I think movie violence peaked in the 80s and early 90s due to the practical effects required made the blood and guts so visceral. Movies are more violent today but only because they’re faster and more action packed, gore on the other hand is way lessened because fake CGI blood is both poorly used and looks fake as hell.
Anyone remember Dennis Hopper and Amy Irving in Carried Away?
Let’s just say middle aged nudity isn’t easily unseen or forgotten.
I was just giving you a lil’ shit 'cause the first line of your post didn’t really follow with the rest. 
But I agree that movies have gone too far with terrible writing which has resulted in confusing and unnecessary violence and nudity (and stories and characters and plots and everything else.)
However, the OP’s poll is parsed oddly, seeming to be blaming the nudity and violence itself, which is why I voted no.
No problem.
The poll is worded oddly.
My guess is, the Internet has made straight-up porn so common and accessible, that folks don’t need to go to an R-rated movie if they want to see naughty bits, anymore.
It seems to me that penises are becoming slightly more common in movies and such. Forgetting Sarah Marshall and Outlander both featured their male leads’ schlongs, and last season’s American Gods had the first shot of an erect penis I’ve ever seen in a non-porno.
OK, now for a serious answer. I don’t thing that movies have gotten more violent, outside the “torture porn” horror sub-genre, but I do think that more of them are violent within the same violence limitations that have existed. I, too, note the decline in nudity. Maybe it’s because of the net, as has been stated, or maybe international marketing has something to do with it. While some countries are more libertine than US others are less so and marketing usually defaults to the most restrictive standard. But then, I don’t see a lot of movies, at least not in the theater. The last instance of FFF (female full frontal) I remember was Julianne Moore in “Shortcuts”.
Well, a lot of silent film stars couldn’t make the transition to talkies. Their voices didn’t match their screen image.
Perhaps some of the Hollywood Glamour boys won’t measure up to the new demands of movies?
I dunno why the OP limited the nudity to female, but the full-frontal male nudity in Watchmen was in fact necessary to the plot. I daresay anyone who was either offended by it or reduced to giggling by it missed the point.
If you want a scene of full-frontal male nudity which is non-sexual, funny, in good taste, and integral to the plot, watch A Room with a View (1985).
19th century England. Three guys, including the local vicar, go swimming nude in a pond in the woods. Two ladies and a very proper gentleman come strolling along…
The clip is on YouTube
When we stop getting automatic “R” ratings for stage blood, then we can talk.
Philadelphia and Schindler’s list came out in 1993. The Color Purple came out in 1985. Those years also featured films such as Jason Goes to Hell : The Final Friday, Leprechaun, A Nightmare on Elm Street 2, Robocop 3, and Rambo 2. Going for the “easy shock value” has been going on a long time, it’s not a new invention of 2017.
I think nudity is unnecessary and any movie will work just as effectively without it. This includes any sex scene - we do not need to see a sex scene to be aware that sex has taken place, if we even need that information at all.
On the other hand, if there truly is a need for nudity, somehow, and I’m sure some examples can be presented, then just show it. Don’t half-show it, or cleverly hide it with a well-placed flower pot. In the real world, nudity occurs in some situations, it’s natural and common, so present it as such.
Nudity as titillation should be exclusive to porn. In a mainstream regular movie, it has to be utterly necessary if it is going to be included, which is a vanishingly tiny number. If it isn’t necessary, then work around it.
Of course, nobody is going to listen to me. For some reason seeing your favourite celebrities nekkid has a thrill that makes all of the above moot.
As for violence, I don’t mind cartoony over-the-top stuff, in an 80s PG13 way, but the overly graphic and realistic stuff completely revolts me.
We don’t even “need” movies, so certainly we don’t “need” nudity or any of that. But it isn’t a problem, in my opinion.
I avoid torture porn and extreme gore for gore’s sake, but I don’t mind the kind of violence you get on, say, Game of Thrones. And I’m glad the real gory stuff is out there for the folks who enjoy it.
You know what I’m sick of? Explosions? Bullshit, fake, CGI explosions are half the screen time of most major blockbuster movies these days. The kind of explosion where you flick a cigarette butt and light the gasoline, and it explodes like 100 tons of TNT, but the heroes can still just outrun the blast like it’s a scary dog or something.
I think that it was Roger Ebert who said that when the clothes come off, it stops being fiction and becomes documentary. When character X takes of her top, you’re not seeing character X topless but actress X. I certainly don’t object to it but, like anything else, it can be overdone.
Personally, I like a little titillation in my movies and tv shows.
There’s that. But I could also make an argument that seeing the sex scenes instead of implying them makes it somehow more “real,” like you’re truly peeking in on the lives of the characters, instead of being cut away to another scene. I sure as shit know if I was a ghost watching the scene unfold, I’d probably stick around for the sex.
Anyhow, I don’t feel like movies are going too far. Sex and nudity, to my eye, are actually down since the 80s. (I mean, come on, tits were so gratuitous in the 80s, especially in comedies. Remember this Airplane! scene?) I would say that there probably is more violence, at least in certain cinematic subgenres. In mainstream movies, though, I don’t get the sense that things are going too far.
“Angels and Insects” (1995) featured a full frontal semi. According to the director (in a Terry Gross interview), as the cameras were rolling “the event occurred”, the actor said he was okay with it, so they kept filming.
Exactly. These two categories have moved in opposite directions. The 70s and 80s were the heyday of female nudity, actresses wanted to do nude scenes. Since then it’s been a steady decline with female frontal nudity largely only found in raunchy comedies and some older actresses who want to show they still have what it takes or need a career jump start. Violence during that time has increased by leaps and bounds, not just in the number of incidents but in the detail.
Then looking at these two categories we have to consider what ‘too far’ means. What is too far in female frontal nudity? There’s fully nude and the only further you can get is porn style closeups and actual sex. As for violence, there’s no end in sight, we see people killed in gory detail, in droves, torture, slow motion close up shots of dismemberment, blood gushing by the gallon. I don’t see the films even approaching the limits of violent potential.
I’ve been watching “The Deuce” on HBO.
I realize it’s HBO and they do give it an “MA” rating, but I’m still surprised at some of the scenes in the series.
Last episode had a scene where a lady was holding some dude’s hard dick in her hand.
I’m not bothered by any of it. Just say’n…
A couple of examples come to mind, both from X-Men United. The first is Mystique: She ordinarily doesn’t wear any clothes, because she has no reason to: She can just shift into a shape that’s wearing clothes. But then she gets hit with a shot of the de-mutant-ifying serum, and turns into a normal woman… still naked. It makes sense because of how her powers work, and it also highlights her essential vulnerability without her powers.
But then we get another example that doesn’t make sense, because they didn’t go for the nudity but should have. In the climactic battle, Phoenix is disintegrating everything around her, and Wolverine is the only one who can get close enough to stop her, because he’s continually regenerating as fast as she’s disintegrating him. But unlike Mystique, his powers don’t extend to his clothes, and so his shirt is shredded in moments. Except that, for some reason, his jeans remain intact. Again, nudity would have made sense on multiple levels: His pants should be disintegrated because everything is being disintegrated. And Phoenix is basically a manifestation of Jean Gray’s id, and it’s established that she’s physically attracted to him (at least on the id level), so if anything, she should be especially trying to disintegrate his pants, because she wants him naked.
Now, I’m not saying that the titillation wasn’t also a factor. About half the audience really is interested in seeing Rebeca Romjin-Stamos naked, and the other half is interested in seeing Hugh Jackman. And there’s no reason you can’t have a little of that in a movie: After all, there are many different types of entertainment in a movie. But it wasn’t the only factor.