There are moments when watching a sex scene in a movie feels wrong. Like when you’re with your parents. Or in a high school classroom, when you wondered if anyone thought you were a prude if you looked away or a pervert if you watched. And then there are movies that are so awkward, they don’t need any help from your classmates or your parents. These are Monsoon’s top 5 unsexiest sex scenes:
5 … “”P.S.”” was supposed to be sort of funny, but only succeeds when you’re laughing because you don’t quite know what else to do. Laura Linney plays a 30-something divorcee. She meets that skinny kid from “”That ’70s Show”” (Topher Grace), a painter whom she believes to be the reincarnation of her dead one and only true love. If the whole crazy thing isn’t unsexy enough, listening to her heavy breathing as she straddles Grace while he fumbles with undressing and putting on a condom definitely is. But it’s not over until he tells her that it was “”fucking awesome”” and asks to call his mom.
4 … The late Brittany Murphy is always rollin’ with the homies when I think of her. But that adorable frumpy girl from “”Clueless”” never appears in “”8 Mile.”” As Murphy and Eminem’s characters press up against the shelves of a warehouse, with nothing but the sound of their breathing to listen to, they fumble for just a moment. Then they gaze straight into each other’s eyes and Murphy gets all innovative and licks the palm of her hand. Saliva: nature’s not-so-seductive lube.
3 … You go into the the 1994 movie “”Threesome”” knowing it’ll be awkward. It is, after all, about Stuart (Stephen Baldwin) loving Alex (Lara Flynn Boyle) who loves Eddy (Josh Charles) who’s in love with Stuart. Even if you ignore how unattractive Baldwin is, the scene in which the three finally act on their sexual tension is a mess of limbs, flesh and crescendoing music. Stuart appears to be only a heterosexual third wheel, until they make an Alex-sandwich and the boys find themselves gazing hungrily into each other’s eyes, instead of Alex’s. Two is company, but three is a fantasy gone very wrong.
2 … Eric Bana’s sex scene in “”Munich”” is disturbing. The intercutting of scenes with Bana’s character having sex with his wife mixed with his flashbacks of the Munich Massacre are supposed to be a poetic commentary on sex and violence. But when machine gunfire is followed by Bana throwing back a ridiculous mane of hair followed then by more gunfire as Bana orgasms, all set to the soundtrack of a dramatic Israeli singer, the scene is just plain overwhelming. The metaphor is just too sweat-slicked to appreciate.
1 … “”The Dreamers”” is supposed to push the boundaries of eroticism with its story of Matthew (Michael Pitt), an American who befriends French twins Isabelle (Eva Green) and Theo (Louis Garrel). The siblings’ relationship is practically illegal, if not technically, with the vaguely incestuous sexual dares and the sleeping naked together. But the most uncomfortable moment of the film is watching Matthew and Isabelle have sex on the kitchen floor while Theo watches (and also cooks eggs). When they are finished, you learn Isabelle was a virgin from the way both boys rub the blood between their fingers — then all over her face when she and Matthew make out. After watching it, it seems as though everyone, including the viewer, will need a shower.
