Everything Below This Is NSFW

July 16, 2010 5:04 PM

Cinema's Most Pivotal Gay Sex Scenes from Salon.com. (NSFW, of course)

some notable omissions.

In other Gay cinema news: I Love You Phillip Morris will finally get a US release.

posted by The Whelk (94 comments total)

I'm not sure what's "pivotal." I would include Y tu mama tambien. (It's only a kiss, but ... mmm, what a kiss.)
posted by anshuman at 5:16 PM on July 16, 2010 [2 favorites]

Wild Things was such a gross movie.
posted by Houyhnhnm at 5:17 PM on July 16, 2010 [3 favorites]

agreed.
posted by The Whelk at 5:20 PM on July 16, 2010

I would like the criteria for 'pivotal' to be more clearly specified. Mostly I don't understand how Wild Things is important because it shows two girls kissing and encourages more of this in other films.
posted by Hicksu at 5:31 PM on July 16, 2010

What, no love for Sayle's Lianna?

Derek Jarman's Sebastiane is not only the only full-length movie entirely in Latin (well, that I know of; prove me wrong), but it's also the first erection to appear in a non-port British film.

This seems to have a very odd idea of "pivotal."
posted by GenjiandProust at 5:32 PM on July 16, 2010 [2 favorites]

In discussing the topic of this FPP, we must not forget to mention the documentaries:

The Celluloid Closet.

Fabulous! The Story of Queer Cinema.

posted by ericb at 5:39 PM on July 16, 2010 [2 favorites]

Oh good, do we get to quibble now?

It's an interesting linkbait list, thanks. But I'd call that first sex scene in The Crying Game a far more "pivotal" moment for mainstream cinema than Mulholland Drive. And yeah, William Hurt won the first Oscar for an out queer character in your "omissions" link, which IMDB calls "one of the first independent hit movies." Fairly pivotal. It had a tense prison makeout scene and, if I recall right, implied male-male fucking that was probably more courageous for its time than was Brokeback.
posted by mediareport at 5:42 PM on July 16, 2010 [4 favorites]

Actually, the big, empty white square where a slide show is supposed to be is surprisingly safe for work.
posted by koeselitz at 5:45 PM on July 16, 2010

Geez, where the hell is "Velvet Goldmine?"
posted by tzikeh at 5:46 PM on July 16, 2010 [11 favorites]

I learned about teh Gay from watching Superman kiss Michael Caine.
posted by Dr. Zira at 5:48 PM on July 16, 2010 [4 favorites]

No Happy Together, no dice.
posted by Weebot at 5:50 PM on July 16, 2010 [4 favorites]

[Yeah, this web interface thingie seems to be completely, irretrievably broken in Chrome / Fedora 12, although it works fine in Firefox on the same machine. Hmm.]
posted by koeselitz at 5:52 PM on July 16, 2010

I learned about teh Gay from watching Superman kiss Michael Caine.

Me too.
posted by Bookhouse at 5:52 PM on July 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

For those unfamiliar with Velvet Goldmine it is a glam-rock tribute in which Obi Won Kenobi And Batman totally do it.
posted by The Whelk at 5:54 PM on July 16, 2010 [11 favorites]

Surprised that Henry and June and Bad Education aren't on this list.
posted by Anima Mundi at 5:54 PM on July 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

I'm surprised Basic Instinct wasn't mentioned. It didn't technically have a lesbian sex scene, but some lesbian groping and kissing, and yes, there was the infamous beaver shot. And yes, it was a terribly schlocky film that barely rises to the level of "film." But I think, when asked to name a lesbian film character, Basic Instinct would float into most people's minds.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 5:55 PM on July 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

The lack of any Pedro Almodovar is kinda strange considering he's a critical darling in the States since ever forever and lush homoerotic interludes are kinda of his thing.
posted by The Whelk at 5:56 PM on July 16, 2010 [3 favorites]

Threesome was so silly.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 5:56 PM on July 16, 2010 [2 favorites]

Personally, that scene between Michael Ian Black and Bradley Cooper in Wet Hot American Summer was pretty pivotal. Especially since I first watched it as a teenager with my Christian fundamentalist parents. I think that was the last time my mother rented a film just because "that funny guy from Frasier" was in it.
posted by fryman at 6:06 PM on July 16, 2010 [6 favorites]

The shower scene in "Elephant" was very pivotal...and ignored. Lame.
posted by shockingbluamp at 6:07 PM on July 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

Oh good, do we get to quibble now?

