There were so many scenes in Secretary that were loaded with innuendo. The scene where she works and works and works to get the first memo typed properly, and he’s on the phone, and just blows her off – “I’m not going to check it. If you’ve done it right, it’s right.” She’s dying for him to get out the red pen, and he is reveling in the teasing.
Also the scene where he sits her down on the couch and tells her she’s never going to cut herself again, and then takes her picture with the Polaroid camera.
C’mon! Did you see what he was wearing? He was *asking * for it!
But seriously, as Ebert says, Mr. Stevens was terrified of intimacy, but he clearly wanted it, too. That’s what gives the scene its emotional power: the internal conflict within Stevens. It’s the only moment of intimacy in Stevens’ entire life.
If it’s rape, it’s like Rhett’s infamous rape of Scarlett in Gone With the Wind.
Oh, and Case Sensitive, Uma appeared in at least three films before Munchausen, although the only decent one was Dangerous Liaisons. That was where I first noticed her. She’s presented as this gawky, innocent, little thing, not terribly attractive, and then Malkovich’s character starts seducing her, and opens her blouse. :eek:
In the Elvira movie, the Mistress of the Dark concocts something from a recipe out of an old magic book and takes it to the church picnic of the puritans who are always harassing her. They eat it and get all horny for each other. One lady looks at a guy leeringly and takes a bite out of a taco that has a hot dog in it.
Well, first of all, I personally didn’t find the scene sexy, either. Emotionally powerful, yes, but it didn’t turn me on.
But I disagree about Stevens being humiliated. Or at least he wasn’t humiliated by Miss Kenton. He was a willing partner in that little drama. He could have simply dismissed her, but he stands there, closer to her than he’s ever been, and makes her pry the book from his hand.* As Hopkins plays the scene, it’s clear (IMO) that he’s enjoying it.
His humiliation comes not from her discovery of the “silly romance” he has been reading, but from his inability to let down his defenses with Miss Kenton. He humiliates himself with his ridiculous excuse of reading the book to improve himself, and by refusing to admit his attraction to Miss Kenton.
This is how the scene is played in the movie. IIRC, it’s not quite the same in the book. BTW, I highly recommend the book.
How could I forget Secretary? The scene where she licks the envelope … I mena, it SETS THE STANDARD for envelope-licking. I mean, I have seen ENTIRE EXPLICIT SEX SCENES that didn’t have 1/100th of the hotness of that scene. The Spader character was such a fool … when you find a woman who can lick an envelope like that, you don’t reject her, you move heaven and earth to keep her.
The IMDB lists the following films she made in 1988, in chronological order: Johnny Be Good, Kiss Daddy Goodnight {no, I’ve never heard of them either, although the second sounds fairly icky}, followed by Baron Munchausen and thenDangerous Liasons. Busy girl that year.
Age of Innocence --Daniel Day Lewis–the scene where he smells her glove (or fondles it or something, it’s been a while). That whole movie simmers with bridled lust.
And I agree with the Remains of the Day–Emma is practically begging him to kiss her (she does not humiliate him re: the book at all), but he is unable to. He does try to rekindle stuff later in life, sadly…
Ah, but if you look at the release dates, you’ll see that Dangerous Liaisons opened in the U.S. in December 1988, and Munchausen in March 1989.
I was confused by that list too, because, as I mentioned, I found Uma’s scene in DL quite memorable, and was certain that it was the first time I had seen her. I recognized her when I saw her again in Munchausen.
It looks as though IMDb’s lists are sorted by the earliest release date, no matter where it was. Munchausen opened in Germany a week before Dangerous Liaisons opened in the U.S.
I just saw a great little movie called Mostly Martha then hastened to open this thread. Scene in question: Martha (a chef) is blindfolded and has to taste spices in a soup spoon-fed to her by her ruggedly handsome Italian co-chef…wow. fans herself
Maybe these both rely on the innate sexiness of the actresses involved, butthe first ones that came to my mind were the scene in Unmarried Woman where some guy is rubbing Jill Clayburgh’s feet, and then Lois Lane and Superman’s get-acquainted rooftop scene in the 1978 Superman. In the comics Lois never said things like: “What color underwear am I wearing?” in a gravelly, guttural coo…
ON the Barron Von Munchausen DVD on the director commentary Terry Giliam mentions how he was dissapointed that he didn’t get to have Uma on screen first. That Dangerous Liasons got out before his movie.
But
My Baron VM disk doesn’t have a director commentary. So now I’m wondering where I heard that. Or If I heard that.
Terry Gilliam is transmitting messages directly into your brain. Don’t worry, he does that to me, too. Mostly it’s pretty harmless stuff, but if you get tired of it, I find the tinfoil hat works fine.
We have a conundrum, then, which depends on where you are - I saw both, and Munchausen was definitely released before Liasions here in NZ. The reason I’m sure is that after seeing some nekkid Uma in the first, I wanted to see more nekkid Uma in the second. Mmm, nekkid Uma…
Well, now that you mention it, there’s a scene from the episode of X-Files written by William Gibson, where a hacker uploads himself to a computer net. Fox and Mulder are trying to figure out why the computer net has started killing people, and the trail leads’ to the hacker’s girlfriend, who’s a hot female hacker. Fox and Mulder capture her and take her to the Lone Gunmen’s lair in handcuffs. The Lone Gunmen see her, recognize her instantly, and are instantly in a weird combination of awe/lust for her. She goes over to their computing rig, punches a few keys and says, “Is somebody going to take these cuffs off or am I going to have to do this with my tongue.”
Mulder, taking in the Lone Gunmen, who are just barely managing not to drool: “I’d hate to have to put it to a vote” eliciting a knowing smirk from Scully. A hot/funny little scene.
The whole movie really, sigh, but especially that scene where Paul Mercurio dances by himself, watching himself in the mirror. I mean, Wow. It’s so …private. You know how they always say “dance like nobody’s watching”?
And also the scene where Scott and Fran (I’ve switched from actor to character names) start dancing the rumba (rhumba?) behind the curtain as Doris Day sings “Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps”