Our product picks are editor-tested, expert-approved. We may earn a commission through links on our site. Why Trust Us? In terms of classification, it's difficult separating the "romantic movie" from the "sex movie. And so those movies are movies about sex crimes. The movie and the depicted act reveals something about us , and though it can sometimes be ineffable, we know it when we feel it. Here, in no particular order, are the best sex movies—the best movies about sex—ever. Paul Thomas Anderson's Boogie Nights is maybe the ultimate "sex movie.
This is sex truly seeping into art and making everyone ask: but is it art? Unlike PTA's above classic, the pie hasn't aged all too well; like most R-rated sex comedies of the 90s and early aughts, the drives were all carnal, the lubricant alcohol, and the manner of consent, well, sometimes a little fuzzy.
Still, American Pie made a big impact on the genre and, ripe or rotten, is still one of the most iconic films on this list. Stanley Kubrick's final film is also his most erotic and sensual.
Kubrick originally got the rights for the story based on Austrian novel in the s. We doubt the film could have taken the same form back then, but we're happy Kubrick got the chance to make it. He died shortly after filming. Written, directed, starring and probably inspired by Joseph Gordon Levitt , the multi-hyphenate filmmaker plays Jon Martello, a womanizing playboy who has to come to terms with his unhealthy relationship with pornography. As Wall Street arbitrageur John Gray Rourke and SoHo art gallery worker Elizabeth McGraw Basinger , the pair engages in a sordid sadomasochistic affair that blurs the line between sexual assault and uninhibited passion in a way that could be a bit cringey.
The movie was so shocking for the time it was heavily edited for its theatrical release and was traumatic for the leading lady. Stream It Here. Had Kubrick directed Eyes Wide Shut in the '60s, it might have been the more toned down though still erotic for its time Belle de Jour , a film about a French woman who, unable to be intimate with her husband, decides to become a high class prostitute.