Isn't that why we are here?

Also no mention of Desert Hearts. Which I consider an inspiration for Brokeback Mountain.
posted by Hicksu at 6:07 PM on July 16, 2010 [4 favorites]

Was "My Own Private Idaho" didn't make it? Whoa!

Also, huge Bowie fan, but crossing "Velvet Goldmine" off my list of films I want to see.
posted by cjorgensen at 6:14 PM on July 16, 2010

Blazecock Pileon: Threesome was so silly.

Agreed. As I said earlier on the subject in a Baldwin thread:

FYI: (a dude) + (a girl from Twin Peaks) = pretty much my greatest sexual fantasy when I was a teen...yet even I thought this movie was repugnant...though for not the same reason.

I'm really not sure I get how this measures 'pivotal'; the text before doesn't help and really neither does the selection from the slideshows. And even if it is just a personal thing, I'm not sure how these would all be selected unless together it was just "the one's this author has seen."

But that all just might be that I've seen enough gay cinema (or in the majority of these cases, gay scenes in mainstream cinema with same sex sex scenes) to have an opinion but haven't really spent much time thinking about how it all fits together. Maybe I'm having a hard time removing "scenes" from "film's overall impact", but although there's some obvious choices (like Brokeback Mountain or Cruising but with the word "most" attached, many of the others seem a little...not most pivotal.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 6:17 PM on July 16, 2010 [2 favorites]

I always thought Wild Things was more pandering to straight dudes than it was promoting the equality of LGBT relationships with straight relationships in cinema. Feels like more of a step back than a step forward to me.
posted by emilyd22222 at 6:19 PM on July 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

I haven't seen My Beautiful Launderette since the late 80's, but this reminds me to watch that again. I don't remember much except that it was a really good movie. I must have been drubk at the time. Where's the Crying Game? Too cliché at this point? And what about Uncle Monte's advances in Withnail? There's some interesting subtext there about closeting and homophobia.
posted by Devils Rancher at 6:19 PM on July 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

re: pivotal and the exclusion of Gus Van Sant movies, you could make the argument that they aren't pivotal because they didn't have a big enough audience. But again, this falls apart when you compare it to some that did make the list.

Still though, like most top ten lists about subjects I give a damn about, it makes me think about it, so I'm still glad for the article (and the post)
posted by MCMikeNamara at 6:20 PM on July 16, 2010 [2 favorites]

I would like the criteria for 'pivotal' to be more clearly specified.

It sounded more intellectual to Salon's editors than "Nine Hot Softcore Gay Sex Scenes In Mainstream Hollywood Movies and My Beautiful Laundrette". But since we're playing that games, surely we could swap The Hunger in and Wild Things out.
posted by Combustible Edison Lighthouse at 6:35 PM on July 16, 2010 [2 favorites]

The most memorable gay sex scene for me was between Brian and Justin in the first episode of Queer as Folk (the American version).

Yeah, I know, TV, not film. But still it's what really stands out to me.

Which media has done more to advance gay acceptance in the American main stream, TV or movies?
posted by marsha56 at 6:38 PM on July 16, 2010 [2 favorites]

I always thought Wild Things was more pandering to straight dudes than it was promoting the equality of LGBT relationships with straight relationships in cinema.

Yeah, if you want to see a two-woman sex scene that actually is appealing to women, then check out the Susan Sarandon and Catherine Deneuve (!) seduction flashback in The Hunger. Holy cow.
posted by FelliniBlank at 6:39 PM on July 16, 2010 [3 favorites]

Damn you, Combustible Edison Lighthouse!
posted by FelliniBlank at 6:41 PM on July 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

Bad news: everybody's got their own list.

