“Brokeback Mountain”
Regardless of the orientation and gender of its protagonists (and, indeed the viewer), “Brokeback Mountain” stands as one of the most searing and effective films about forbidden and semi-requited love out there, and it all starts with one night in a tent. Ennis (Heath Ledger) and Jack (Jake Gyllenhaal) have been hired to tend sheep over a Wyoming summer, and one cold night, after they’ve both been drinking, Jack invites Ennis into his tent. There’s a sense of inevitability in the moments beforehand, and even as they realize what’s happening, the pair are almost trying to fight each other, each instigating, then pushing back violently. But finally, it happens; without even a kiss, Jack takes his jeans down, and the pair have sex. There are more romantic scenes on this list, and ones that are more arousing, certainly, but thanks to Ang Lee (who also contributed some equally memorable, if more explicit scenes in “Lust, Caution“), there’s a sensuality to go with the almost businesslike manner of the duo.
“Y Tu Mamá Tambien”
Fittingly for a film that focuses on two adolescent boys who think with their dicks much more than they do with their brains, Alfonso Cuarón‘s coming-of-age road movie “Y Tu Mamá Tambien” is pretty much obsessed with sex from the get-go, with the earliest scenes finding Julio (Gael García Bernal) and Tenoch (Diego Luna) both having sex with their girlfriends, and masturbating together by the pool. But their sexual competition becomes more pronounced when they head off on a road trip with Luisa (Maribel Verdú), the wife of Tenoch’s cousin, who, unbeknownst to Julio or Tenoch, has a terminal illness. She beds first Tenoch, then Julio, each proving awkward and less than skilled in the sack. But the film’s most memorable sex scene comes near the end, when the trio all go to bed together, drunkenly, Luisa going down on the boys while they kiss, passionately. It’s less panicked and awkward than previous encounters, Luisa’s demonstration of the boy’s latent attraction to each seemingly proving a release for the pair, even as they worship her (and to an extent, she them). It’s a touching and deeply sexy scene, even if it’s one of the unlikelier precursors to a ‘Harry Potter‘ movie you can imagine (Cuarón’s next film was the third Potter film, “The Prisoner of Azkaban.”)
“Secretary”
Long after the then-shocking subject matter has been absorbed into the mainstream (hence the enormous success of “Fifty Shades Of Grey“), Steven Shainberg‘s “Secretary” has settled into its place in film history as a smart, rich and beautifully acted romantic comedy, albeit one with lashings of BDSM. Shainberg was setting out to help to normalize such non-vanilla relationships in the eyes of audiences, inspired by films like “My Beautiful Launderette,” and certainly succeeded, with his tale of the relationship between self-harming secretary Lee (Maggie Gyllenhaal), and her employer, attorney E. Edward Grey (everyone’s favorite cinematic perv, James Spader). He’s initially infuriated by her incompetence at work, but the two gradually work out that her submissiveness, and his dominance, go hand in hand, and they tentatively fall in love. Bar the spanking et al, it’s a reasonably traditional love triangle — Edward the emotionally unavailable Mr. Darcy type, her boyfriend (Jeremy Davies) the harmless, hapless Bill Pullman figure. But even without all that much actual intercourse going on, at least in the more memorable moments, the sex scenes are almost revelatory, Shainberg letting them unfold slowly, placing Lee’s gradual awakening, and Edward’s emotional thawing, front and center. The director’s now prepping a film about a foot fetishist, so let’s see if lightning can strike twice…
