THREE LOCAL MOVIE STORES FORCED TO CLOSE THIS MONTH

BY MALLORY BATEMAN / Dec 5, 2007
Brigham Young University's Daily Universe

As Flix Club owner Daniel Thompson treated eager customers to a free copy of "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End," the gift was accompanied by news that the store would not survive to see the new year.

The owner greeted customers by name as they filed in to the small store on State Street in Orem Tuesday night. The media had already gathered to hear what few people knew - Hollywood had finally won the battle against edited movie stores and was closing them down.

Flix Club, along with Cougar Video and Family Video, once competitors, were all serviced papers in September from law firm Loeb and Loeb in New York stating the stores needed to shut down. "I wrote them back saying I was operating under educational use," an exception in copyright law, Thompson said. "They responded by giving me three options."

The firm told Thompson that his loophole to copyright law would not hold up and he could negotiate with each individual studio, close down, or continue to operate and face a lawsuit, he said. "I called the firm and said I don't want to fight," Thompson said. "They said that if I don't shut down they would break me and take everything I have." So he decided to quit.

Flix Club has been in business for seven years, but Thompson said he couldn't fight the battle anymore, especially against companies like Disney, MGM and Dreamworks. "How many people know me?" Thompson said.

The crowd responded with cheers as nearly everyone raised their hands. "I've looked into every possibility," Thompson said. "They're wiping us out."

In an emotional speech, Thompson thanked customers for their business and asked for their support until he turns his sign off for good on Dec. 31. "You know me; you know that I'm here." Thompson said. "You mean everything to me."Customers thanked Thompson for his business and pledged their support as they gave their regards.

Orem resident Dana Johnson said Thompson knows every customer by name and said he thinks Hollywood is making a mistake "I think it's awful," Johnson said. "They're giving up money for something stupid."

BYU student David Ybarra said he and his wife Emily have rented from Thompson since high school and prefer Flix Club to any other video store. "I won't watch a movie if it's not edited," Emily Ybarra said. "It makes it so you don't have to brace yourself during the movie."

Cougar Video owner Kirt Merrill said he would be closing, too, even though 90 percent of his movies are not edited. However, he said, 85 percent of his income comes from renting the edited movies.

Family Video owner Ryan Van Dorn said he survived the first wave, which closed down Clean Flicks, but his edited movies won't survive this time. He said he will continue to rent movies rated PG-13 or lower. "This will be the final nail in the coffin," Van Dorn said.

CUTTING AND PASTING: HUNSTSMAN v SODERBERGH AND COPYRIGHT LAW

BY CHRISTOPHER JORDAN / Nov 16, 2007
Flow TV

Huntsman v. Soderbergh illustrates the ever-escalating efforts of corporations to control their every representation in culture as if copyright ownership is a natural right rather than a constitutional privilege. In Huntsman v. Soderbergh, filed in August 2003 and decided in favor of the Directors Guild of America (DGA) in July 2006, a Denver federal court ordered four companies to stop selling and renting unauthorized edited or altered copies of movies, while allowing another company to continue marketing its DVD players and software filters because it does not make derivative copies of movies.

The guild argued that the creation and distribution of the final edited film products violated these provisions. The basis of the main “reproduction” claim was that duplicating movies by copying them onto a computer hard drive as part of the process of making the final edited movie was infringing. Huntsman v. Soderbergh thus raised several questions: Did CleanFlicks violate fair use by using illegal means to create its clean DVDs and by selling a product that compromises the potential market for the copyrighted work? Did ClearPlay violate copyright law by selling software that omitted offensive content without actually altering DVD content? Did CleanFlicks have the right to modify copies of works it had paid for under the first sale doctrine and sell them for profit or did this violate the copyright owner’s sole right of reproduction of the work?The “fair use” law allows the reproduction and use of a copyrighted work in order to balance the author’s right to compensation against the public’s interest in the widest possible dissemination of ideas and information. Fair use thus acts as a defense against the copyright owner’s monopolistic control over who can access copyrighted material and how they can use it.ClearPlay and CleanFlicks contended that their enterprises were legal under two provisions of fair use: purpose and character of the use, and the effect on the potential market of the copyrighted work. In contrast to CleanFlicks, ClearPlay markets a DVD player equipped with filtering technology as well as downloadable software that allows consumers to edit potentially offensive material without actually accessing the DVD. Huntsman v. Soderbergh determined that ClearPlay does not violate the copyright owner’s exclusive right to prepare derivative copies because it is not feasible to have a derivative work when no copy (or “fixation”) of the derivative work exists.