Good news: there most definitely is film at eleven.

Go Fish, Wild Side, When Night Is Falling
posted by Halloween Jack at 6:52 PM on July 16, 2010 [2 favorites]

It comes as no shock to me that the slide on Wild Things fails to mention a scene with two men in the shower. The only thing pivotal about the Richards-Dillon-Campbell scene was how quickly it swung over to wretched and disappointing — like it was greased. Any bros in it for the girl-girl might have had a shock coming to them had the producers the guts to film the proposed scene where Kevin Bacon and Matt Dillon are in the shower together. Complete copout.

I liked Threesome. It wasn't a film so about labels as it was about desire and how people attempt to wrestle those desires into convenient little boxes, often at the expense of others. Oh, and the guy known as "Front Desk Dick" in the film, Alexis Arquette, is now a woman. Catch her in the exquisitely painful Killer Drag Queens on Dope.
posted by adipocere at 6:53 PM on July 16, 2010

Also, huge Bowie fan, but crossing "Velvet Goldmine" off my list of films I want to see.

If you're saying this because of that YT link, I suggest you give the first few minutes a try.

Seriously, the film's a mess on various levels, but brilliant on way more. It certainly slapped my heterosexual brain around in all kinds of weird and amazing ways, managing to make the indelible point that yes, as a matter of fact, GLAM had way more to it than just platform shoes, too much makeup and some good songs.

From the AV CLUB's New Cult Canon - Velvet Goldmine

But just as Haynes relies on Citizen Kane for a narrative framework, Velvet Goldmine also breaks from it in an important way: It's Kane without "Rosebud." There's no skeleton key that unlocks the mystery of Slade's person, revealing some hidden longing at the core of his being. Haynes isn't out to explode the myths that glam-rock stars construct around themselves; otherwise, he wouldn't have opened the film with the likes of Oscar Wilde getting beamed down from a spaceship. "You live in terror of not being misunderstood," Mandy tells Slade after their marriage has dissolved, and she's right: The minute people think they know the real Slade, behind the carefully crafted mask of Maxwell Demon, he's exposed as being as painfully banal as the rest of humanity. It might sound like an odd goal, but Haynes succeeds smashingly at keeping the audience from truly knowing his pop icons.
posted by philip-random at 6:56 PM on July 16, 2010

'IF...." One shot, two boys in bed, it was pivotal, take my word for it.
posted by Some1 at 7:19 PM on July 16, 2010 [2 favorites]

The great 'gay' movie in my opinion is Jeffrey... I don't remember a sex scene, but it is a movie that everyone who thinks gays are 'funny' should watch. I watched it in a theater full of gay men in Long Beach, CA, though, so maybe it's not as great as I remember.
posted by Huck500 at 7:38 PM on July 16, 2010 [2 favorites]

Yes, "Threesome" was silly, or it may seem silly now looking back, but the Salon remark that it was "tame" by "today's standards" is ridiculous. What standards do they mean? There's way less gay sex, actual or implied, in mainstream or indie cinema today than there was 10 or 15 years ago. Only two of the films that Salon chooses to mention were released in the last ten years, which doesn't do much for the implication that today's "standards" are somehow so much more open and daring than yesterday's. That's pathetic because Salon can't think of any good films with gay sex (others have named great examples above), but it's even more pathetic because everybody is too scared of their own shadow to finance movies that contain scenes of gay sex.

