Having just survived another round of the Olympics where America emerged victorious with the most overall medals as well as the most medals in each of the three medal categories, we thought it was high time to conduct a skinvestigation of our own! The rest of the world—Europe in particular—seems to have much more lax and must fewer restrictions when it comes to nudity. It seems like you could flip on the evening news in almost any other country and be guaranteed to see bare breasts.
This sort of thing has given most people the impression that while Hollywood produces a lot of films with nudity, it's nowhere close to the output of the rest of the world. Is there any merit to this perception? That's what we wanted to find out!
Hollywood was late to the party on celebrity nudity in film as well. European filmmakers, like those in the French New Wave, began incorporating sex and nudity into their films beginning in the late 1950s, when America was still in the throes of restrictive film censorship laws colloquially known as the Hays Code. This might lead many to conclude that Hollywood was too far behind the 8-ball to ever catch up with the rest of the world in terms of celebrity nudity.
Well, Americans love nothing more than making up for lost time and since the MPAA ratings system took hold in 1968, we've dwarfed the competition. In fact, as the charts that follow will show, we've basically got more nudity in our films than the next four highest ranking countries combined...
Top 5 Countries Ranked By Number of Nude Scenes
****
Nude Scenes Distribution by Country
So there's a lot to digest there, so let's break it down further with charts and graphs—everyone's favorite! First up, let's see how things break down by nude scenes alone. Hollywood has accounted for over 28,000 nude scenes in film, compared with France's 7,681; Germany's 5,336; Italy's 5,105; and the UK's 3,439. That means Hollywood accounts for over 60% of the total nude scenes represented by these five countries.
****
Nude Titles By Country
If you narrow the criteria slightly and just look at the number of titles with nudity, not every scene within those titles, things balance out a bit with Hollywood racking up 9,721 titles with nudity. If you combine France's 3,900 titles, Germany's 2,623 titles, Italy's 1,671 titles, and the UK's 1626 titles, the rest of the world ends up with 99 more titles with nudity than Hollywood.
****
Nude Celebs by Country of Birth
What about the number of celebrities who've gone nude? Things don't balance quite as well in the world's favor in that regard, tipping heavily toward Hollywood. The United States is home to 7,322 celebrities who have gone nude on film, compared with 1,766 French celebs, 1,287 German celebs, 852 UK celebs, and 554 Italian celebs, giving Hollywood one tremendous slice of the pie!
****
Nude Celebs by Tier
A further drill down in this same category also shows some fairly interesting statistics. A-list celebs account for the least amount of nude scenes regardless of country. In fact, Germany hasn't got a single A-lister that's gone nude on film and the other three countries are in the single digits. B-list celebs are around 10 times more likely to go nude on film with Hollywood leading the way with 1,627 B-listers who've gone nude. France comes in second there with only 90.
It's the C-list celebs who do the heavy lifting here, no matter which country you're looking at, with the numbers exploding once you get into C-list territory. 5,531 Hollywood C-listers have doffed their duds on film along with 1,669 French C-listers, 1,243 German C-listers, 797 UK C-listers, and 497 Italian C-listers.
****
Nudity Breakdown by Tags: Breasts, Butts, and Bush Shown
Our final breakdown looks at nudity by body part. Hollywood loves breasts, butts, and bushes in that order and there's no denying that the rest of the world has got identical breakdowns. The disparity between boobs and everything else is substantial no matter where in the world you are, but Europe has got a lot more parity between butts and bushes than America does, that's for sure.
Hollywood's boob count is a 14,368, compared with 3,906 in France, 3,336 in Italy, 2,590 in Germany, and 1,968 in the UK. Hollywood's butt counter lands at 5,008, more than France's 1,562, Italy's 1,435, Germany's 994, and the UK's 687. Finally, bare bushes have been featured in Hollywood films 3,334 times, versus 1,312 in France, 1,172 in Italy, 742 in Germany, and 468 in the UK.
Again, the Europeans have really closed the gap between butts and bushes, especially in Italy and France where the butts lead by only a little over 200.
****
Finally, who are the most popular nude celebs from each country? While the number one spot may have changed over the years due to casting news and other trends, a few celebrities have managed to endure in the top spots. Overall, the most popular celebs from each country have been:
USA - Scarlett Johansson
France - Eva Green
Germany - Diane Kruger
United Kingdom - Kate Winslet
Italy - Monica Bellucci
****
So what have we learned? Hollywood may seem puritanical and overly censorship happy when it comes to on screen nudity, but the facts bear out a narrative that says Hollywood loves nudity. Obviously, Hollywood is the biggest film industry in the world and cranks out more films every year than the rest of the world combined, so that's but one of the many factors that have obviously helped to break some of these taboos about Hollywood we all have.
When it comes to nudity, you can say it loud and say it proud because We're Number One!
****