CleanFlicks similarly argued that its modification of Hollywood movies conformed to fair use because the legality of the intermediate copying involved (e.g., reproducing works onto a hard drive) depended on the legality of the final product, and that such copying was a non-infringing fair use when it ultimately produced a transformative, non-infringing final product. Rather than compete with the market for the original product, CleanFlicks argued that it served an entirely new market and bolstered the original one, since the company purchased one copy for every copy it sold in edited form. By condemning this rationale, Huntsman v. Soderbergh threatens the role of fair use in offsetting the monopoly of copyright ownership conferred by the U.S. Constitution.

CleanFlicks also defended its business on the grounds of the first sale doctrine, through which the first buyer of a copyrighted work can use it in any way she sees fit as long as no violation of copyright occurs, such as the duplication of a copyrighted work. The ruling against this argument in Huntsman v. Soderbergh undermines the role of the first sale doctrine in counterbalancing the monopoly enjoyed by copyright owners.The counter suit filed by the DGA also alleged that CleanFlicks and ClearPlay violated the Lanham Act by misrepresenting the trademarked names of well-known directors. Because U.S. copyright law has never acknowledged an artist’s moral right to prevent the mutilation or distortion of his or her work, Hollywood studios protect the artistic interests of directors by using the exclusive ownership conferred by copyright law to define the alteration of film content as trademark infringement. The use of copyright law in this fashion primarily protects the interests of the major studios rather than directors in the digital age by allowing them to argue that manipulation of a specific movie distributed by them damages their ability to profitably exhibit it in theaters and market it to multiple consumer demographics, as they currently do by releasing the R-rated version of a film in theaters and an NC-17 version as a Director’s Cut on DVD.

The DGA argued that ClearPlay and CleanFlicks engaged in editing that is inconsistent, creating confusion in the mind of the consumer. In Pirates of the Carribean (2003), “God-forsaken island” is muted, but “heathen gods” slips through. According to the DGA, ClearPlay editing also resulted in the insertion of social, political, and professional prejudices. In The Hurricane (1999), racial conflict between law enforcement and people of color is deleted, even though it establishes a context for how people of color later react to the police. The argument that CleanFlicks and ClearPlay’s editing created confusion in the mind of the consumer is erroneous. Consumers seek out edited videos or editing software/hardware systems exactly because of the difference between the altered products and the originals.The DGA’s allegation that CleanFlicks and ClearPlay violated directors’ trademark rights is also questionable because directors rarely hold the copyright to their films, much less the underlying rights to the script. Their artistic efforts are “work made for hire” by the studios; thus the studios hold copyright. The designation of the studios rather than film directors as copyright owners of Hollywood movies nonetheless throws into relief the extent to which the Lanham Act actually serves the interests of Hollywood studios rather than the DGA.

Huntsman v. Soderbergh illustrates how the legal system constructs copyright ownership as a natural right rather than a constitutional privilege. Even though the Directors Guild of America prevailed in Huntsman v. Soderbergh, the case nonetheless demonstrates that copyright law ultimately protects the interests of capital rather than Hollywood directors. Content providers who wish to extend copyright protection well beyond its intended objective of ensuring remuneration for creators and promoting the progress of the arts and sciences will continue on the basis of Huntsman v. Soderbergh to exert absolute control over how and when legally acquired, copyrighted material can be used.