The one film that everybody can think of that transgressed that boundary was "Brokeback," but it's the exception that proves the rule. You see less skin and less sexual contact in "Brokeback" than you do in "Threesome," and even that little bit provoked a firestorm of criticism. By today's standards, the threesome sex scene in "Threesome" is actually kind of reckless, not tame. That movie wouldn't get a distributor today. "Brokeback" might not even get a distributor if it were being filmed now.
posted by blucevalo at 8:05 PM on July 16, 2010 [3 favorites]

No way am I letting this thread go without linking to one of the greatest scenes in motion picture history.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 8:19 PM on July 16, 2010 [6 favorites]

So I just saw A Single Man, no sex scenes (but oh so much loooooonging) and a bit heavy-handed, but uh ...yeah I haven't seen situation's I've been in done so close to bone like that. Yikes


dear god why is The Boiler Room the default Gay Bar in any movie that takes place in NYC? Seriously? They can throw all the fabric around they want but I know that chipped wood pillar pillar anywhere. Who owes someone a favor here?
posted by The Whelk at 8:23 PM on July 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

Also jack Hamm is in it for like 10 seconds which means it's now part of the Mad Men universe dammnit.

and yeah it was a good translation of Isherwood's prose style, which has been, for good or bad, always been called "cinematic". And Juliane Moore needs to be sloppy drunk in more movies. Have we all forgotten Surviving Picasso? She does great Crazy.
posted by The Whelk at 8:26 PM on July 16, 2010

There's way less gay sex, actual or implied, in mainstream or indie cinema today than there was 10 or 15 years ago.

Sorry I'm going to have to call bullshit on that:

Ken Park (2001) - I forget how graphic Threesome got, but there's an extended threesome at the end with plenty of flesh.
Lost and Delirious (2001)
Hedwig and the Angry Inch (2001)
Angels in America (2003) - Yeah I know not technically a movie, but whatever, it was that good.
My Summer of Love (2004)
Transamerica (2005)
Shortbus (2006)
Milk (2008)
Vicky Christina Barcelona (2008)
A Single Man (2009) - No gay sex, but I didn't really feel there needed to be, it would have ruined it. Still as gay as you'll get.
Bruno (2009) - Probably the most graphically gay thing in mainstream media in a long time, a parody sure, but still.

That's just off the top of my head, restricted to the last 10 years, movies that were primarily about LGBT and were mainstream / likely to be found in an average art house. I'm not even stretching here. I didn't even touch movies where gay characters were merely ancillary to the story, something you wouldn't have seen 15-20 years ago that's just taken as a given now.

I will grant you that there's no explicit Fatal Attraction type of gay sex taking place in films. There's not even straight Fatal Attraction taking place in films anymore, but there's definitely more T&A than dicks and you'll have a much better chance of seeing two chicks kiss than two guys. But I don't see softcore scenes as really necessary in affirming that LGBT-oriented films have a firm ground in cinema today.
posted by geoff. at 8:49 PM on July 16, 2010

I'm trying to remember now if The Dreamers had a gay sex scene, or was simply incestuous.
posted by sbutler at 8:50 PM on July 16, 2010

For those unfamiliar with Velvet Goldmine it is a glam-rock tribute in which Obi Won Kenobi And Batman totally do it.

it was also fucking terrible. However if you like the whole Glam Rock thing, or if you enjoyed My Beautiful Laundrette, you might want to check out The Buddah of Suburbia.
posted by Artw at 9:02 PM on July 16, 2010

I didn't even touch movies where gay characters were merely ancillary to the story, something you wouldn't have seen 15-20 years ago that's just taken as a given now.

I agree that there are more gay supporting roles in movies than there were 15-20 years ago, though not as many and not as substantial as you'd expect given the pace of change in the real world.

I was talking about sex scenes. I guess I could have made my case better if I'd said "gay male sex," maybe, because as you say, there's a much better chance of seeing two women kissing than two guys.

Anyway, very good list. I forgot about it, but I'd add "Far from Heaven" to it too.
posted by blucevalo at 9:18 PM on July 16, 2010

I forget how graphic Threesome got

Not very, and if memory serves there was heavy gauzy lensing on the camera, like something out of a 1980s Skinemax flick. The scene didn't last long either. But still, way more arousing to me than the scene in "Brokeback."
posted by blucevalo at 9:26 PM on July 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

I was a total closet case when Threesome was released but I remember liking it at the time. I think I found the idea of fluid sexuality comforting, although I'm pretty much a Kinsey 6 now.

