Sex Sells: A Brief History of Cinema’s Favourite Trick.

Sex sells. This is not a bold thesis so much as a stubborn, unkillable truth, and few mediums have leaned into it more enthusiastically than cinema. From the earliest flickers of film, sexuality has been baked into the language of movies. One of the first films ever publicly exhibited, The Kiss (1886), ran a scandalous 47 seconds and consisted entirely of a man kissing a woman. The industry has grown more sophisticated since then, occasionally remembering to include things like plot and character, but the underlying principle hasn’t changed: if you want attention, sex remains one of the easiest ways to get it.

Naturally, the moment filmmakers realized audiences were paying attention, moral guardians materialized with torches in hand. Complaints about nudity, sexuality, and violence flooded in, accompanied by the timeless cry of “think of the children.” Governments responded with censorship laws, and Hollywood eventually imposed the Hays Code, a rigid system that required scripts to be approved before production. Films deemed too immoral risked fines, bans, or both. Ironically, this crackdown didn’t eliminate sex from cinema; it forced filmmakers to get clever. Suggestion replaced depiction, and innuendo became an art form. Directors learned to communicate everything without showing anything, turning visual metaphor into a kind of cinematic wink. When Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint celebrate their victory over James Mason in North by Northwest, the audience is treated not to explicit romance, but to a train plunging decisively into a tunnel…

…Cary embracing Eva Maria Saint…

…then cut to a train entering a tunnel.

Subtle? Not particularly. Effective? Completely. More importantly, it slipped neatly past watchdog groups like the Catholic League of Decency, who couldn’t very well condemn a piece of transportation infrastructure. Over time, censorship didn’t disappear so much as evolve. Rating systems emerged as a compromise, categorizing films instead of outright banning them. A G rating signaled harmless entertainment, PG suggested a bit of caution, and R restricted content to adults. Then there was X, a label intended for explicit material that quickly became synonymous with pornography after the adult film industry adopted it wholesale. Hollywood, eager to distance itself from that association, eventually replaced it with NC-17. The labels changed, the rules shifted, but the tension between artistic freedom and public outrage remained a constant.

This essay focuses on films that don’t bother with metaphor or polite suggestion, choosing instead to place sex front and centre as the primary engine of their narratives. These are not stories where sexuality lingers in the background; it is the main event, the driving force, and often the entire point. Consider this fair warning: some of these films are less interested in easing viewers into uncomfortable territory than in shoving them there outright. Proceed accordingly, and don’t expect subtlety to hold your hand.

Flesh Gordon (1974)

When porn started getting crossover appeal with regular audiences, the industry brought to the world an erotic film that parodied the classic Flash Gordon serials of the 30s in a very campy and bizarre way.

 The Story of O (1975)

This exemplifies the kinkier and more explicit side of sex in the movies. It was in the 70s that movies that by today’s standards would be considered pornography got proper theatrical releases and were reviewed by notable critics, and this one did with a rather stylish flair.

The Image (1975)

Not to be outdone by the French, we have this S&M entry from America that may be a little over-the-top for casual viewers, as it drifts very close to being actual porn and not just erotica.

Shivers (1975)

This film by David Cronenberg takes sex in an even darker and more fatal direction, as we get a truly horrifying tale on a shoestring budget, one that leaves the viewer with images that will haunt them ever after.

Alice in Wonderland: An X-Rated Musical Fantasy (1976)

Alice dreams of the White Rabbit, whom she follows into Wonderland, where she begins to experiment with her unexplored sexuality.

Cinderella (1977)

Cinderella navigates a series of misadventures with the help of her “fairy” godmother and is granted heightened sexual prowess to win over Prince Charming.

Sex World (1978)

In this sci-fi sex romp, a bus tour takes its passengers to a place called SexWorld, where they can live out their most secret desires during a weekend.

The Perils of Gwendoline in the Land of the Yik-Yak (1984)

This Indiana Jones rip-off provides us with a wacky sexploitation adventure, one loaded with bondage and bad writing, and pretty much delivers everything one could expect from such a thing.

R100 (2013)

You’ve got to hand it to the Japanese when it comes to sex and the bizarre, as can be seen in this dark comedy about S&M that proves they can really deliver on an “out there” concept.

 Fifty Shades of Grey (2015)

Though based on a book that gave millions of housewives the vapours, this movie is your standard Hollywood fair that thinks it’s edgy when it’s clearly not, and it displays a bondage relationship that is anything but romantic.

As the cultural mood continues its unpredictable spin, the future of sex in cinema remains impossible to pin down. Will explicit content return to mainstream theatres, or will new waves of censorship rise up to push things back into the shadows? Trends come and go, outrage cycles reset, and standards shift depending on who’s currently clutching their pearls. What doesn’t change is the impulse to test boundaries. No matter how strict the rules become or how relaxed they seem, someone, somewhere, will always be trying to go further.