THE 50 GREATEST SEX SCENES IN CINEMA

July 25,2007
Independent Film Channel

There's a reason that any talk of sex in film comes back around to certain titles again and again. Getting two (or more) attractive actors to mash their faces together and huff and puff for the camera is relatively easy. Shooting a memorable sex scene is hard.

We here at IFC News and Nerve.com sat through a lot of movie sex to make this list — oh, we suffered through it somehow. But even after all that ranking, weighing and debating, we'd be hard pressed to define exactly what it is that makes a sex scene great — in true Justice Potter Stewart fashion, we just know it when we see it, whether it shocks us, titillates us, turns us on, breaks our hearts or confounds our expectations.

The oldest film on this list is from 1896; the newest is from last year. You'll notice we decided to leave certain standards in the field off.

50. Ken Park (2002)
Oh, Larry Clark, what oversexed minors are you discovering/exploiting this time? Ken Park's most well-known scene is the boy-on-girl-on-boy oral-sex fest toward the film's finale, and it's kind of disturbing and kind of fun. These kids are young, which makes you feel a wee bit lecherous about sitting in a theater and getting turned on amongst a couple hundred strangers who are doing the same. But what can you do? The fact that the scene concludes with a tickle fight that wouldn't be out of place in a PG movie about summer camp (were the participants not totally naked) doesn't help. But then, making us feel just a little weird about ourselves is what Clark has always been good at. — Will Doig

49. Laurel Canyon (2002)
This film's much-ballyhooed threesome isn't as pitch-perfect as Kate Beckinsale and Christian Bale's opening sex scene, all awkward and tender and on the verge of a possibly ill-conceived marriage. Bale's character is going down on Beckinsale's, following her highly specific verbal instructions in what we can assume to be a foreshadowing of their lopsided wedded dynamic. It's great when a sex scene can actually say something about the characters' inner lives and not just steam up the passenger window of a Model-T in cruise ship cargo hold. Beckinsale finally orders her fiancé to "fuck me," only to be interrupted by an answering machine from her future mother-in-law. In the end, she orgasms and then asks Bale if he came too, to which he sighs and responds, "I'm okay." — Will Doig

48. Fur (2007)
It's easy to forget the inherent sexuality of the Beauty and the Beast metaphor in these Disney-fied times — that the contrast between glamorous and grotesque generates palpable erotic friction. Fortunately, screenwriter Erin Cressida Wilson and director Steven Shainberg (the team behind 2002's SM love story Secretary) tease out the fairy tale in Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus, a whimsical biopic that renders the photographer's muse a fictional, hirsute Lothario named Lionel (Robert Downey Jr.) who introduces Arbus to a world of photogenic imperfection. Compared to James Spader's dominant persona in Secretary, Lionel brings less insecurity to the table, blindfolding Arbus (Nicole Kidman) while confidently drawing her in to his sexual universe. As opposed to to the confused, frenzied fucking between Arbus and her husband in the film, the Lionel/Diane sex scenes possess a surprising tenderness despite the kinky power exchange. Hottest of all is the scene where Arbus shaves off Lionel's fur — there is something tender yet carnal, loving yet bestial about the entire exchange — to say nothing of the powerful contradictions in Arbus' photographic oeuvre. — Jessica Gold Haralson

47. The Dreamers (2003)
Maybe it's because we live in an age where blood in the midst of intercourse can be dangerous, but of all the sundry sex acts in The Dreamers, the blood-on-the-face scene is the most memorable. (Some would argue it's the scene where the three young stars literally bathe in a bathtub filled with menstrual blood, and they'd have a solid argument — we say that's a close second). Bertolluci is no stranger to envelope pushing, and though we found this Boomer-made movie about the wonders of 1968 to be a tad preachy, you've got to give him credit for letting young, naïve American Matthew break a hymen on screen. When Matthew (Michael Pitt) then reaches up and smears the virginal blood on his partner Isabelle (Eva Green)'s face — and then her brother does the same — a sex scene that we'll never forget (for better or worse) was born. — Will Doig

