nudity doesn't really bother me but I think that if a person is going to be seen then it should be only by a person that is special to them. Otherwise the beauty of the human body is taken for granted and treated as a sex object rather than a stature of pride and aesthetic.

[Poxin]

"Anyway, with a book, it lies with the person to control the content, to interpret and to use it as the like.

With movies, it's a different story"

I disagree, it's not much different. When watching a movie your still interpreting and getting what you like out of what your watching. You see somthing on the screen and you relate that to a similar memorie. How youve experianced these things in the past decides how feel about them now. Alowing you to interpret and see alot of things much differently then anyone else, all depending on your how youve lived.

Alot of how you feel about sex stems to your childhood, and your first sexual experiances. From what I can recall I was alowed to watch anything I wanted as a child. Sex and violence was not cencored but explained and taught to me so I could fully understand what they were. Knowledge is better then a lack of knowledge. So I feel cencorship only takes away from life and causes problems were they could easily be avoided.

In my opinion I think sex and nudity is beautiful. I'm in no rush to censor my self from these things. It's interesting to see how other people see and portray sex. It gives you new perpectives making way for change, growth, and new understandings. Your only here for so long, you'l have alot of time to not see things when your dead =)

Alot of you said that nudity and sex on the screen is tastless and abused in hollywood. That goes the same with just about everything else. So it's up to you to watch things that are not so tasteless or abused. Even further to challang or alow your self to see somthing that may be over done or abused in a new way, in a new light.

I suggest that if you feel negativly about sex or nudity on the screen try looking at it from another perspective.

[Gordillo]

Nudity = pornography ?
mmmm...No
Violence = pornography ?
mmm....Yes,if don�t helps to told an history.

[Tiger Eaten]

Anyone here seen "Enemy at the Gates"? I thought it was a great movie right up to the sudden on the floor/public sex scene. Where the heck did that come from??? A great war movie that I BECAUSE of that scene I feel a bit uncomfortable to watch. That annoyed me and I felt it didn't add anything to the film.