Ourweekly columnStaff Pickstakes you back to a time when video stores reigned supreme andthe "Staff Picks" section was the placetofind outwhat films were worthy of one's time.Of course, our version ofStaff Pickshas a decidedly skintillating angle, as we suss out the films from a particular subgenre are the best to find great nudity. This week, we look at one of the oldest and most durable subgenres in cinema history, Lovers on the Run!
Our fascination as a society with the notion of lovers on the run began long before motion pictures. This plot has long been a way for average people to connect with similarly ordinary folks who find themselves in truly extraordinary circumstances. Yes, many of these films involve murder as the inciting incident which propels our lovers on their journey, and is often a byproduct of staying hidden, but the truly exceptional examples never lose sight of empathizing with the characters. In the kill-or-be-killed kind of world these characters find themselves, it's difficult for viewers not to place themselves in the shoes of these characters, making tough decisions in order to stay alive.
Now, many of these films go out of their way not to glamorize the plight of lovers on the run, relying on much more visceral emotion to rule the day, rather than logic. This taps into the fight-or-flight response we all have buried deep within us, reminding the audience of the characters' humanity rather than seeking to put them on a pedestal. Obviously there are exceptions to this rule, like Oliver Stone's Natural Born Killers or any of the countless Roger Corman-produced exploitation flicks of the 60s and early 70s, but most of these films seek to ground their characters in an all-too-relatable reality.
Some non-nude films or films with less nudity than those we're covering today which could be considered essential examples of the genre include Jean-Luc Godard’s Breathless, Leonard Kastle’sThe Honeymoon Killers, Terrence Malick’s Badlands, Steven Spielberg’s The Sugarland Express, Robert Altman’s Thieves Like Us, Gus van Sant’s Drugstore Cowboy, David Lowery’s Ain’t Them Bodies Saints, and Ben Wheatley’s Sightseers.
Bonnie and Clyde (1967)
The story behind 1967'sBonnieand Clydeis almost as interesting as the movie itself. It began in 1962 when two journalists, Robert Benton David Newman,who fancied themselves screenwriters, wanted to write a screenplay for their favorite director, François Truffaut, to make as his English-language directorial debut. Truffaut was involved with the project for awhile, as was Jean-Luc Godard, but both eventually moved onto other projects and the film landed in the lap of one of the few American maverickauteurs at the time, Arthur Penn.
Warren Beatty, who at the time was struggling to live up to his desired image of being more than just another pretty face, decided that he wanted to move into producing, and this film would make him the first actor/producer since Charlie Chaplin. All fascinating, interesting stuff, but it wouldn't amount to a hill of beans if the movie weren't any good. Thankfully for us, the movie is fantastic. It is the first studio-produced American feature to embrace the style of the French New Wave and it was the birth of a new wave of American independent film production.
The film opens with the soon-to-be lovers meeting, Clyde (Beatty) having just been released from prison and Bonnie (Faye Dunaway)an out-of-workwaitress in adirtwater Texas town. The first time we see Dunaway's Bonnie Parker she is getting dressed in her bedroom while Clyde waits in the street below. We're treated to some terrific TA from Dunaway, fairly rare for the time as the Hays Code had only just been abolished in favor of the MPAA Ratings System earlier in 1967...
Later on, once the pair are fully on the run, they attempt to have sex but poor Clyde can't get it up. This can be read as an allusion to the real Clyde Barrow's alleged latent homosexuality or simply as him succumbing to the immense pressure put on his life by being constantly on the run. Either way, it's an interesting scene and fairly groundbreaking for the era.
**Available to Rent or Own on Amazon Prime Video
Something Wild (1986)
Parts of the followingtext have been excerpted from our recent SKIN-depth Look at the Sex and Nudity of Jonathan Demme's Films...
Easily one of the most underrated comedies of the 80s with a star-making film debut from Ray Liotta,1986'sSomething Wildis the first of two consecutive "broad" comedies that earnedDemme a minor reputation as a comedy guy.Melanie Griffith, hot off ofDe Palma'sBody Double, is starting to show shades of the firecracker talent that would earn her an Oscar nomination two years later forMike Nichols'Working Girlas the sexed up Audrey, who kidnaps Jeff Daniels' buttoned down businessman Charlie for a weekend sexcapade.
Locking themselves in a motel room posing as a married couple, Audrey—going by the name Lulu—rips off her top, having tied Charlie to the bed...
Promising to take him home, Lulu quickly changes her mind and instead takes him to meet her mother in Virginia, introducing him as her husband. While it seems that things couldn't possibly get worse for Charlie, worse things are heading his way courtesy of Lulu's violent ex-con ex-husband Ray (Liotta). Of course, Charlie himself has secrets he's keeping, which will sooner or later compound his problems, but the film's light and breezy attitude is what makes it such a classic. That isn't to say that things don't get fairly bad for our main characters, because they do, but the film never loses sight of the fact that it's a comedy, first and foremost.
All three leads picked up Golden Globe nominations for their stellar work here—yet were all ignored by the Academy months later—and the film endures thanks to their performances, Demme's direction, and a crackerjack script with lots of great twists by E. Max Frye (Palmetto,Foxcatcher).