46. Sex Lies and Videotape (1987)
"I've never really been that much into sex," Ann (Andie McDowell) tells her therapist at the start of Sex Lies and Videotape. Repressed and unhappily married, Ann changes her tune when she meets her husband's reclusive friend Graham (James Spader), who considers himself impotent. Graham's only sexual gratification comes from videotaping women while he questions them about their sex lives; his video collection horrifies Ann and hopelessly intrigues her. After a series of confrontations that leave them both emotionally naked, Ann turns on Graham's video camera and approaches him from behind. Boldly, she guides him to a couch and kisses him. Graham looks alarmed for a moment, then succumbs, then does something truly surprising: turns off the camera. — Gwynne Watkins

45. Breaking The Waves (1996)
"Have me now." Child-like, sweet-faced and perhaps a bit touched in the head, Scottish highlander Bess MacNeill (Emily Watson, in her Oscar-nominated screen debut) has just married oil-rig worker Jan Nyman (Stellan Skarsgård), much to the dismay of her repressed 70s-era Calvinist community. But where lies repression hides a longing for deep dickin', as Jan smirkingly discovers when his new bride leads him away from the reception, then slides off her panties from under a virginal white dress: "What do I do?" Jan's first lesson in marital duties is missionary against a restroom wall, maybe not-so-romantically perched next to the paper towel dispenser, as he then zips and leaves. In Bess' face, however, those two minutes were nothing less than a religious epiphany, her eyes sometimes locking with ours to intensify how intimately we're experiencing both her first fuck and her first of many spiritual falls from innocence. Somewhere behind a camera, Danish auteur Lars von Trier puckishly smiles at one of his more poignant provocations. —Aaron Hillis

44. Poison (1991)
Lying awake in a prison cell next to the object of his growing sexual obsession, John Broom (Scott Renderer) tentatively runs his hand over the sleeping Jack Bolton's (James Lyons) chest. Caught between fear and desire, Broom's hand tests Bolton's boundaries, tremblingly grazing his body until he receives a startling jolt of reciprocation. Shot in low light and lingering close-ups, this tender and complex evocation of homosexual lust caused a furor when Christian right group the American Family Association attacked the NEA for contributing to the film's completion, mainly due to the scene just described, another of rape, and the 15 frames of an erect penis. Thankfully the film survived intact, and it remains a striking homage to Jean Genet's "Un Chant d'Amour," the great French writer's only film, a more poetic vision of male sexuality in prison. —R. Emmet Sweeney

43. Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! (1990)
After Antonio Banderas gets smacked around on a dope deal gone bad, his kidnap victim/love interest Victoria Abril soothes his hurt with the most erotic example of Stockholm Syndrome in film history. Won over by his "troubled childhood turned me into a lovable psychotic" routine, she kisses away his bruises until the pair carefully tumble into the sack. His wounds are still fresh; Abril goes hands free, wriggling underneath him until Banderas valiantly utters, "The only thing the bastards left alone was my cock." A point they go on to prove for three solid minutes: up, down, and helpfully reflected in the skylight mirror. —R.E.S.

42. High Art (1998)
After an hour of build-up between gay artsy burnout Lucy (Ally Sheedy) and straight editorial striver Syd (Radha Mitchell), including a couple of druggy kisses, their trip together to upstate New York is clearly tryst-oriented. In addition to kicking off a jag of lesbian chic in 1998 that is still going fairly strong today, Lisa Chodolenko's "High Art," rather than open itself up to titillation, plays its pivotal sex scene for low-key authenticity. Retiring to bed after a night of talking until what looks from the blue light coating the room to be close to dawn, Lucy and Syd lay themselves down with a ritualistic air that continues through the slow and uncertain but tender scene that follows. Syd's self-consciousness is touching and raw, while Lucy is patient and methodical; there are questions, tears, coaxing, confession and not much actual sex. In other words, something almost sexier than sex: intimacy. —Michelle Orange

