A Guide To The Major Types Of Movie Nudity

It's almost Memorial Day weekend and you've got some serious choices to make. You're probably going to see a movie, but what kind of movie? Let's make this easier: you're going to see a movie with nudity in it, so all you have to do is figure out what type of nudity you're after. That's where this guide comes in!

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Near Nudity

Pretty much every R-rated movie has a bit of near nudity, even if it's just a smidgen of cleavage or someone hiding behind a towel. The truly nefarious near nudity--the stuff that makes you feel like somebody in Hollywood owes you boobage--is the kind that teases you with a sexy situation, appears to be heading in the direction of nakedness, and then leaves you with only a taste of skin. Such is the case with Brie Larson in "The Trouble with Bliss," seen above. She's got a mighty fine ass, but we really thought we were going to see more!

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Gratuitous Nudity

Unless you watch a lot of movies about women who fight crime with flamethrowers embedded in their nipples, you probably don't see many movies in which nudity is absolutely necessary. That being said, there are times when you feel like the director asked all of the willing extras to hang out topless in front of the camera for no particular reason. It's boob for boob's sake. We're almost willing to excuse movies about brothels and/or prostitutes like "House of Tolerance" because the ladies need to show off to their customers, but then there's the long establishing shot with a bunch of topless ladies milling about without purpose. We're not complaining though!

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Horror Bait

From Janet Leigh's shower scene in "Psycho" to Gloria Savage's unfortunate run-in with a Lycan in "Strippers Vs. Werewolves," horror movies love to use naked ladies as monster fodder. Their nudity emphasizes their vulnerability and makes us empathize with them, thus ensuring that we are totally shocked and mortified when terrible things happen. This sort of nudity is often viewed from a distance, as if from the villain's secret hiding spot.

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Funny Nakedness

While horror movies use nudity to show a character's lack of defenses, naked people in comedies are actually dangerous. Well, the men aren't dangerous; naked dudes are usually just laughed at. Naked women, however, usually represent trouble for awkward male characters. Think about the showering girls being spied upon by the dopey lads in "Porky's," or better yet, look at Jason Biggs freak out because Ali Cobrin is stripping in his car in "American Reunion": comedy boys can't handle boobs.

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Sex!

There are different types of movie sex, but most of it is hard to classify; that's why we have this category. The most common nudity-laden sex you see shows you boobs, humping, and maybe--if you're lucky--some orgasm faces. "Seducing Charlie Barker" is a perfect example of what we're talking about.

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Sex in the Dark

We get it: people have sex in beds, people go to bed at night, night is dark, so we don't see much in the way of body parts. That's just how life is. If you hear something about a big-name celebrity getting naked or having sex in a movie, there's a big chance that it will be in a scene so dark that you can hardly tell nipples and elbows apart. Sometimes, like with Keira Knightley in "Silk," a boob or two will jump out from the gloom. If you're at home, just turn up the screen brightness. Everybody does it!

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Shower Sex

Oh yeah, dirty cleanliness. Maybe this is just our water fetish showing, but we think showers are inherently sexy places. Directors seem to agree with us: if somebody (or two bodies) enters a shower and we get to see it, ooh, then the steam starts rising, the suds come out, and if there's no music playing, the percussion of the water enters your ears and arouses your brain-genitals. Shower scenes can pop up anywhere, even in terribly sad films like "Lost in Beijing."

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Unsimulated Sex

You don't always know it when you see it--sometimes you find out that a movie you saw months or years ago contained unsimulated sex--but when you can tell what's going on, you feel like you're getting a little treat. This is essentially watching porn without watching porn, which must be great for people who are worried about being caught watching porn. We're not worried about that stuff, but we love unsimulated sex anyhow. We know authenticity in films is a silly thing to get worked up about, but hey, we're silly people. Besides, how can you argue with this blowjob from "Q"?

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CGI Nudity

Back in 2010, we freaked out because we heard that Jessica Alba's shower scene in "Machete" was altered using CGI. She was wearing underwear that was then digitally removed! This upsets us so!

But why does it upset us so? For the same reason that unsimulated sex thrills us. In the end, it doesn't really matter if you're looking at digitally-added nipples or two people actually touching their genitals together, but the former may make you ask for your money back.

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Non-erotic Nudity

Sometimes you see body parts in movies and you are not even remotely aroused (or, more accurately, you're not meant to be aroused). We're not talking about gory, gruesome, or violent stuff, we're just talking about times when the human figure is so frankly presented that you don't even get to endow it with erotic vibes. Such is the case when Christina Ricci was a body on the slab in "After.Life," or when we saw three big celebrities talking and showering in "Take This Waltz." Of course, you can always do what we do: take the nudity out of context. In "Albert Nobbs," Janet McTeer's breasts are a sign of trust, but in the clip above, they're just the very lovely breasts of Janet McTeer!