**Available to Own on DVD and Blu-ray via The Criterion Collection
Wild at Heart (1990)
Parts of the followingtext have beenexcerpted from ourSKIN-depth Look at the Sex and Nudity of David Lynch's Films...
Takinga break from filming his seriesTwin Peaks, David Lynch'sfifth feature film is this tale about star-crossed lovers (Nicolas Cage andLaura Dern) on the run from a hitman (Willem Dafoe) hired by the girl's mother (Diane Ladd). Based on a book of the same name by Barry Gifford, Lynch changed the book's downer of an ending to fit withhis strongly heldbelief that sometimes a "happy ending" can be a fate worse than death.Perhaps the most notable thing about the film is that it gotLaura Dernto waive her "no nudity" clause, setting up a lifetime of amazing nude scenes from this legendary actress. Dern said in interviews that she struggled with playing a ditzy blonde, but it helped demonstrate her versatility as an actress and would be key in helping her land her Oscar nominated role inthe same year'sRambling Rose...
While there is a cold detachment in the nude scenes, they're not overtly un-sexy in the way the nude scenes inBlue Velvetwere, and there's some truly spank-worthy nudity in here. The problem with it is that it's either fleeting—like Dern's scene above orCharlie Spradling's scene below—or so bizarre that it's hard to tell if you're supposed to be titillated or disturbed.A pattern was beginning to emerge, however, in that Lynch seemed to exploit American audience's view of sexuality and nudity as taboo. Like a true provocateur, it's almost as if he is challenging the viewersto become aroused by the nudity in his film. It's far more subtle than the way someone likeBrian De PalmaorPaul Schraderused nudity, though they seemingly all intended to arrive at the same conclusion—if you enjoy sex and nudity, you'll inevitably feelshame for having done so.
**Available to Own on Blu-ray via Shout Factory
The Doom Generation (1995)
Gregg Araki is the mondo-visual stylist of the 90s independent cinema movement, crafting films that reside somewhere between hallucination and reality, and none more mad than his 1995 film The Doom Generation, originally bearing the deliberately misleading subtitle "A Heterosexual Movie by Gregg Araki." If you crave subtlety or a film that doesn't wear its themes brazenly upon its sleeve, this likely isn't the film for you. Coming as it did on the heels of such equally brazen creative experiments as the aforementioned Natural Born Killers, the film didn't feel as revolutionary in its own time as it does now in retrospect.
The film centers around a trio of aimless Gen-X drifters named Xavier Red (Johnathon Schaech), Jordan White (James Duval), and Amy Blue (Rose McGowan)—like I said, there's no subtlety to be found in this film—as they travel across Southern California. Shortly after being picked up by Jordan and Amy, Xavier (aka X) murders a convenience store clerk, sending the trio on the lam not just from the law, but also from Amy's dangerous past. McGowan has several nude scenes in the film, including individual sex scenes with both Schaech and Duval, as well as a threesome just before the film's climax...
The film is jam-packed with cameos that ground the film firmly in the mid-90s from such indie darlings as Parker Posey and Nicky Katt, as well as supremely bizarre cameos from Margaret Cho,Heidi Fleiss, Jane's Addiction frontman Perry Farrell, and the entirety of the band Skinny Puppy as a vicious gang of skinheads. Man, somebody take those guys bowling already! Though difficult to track down, the film is worth the effort if it sounds like it might appeal to you. And even if it doesn't, it is still a fascinating time capsule about a generation in search of an identity.
**Currently unavailable on disc format or to stream
Queen Slim (2019)
The most recent Lovers on the Run film we'll be discussing is one of last year's most provocative—and most criminally ignored—films, Queen Slim, written by Lena Waithe and directed byMelina Matsoukas. Jett's breakout star Jodie Turner-Smith and Get Out's Daniel Kaluuya play the titular twosome, a mismatched pair thrust into a situation beyond their control and spiraling toward an inevitably tragic outcome. The film opens with Queen, a criminal defense attorney, on a fairly disastrous Tinder date with Slim that ends with him offering to drive her home after it's clear the two didn't hit it off. On the way home, they are pulled over by a cop (Sturgill Simpson) and things escalate quickly, ending with Slim shooting the cop to protect Queen.
The two go on the run, and unlike a lot of other films we've been looking at today, we get to see their relationship develop over the course of the film. Most films in the genre start with at least some sort of attraction between the lovers before they go on the run, but Queen and Slim don't especially care for one another at first. Their journey takes them all over the southern US, including a detour to the grave of Queen's mother roughly 3/4 of the way through the film. It's here that the passion and attraction between the two finally boils over and they have sex in the front seat of their car...
To bring things full circle, the film's advertising played up actor Bokeem Woodbine's line dubbing the pair "The Black Bonnie Clyde," but that's a fairly misleading statement once you've seen the film. In fact, if you were to double feature them, the contrast between the two pairs of lovers on the run becomes more plainly obvious. However, one thing that both films share is a bone-deep love and empathy for its lead characters, helping the audience to hang with them in increasingly dire situations.
**Available to Rent or Own via Amazon Prime Video