41. High Fidelity (2000)
"We used to listen to him having sex upstairs," mutters a cowering John Cusack, huddled beneath the covers, as he conjures up an imagined scene of his ex Laura (Iben Hjejle) and their ponytailed, world music-loving former neighbor Ian (Tim Robbins) engaging in hilariously flailing, extremely moist lovemaking. Ian pulls aside fantasy Laura's lacy black underthings to reveal a heart tattoo inscribed with his name, and the two gasp and groan through different positions to a soundtrack of Barry White in what seems to be a red satin-lined boudoir. It's silly and amazingly unsexy, and yet it tortures Cusack's Rob to sleeplessness, and it's impossible not to sympathize at least a little — the scene is an exaggerated and cartoonish vision of the better, hotter sex we've all at times suspected others are managing to have, particularly when those others include someone you used to date. —Alison Willmore

40. The Lover (1992)
As a teenager having an affair with an older Chinese man, French actress Jane March is nothing short of luscious in this 1992 Jean-Jacques Annaud film. The fact that she is unknown to American audiences, while our tabloids overflow with waifs like Kirsten Dunst and Kate Beckinsale, should make the Weinsteins ashamed of themselves. Based on Marguerite Duras' erotic autobiography, The Lover is ultimately a bit of a cold narrative, exploring the sexual and racial mores of 1929 Indochina but never saying much. But the film is worth it for the heated scenes in which March, playing a role called only The Young Girl, breaks taboos with her world-weary lover (Tony Leung Ka Fai). Annaud shoots the sex in extreme close-up: the plump, wet lips barely parted, a zoom on the soft, quivering belly, nipples and ass and probing fingers. It's highbrow spank material, frankly, but who doesn't enjoy a little softcore porn? — Sarah Hepola

39. The Piano (1993)
Erotic blackmail gets a bad rap in reality, but it's hotter than Hades in fiction. That is, at least, what we take away from this mid-19th-century fable about eccentric mute Scotswoman Ada (Holly Hunter) increasingly succumbing to her neighbor George's (Harvey Keitel) sexual demands in exchange for her beloved piano's return. While this scenario might make the Andrea Dworkins of the world tut-tut in dismay, the deliciously wrong power games between Ada and George are unquestionably hot — even more so in contrast to Ada's nominally repressed, Victorianesque persona. AdaÕs nudity becomes a metaphor for her gradual sexual awakening in a time of prim propriety, rendering this film more meaningful than similar fare on, say, The Spice Channel. A sex scene that's both hot and non-gratuitous? Rare, yes — but The Piano serves it up. — Jessica Gold Haralson

39. The Piano (1993)
Erotic blackmail gets a bad rap in reality, but it's hotter than Hades in fiction. That is, at least, what we take away from this mid-19th-century fable about eccentric mute Scotswoman Ada (Holly Hunter) increasingly succumbing to her neighbor George's (Harvey Keitel) sexual demands in exchange for her beloved piano's return. While this scenario might make the Andrea Dworkins of the world tut-tut in dismay, the deliciously wrong power games between Ada and George are unquestionably hot — even more so in contrast to Ada's nominally repressed, Victorianesque persona. AdaÕs nudity becomes a metaphor for her gradual sexual awakening in a time of prim propriety, rendering this film more meaningful than similar fare on, say, The Spice Channel. A sex scene that's both hot and non-gratuitous? Rare, yes — but The Piano serves it up. — Jessica Gold Haralson

38. Shortbus (2006)
Sofia (Sook-Yin Lee) is a sex therapist who has never had an orgasm, and is painfully aware of the irony. When she snaps during a therapy session with a very understanding couple, her clients suggest that she visit "Shortbus," an underground performance space, salon and sex club. When Sofia walks through the door, she encounters the best orgy scene to appear on film after 1979. Piled on the floor, dangling from swings and squirming against the walls are dozens of bodies, of all genders and descriptions, screwing and licking in every possible combination. Sofia's eyes focus on one dark-haired, tattooed beauty in the foreground, who has a shuddering, very real orgasm as her boyfriend fucks her from behind. One second later, she looks at Sofia with a devasting combination of empathy and post-coital bliss. We never learn the girl's name, but we see her again in the final scene, where she helps solve Sofia's orgasm deficiency (as well as the New York City blackout). — Gwynne Watkins