'A Single Man' was pretty great - never has a fuzzy pink sweater looked so good - but I was disappointed by the ending. It seemed lazy to my modern sensibilities.
posted by sevenyearlurk at 9:31 PM on July 16, 2010

Am I the only one who thought that Wild Things was one of the last great sunset noirs, and a strange peice of trash that would be considered a lost classic if it was made by API ca 1972---b/c I love the fuck out of that movie.
posted by PinkMoose at 9:48 PM on July 16, 2010 [4 favorites]

Anyway, very good list. I forgot about it, but I'd add "Far from Heaven" to it too

I love the bits from Far From Heaven where Prejudice strikes... It's like something from Invasion of the Bodysnatchers or similar 50s paranoia SF.
posted by Artw at 9:52 PM on July 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

That movie doesn't stand up so well on repeated viewings and was way too overhyped when it was originally released, but it had its moments. It was somewhat amusing to watch Dennis Quaid try to pretend to like getting it on with a guy.
posted by blucevalo at 10:06 PM on July 16, 2010

Interesting, I caught Far From Heaven recently and was surprised how much better some of it was than I remember. Could be because I've seen more Douglas Sirk movies since and because I care less about the gay part. I think Dennis Quaid is pretty bad in it, but the rest of the bits (acting, directing, cinematography) are great and reminds me, like a lot of Todd Haynes not-quite-great work, of Quentin Tarantino's not-quite-gread movies -- a good movie but more about the movies than something that stands on its own. (I don't mean just the Douglas Sirk tribute stuff either.,)

PinkMoose: Am I the only one who thought that Wild Things was one of the last great sunset noirs, and a strange peice of trash that would be considered a lost classic if it was made by API ca 1972---b/c I love the fuck out of that movie.

No - you totally aren't . I've heard similar things many times from people. Don't agree with them or you though :) Similarly they like it too, so you might all be trash apologists (which I'm totally game for but Wild Things just doesn't work for me -- though seeing it again I do think there's some truth in your thoughts that it would have been thought of differently if it came out earlier would possibly have a different critical reputation. (For a reversal of this, I feel similarly about Midnight Cowboy, even though I enjoyed watching it once I finally saw it about 5-6 years ago, I realized it was very, very much doesn't hold up except for more than a curiosity.)
posted by MCMikeNamara at 11:12 PM on July 16, 2010

Could be because I've seen more Douglas Sirk movies since and because I care less about the gay part.

Exactly -- the main reason I wanted to see it was for the Sirk references. After I'd seen them, there wasn't much else to see.
posted by blucevalo at 11:42 PM on July 16, 2010

I'm with you, PinkMoose.
posted by brundlefly at 12:14 AM on July 17, 2010

what is the ettiquette of self linking to a blog entry i wrote about wild things? also, thank you mike and brundlefly.
posted by PinkMoose at 12:38 AM on July 17, 2010

A film I'm always missing in those LGBT listings, probably because of age, obscure- and Fenchness, is Pourquoi pas! (1977) About a m/m/f relationship that has some troubles transforming into an m/f/m/f foursome. For some reason the otherwise forgotten movie has a bit of a cult status in Germany (artsy-circles) and is quite the treat for a bisexual, poly persons like me. No overt sex-scenes, but enough nudity und eroticism nevertheless.

The movie that single-handedly turned me queer is the Canadian When Night Is Falling (1995) No seriously. Sorching lesbian hottnes. Rawr.
posted by ZeroAmbition at 1:33 AM on July 17, 2010 [2 favorites]

See. Just thinking about how hot it was impairs my spelling.
posted by ZeroAmbition at 1:43 AM on July 17, 2010

Threesome was silly, by any standard!

But what strikes me now, thinking about it, was how I was sooo excited to go to a movie about bisexuals because there were no other movies in the universe about bisexuals.

Nowadays there's a queer movie every week. I never even know they're playing anymore.
posted by serazin at 1:51 AM on July 17, 2010

When Night is Falling pretty much turned me queer too, Zero Ambition! Ah, memories ...
posted by kyrademon at 2:16 AM on July 17, 2010

(Also, I would like to say that D.E.B.S. is underrated. I love that film.)
posted by kyrademon at 2:24 AM on July 17, 2010

Cinema's Most Pivotal Gay Sex Scenes

If you squint, it reads as "Obama's Most Pivotal Gay Sex Scenes"
posted by delmoi at 3:51 AM on July 17, 2010 [1 favorite]

If you squint, it reads as "Obama's Most Pivotal Gay Sex Scenes"

I reloaded the front page a couple times while this was at the top, and read "China's Most Pivotal Gay Sex Scenes." Damn commie pinkos.
posted by Devils Rancher at 4:32 AM on July 17, 2010

Priscilla won an Academy Award. A 1994 film from Australia with several elements that were advanced even in '94 I'd call pivotal. & Hugo got to be a lot cuter than in Matrix, & Guy than in Time Machine.
posted by Twang at 4:36 AM on July 17, 2010 [2 favorites]

what is the ettiquette of self linking to a blog entry i wrote

Perfectly fine as a comment in a relevant thread. Go ahead!
posted by mediareport at 4:57 AM on July 17, 2010

Where is The Pillow Book? It must be in Ewan McGregor's contract that he will be naked in every movie -- even "The Ghost Writer" features his British bum.
posted by autopilot at 5:02 AM on July 17, 2010 [1 favorite]

Soooo..."pivotal" means "scenes of straight girls kissing, added to get straight guys into the theater"?
posted by Thorzdad at 5:02 AM on July 17, 2010

Aside from the weird threesome, I thought Wild Things was a fun movie. It also had a great low-key bayou soundtrack by George S. Clinton.
posted by Evilspork at 5:09 AM on July 17, 2010

I'm surprised nobody's yet mentioned 1982's Making Love, with Harry Hamlin and Michael Ontkean. I think it was the first time I'd seen two men doing it on screen. While the story is Harlequin Romance at its worst, it was a revelation at the time.
posted by Short Attention Sp at 5:31 AM on July 17, 2010 [1 favorite]

Far From Heaven led to a schism in our household, as I was enjoying a wickedly funny romp through pantone color samples while the BF was more ...emotionally involved in the story.

I still hold to my guns that it could be read as a SF film and still work.
posted by The Whelk at 7:35 AM on July 17, 2010 [1 favorite]

I'm trying to remember now if The Dreamers had a gay sex scene, or was simply incestuous.

Micheal Pitt was reportedly very upset that the extended double-incest gay sec scenes where ultimately cut from the movie.
posted by The Whelk at 7:39 AM on July 17, 2010

adipocere:

Any bros in it for the girl-girl might have had a shock coming to them had the producers the guts to film the proposed scene where Kevin Bacon and Matt Dillon are in the shower together. Complete copout.

I always knew there must have been something cut out from that part of the movie. The scene where Dillon walks in on Bacon in the shower, where we get shown a flash of, er, Kevin's bacon (heh), has no reason to be there without the two of them at least kissing. It's the logical next step in the movie's continual twist-after-sexual-twist plot. Really, the end doesn't make sense without it.

Also totally agree with others that "Mulholland Drive," good though the film is, shouldn't be on this list. "The Hunger" should.

Also - where's the recognition of "Making Love"? It may be a bit maudlin but it was groundbreaking for a mainstream Hollywood movie, in that it had big name actors playing gay, and a happy ending for Michael Ontkean's character. Harry Hamlin's character is also noteworthy, in my opinion, in that he's an accurate depiction of the "swinging single" sort of gay man of the era, is unapologetic about it, and isn't made to appear like some sort of vile depraved villain.
posted by dnash at 8:30 AM on July 17, 2010

WHOA WHOA WHOA! No GO FISH?!?!?!
posted by liza at 8:32 AM on July 17, 2010 [1 favorite]

If you squint, it reads as "Obama's Most Pivotal Gay Sex Scenes"

I tried the squint and got "Obama's a card carrying Gay Sex Scenester"
posted by philip-random at 8:38 AM on July 17, 2010

Too bad they left out Nightmare on Elm Street Pt. 2!
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 9:31 AM on July 17, 2010 [2 favorites]

No mention of "Maurice" yet?! "The Incredibly True Adventure of Two Girls in Love?"
posted by Wuggie Norple at 9:52 AM on July 17, 2010

"Maurice" has that "I was just ..arranging matchsticks." "I see." "I think you'd better go." problem about it.
posted by The Whelk at 9:54 AM on July 17, 2010 [3 favorites]

has anyone seen I Love You Phillip Morris yet? One of the rumors around it was it had a graphic gay sex scene (with Jim Carrey!) that was too much for American Audiences (it turned it not to be, it was more a complex legal battle, but people found the clip and posted it anyway which you can find if you look hard enough .) I did see the clip and it looked ....good. Dark comedy about two cons who are In Love and on a Spree? Sounds up my alley.


I'd like to take this moment to thank Mr. McGregor for his repeated devotion to being at least partially nude in all his movies.
posted by The Whelk at 10:14 AM on July 17, 2010 [3 favorites]

Hot furtive snogging scene in "Maurice" between James Wilby as Maurice and Rupert Graves as Scudder the undergamekeeper, but all too brief, like a shooting star in the night. Hugh Grant is a major presence in "Maurice" as well (as Clive Durham), but he seems uncomfortable, like he wandered off a straight romcom and doesn't know what to do with himself.
posted by blucevalo at 11:18 AM on July 17, 2010

And I would be remiss not to mention Marek Kanievska's "Another Country," which had no sex scene, just a moonlight snuggle between Rupert Everett and Cary Elwes. That movie did more to corrupt me than anything else I ever saw as a closeted teenager, and other than my personal interest in it, it also opened a lot of doors for LGBT filmmaking at a time when most successful movies were either Sly Stone/Arnold Schwarzenegger action flicks, horror movies, Merchant-Ivory costume dramas, or John Hughes films.

This, is my opinion, is a much better list of Gay Sex Scenes That Made Movie History (better than Salon's). I'd totally forgotten about "Kiss of the Spider Woman" and "Prick up Your Ears." And "The Living End" -- talk about amazingly hot movies (at the time, anyway). I'd forgotten about "Latter Days," too, a 2003 movie that had a couple of very hot softcore scenes.
posted by blucevalo at 11:42 AM on July 17, 2010 [2 favorites]

Did anyone mention Bound yet? Wachowskis’ Gay Iraqi Romance ‘CN9′ Begins Casting
posted by Artw at 1:49 PM on July 17, 2010

Bound is in the original article, and yes..they had Susie Bright on set and everything. It's basically the best thing the Wachowskis ever did (It holds together *very* well unlike, say all the other movies)

And I would be remiss not to mention Marek Kanievska's "Another Country," which had no sex scene, just a moonlight snuggle between Rupert Everett and Cary Elwes. That movie did more to corrupt me than anything else I ever saw as a closeted teenager,

Well if we're using THAT metric that let me just say that while I wasn't exactly closeted or confused as a teenager (I had the internet), I wasn't exactly comfortable with the whole thing and sexuality in general. Then along comes 1999 and between Jude Law in Gattaca and Jude Law in The Talented Mr. Ripley, I pretty much had a light blub go off that said "Type Chosen"

of course it's a type that rarely exists outside of fiction and not since 1932, so you have to get other ones.
posted by The Whelk at 2:59 PM on July 17, 2010

Hugh Grant ... seems uncomfortable, like he wandered off a straight romcom and doesn't know what to do with himself.

Doesn't that describe Hugh Grant's entire oeuvre?
posted by Multicellular Exothermic at 5:01 PM on July 17, 2010

The gay sex scene that stands out most strongly in my memory is the "everybody's gettin' it on tonight" sequence early in Longtime Companion. This is because I saw it in 1989 at the local rehabbed vintage movie palace in a midwestern college town with an audience full of oh-so-NPR tweedy and Rotary types. As soon as the hot-man-on-man action got underway, you could hear the discomfited gasps, and I swear at least five people bolted for the exits and a few more trickled out in the next few minutes.

Guess somebody should have read the synopsis before attending. Jesus.
posted by FelliniBlank at 5:41 PM on July 17, 2010 [1 favorite]

no Deliverance?
posted by jonmc at 5:54 PM on July 17, 2010

The Whelk and blucevalo, you have good points about "Maurice." I had almost forgotten it had a very uncomfortable Hugh Grant. :(
posted by Wuggie Norple at 6:02 PM on July 17, 2010

No Elias Koteas in the Continental in Crash?

Mind you, finding that twenty seconds of film blisteringly, achingly hot probably says something worrisome about me. Hell, I don't even really like James Spader or Koteas all that much, and Crash isn't really a masturbation friendly film, but still.

Jeffrey is a fun, clever film and one that led me to give a serodiscordant relationship a try after being completely fucked up in the head by arriving in my twenties smack in the middle of the Reagan 80s and AIDS.

Might have even worked out if he hadn't also been Amish.
posted by sonascope at 9:30 PM on July 17, 2010

Not to be "your favorite gay interest movie sucks" but I found Jeffery really shrill and unlikable. It seemed to make all these assumptions about the viewer without ever proving them - like I had no idea why we should care about anyone on the screen at all and the dramatic moments where completely hilarious. (I tapped out at the Dance-Cry the Pain Away scene ..which should be a looping gif or something)

I'm willing to go with it's a peroid piece very wedded to it's time and place, but I just, didn't like it despite all the "wow, really" cameos.

I mean aside from camp Captain Picard cause c'mon.

Also I saw the actor who played Jeffery in the Producers, twice, so I kept wondering when Leo Bloom switched teams
posted by The Whelk at 8:04 AM on July 18, 2010 [1 favorite]

I couldn't deal with Picard's sweaters in Jeffrey.
posted by serazin at 9:51 AM on July 18, 2010

True, Jeffrey is a problematic period piece. It was, however, worlds of improvement over the hand-wringery of something like An Early Frost or the rest of that ilk, I think.
posted by sonascope at 10:35 AM on July 18, 2010

Well that's true, we're victims of our time periods so it's always difficult to understand the impact of something from before.
posted by The Whelk at 11:08 AM on July 18, 2010

Jeffery I found v. v. funny.

For most of high school I went through a kind of bisexual threesome on film stage, which led me to two queer films that I wonder were so over rated that they are under rated now--Namely Suddenly Last Summer and Cabaret. The dancing scene b/w Sally, Max and Brian I once brought in to a high school english class as an iconic love scene, no one understood it. still makes me hard. (Cabaret might be the first queer film i loved to peices as a kid, and one that still has not been mentioned)

Here is what I wrote about Wild Things:
self link
posted by PinkMoose at 11:42 AM on July 18, 2010

Suddenly Last Summer !

BIRDS! RAVENOUS BIRDS!
posted by The Whelk at 11:44 AM on July 18, 2010

i totally didnt mean suddenly last summer, i meant sunday, bloody sunday, how is that like the freudian slip of the week.
posted by PinkMoose at 11:53 AM on July 18, 2010

Oh yeah that. That's a movie where a whole lot of nothing happens for while.
posted by The Whelk at 11:53 AM on July 18, 2010

but a whole lot of sexy nothing--the 70s were all about sexy nothing
posted by PinkMoose at 6:37 PM on July 18, 2010

Weren't there sex scenes in Wilde?

I couldn't deal with Picard's sweaters in Jeffrey.

"Can I do this, or do I look like a gay superhero?"
posted by kirkaracha at 8:24 PM on July 18, 2010 [1 favorite]

Wilde gets triple bonus points for basically casting the modern version of Oscar and Bosie perfectly beyond comment or repair.
posted by The Whelk at 8:28 PM on July 18, 2010