37. Shaft (1971)
Gordon Parks's classic action film wasted no time in establishing the sexual agency of its lead character: no sooner had Isaac Hayes warbled "he's a sex machine with all the chicks" in the opening credits, did we see the lead character in bed, generating a fingernail-baring orgasm from his latest conquest. It was a first impression worthy of the character's iconic status. — Michael Martin

36. Boogie Nights (1997)
As befits a film about the adult film industry, most of the sex scenes in Boogie Nights are casual, unshocking — a zip of the trousers in the supply closet, two naked bodies grinding in the corner of the frame. But the one scene actually filmed for a porno, in which Eddie Adams (Mark Wahlberg) makes his big debut, is downright touching. As a newcomer facing the ultimate screen test, Adams is nervous and boyish and eager to please. He wants to make this sexy. His partner in the scene is veteran Amber Waves, played with a brilliant mix of maternal feeling and self-destruction by Julianne Moore. She coaches him through his first time, and the scene is that much more exciting for its primness — no nudity, no sweaty body parts, all we see are facial expressions, and the flicker of tape as the reel runs out. A boy has become a man. And that man will be named Dirk Diggler. — Sarah Hepola

35. Network (1976)
Work-obsessed TV exec Diana Christensen (Best Actress Oscar winner Faye Dunaway) begins an affair with aging news-division prez Max Schumacher (William Holden), who learns that all she wants out of life "is a 30 share and a 20 rating." En route to their weekend romp in the Hamptons, Diana gets excitable over her scheduling problems for "The Mao Tse-Tung Hour" while simultaneously making out with Max. Her manic, non-stop rant outlasts their softly lit dinner, a swoony beach run back to their room and their passionate disrobing, kissing, and rolling around on the bed. On top, Diana breathily brags about getting press if the government sues her station, making her climax quicker than a 15-year-old boy. Not missing a post-coital beat, Diana launches into a soap opera pitch: "'The Dykes,' the heartrending saga about a woman hopelessly in love with her husband's mistress. What do you think?" Having never said a word and already half-asleep, Max lazily opens his eyes as if he's long been thinking: I'm as horny as hell, and I'm not going to listen to this anymore! —Aaron Hillis

34. The End of the Affair (1999)
Ralph Fiennes puts his clammy appeal to its best use in Neil Jordan's 1999 hot-to-the-touch take on Graham Greene's novel. As spurned lover Maurice Bendrix, he seethes and broods over recollections of his finished affair with the married Sarah Miles (Julianne Moore), including a sequence in which the two, all but pushed together by her oblivious spouse, hurry back to her house to consummate their rapidly escalating relationship. They clutch at each other on the stairs and fall into furtive, urgent lovemaking that reaches its climax just as Sarah's husband comes home. "What if he heard?" Bendrix whispers of Sarah's unblushing orgasmic cry. Not a woman to be caught short of a quip, she replies "He wouldn't recognize the sound." —Alison Willmore

33. The Last Seduction (1994)
A woman after my own heart, Bridget Gregory (Linda Fiorentino, possibly at her hotness apex here in 1994), can patter with the best, and never lets common sense get in the way of her raging libido. Zeroing in on a doofy local named Mike (Peter Berg) upon blowing into small-town upstate New York with scads of stolen money, Bridget sizes him up right there under the bar. Retiring to the more roomy, romantic locale of the alley out back, there ensues a scene of ghetto debauchery that — even while clinging to a chain-link fence with her legs hooked around Berg's bare bum — the slinky Fiorentino pulls off as just another night on the femme fatale clock. —Michelle Orange

32. Being John Malkovich (1999)
A randy John Malkovich greets Maxine (Catherine Keener) at his apartment door with an urbane "Shall we to the boudoir?" But alas, such sweet nothings are nothing to Maxine, who is withholding her body until her wild-haired admirer, Lotte (Cameron Diaz), slips down a portal into Malkovich's brainpan. The dead time is passed with awkward couch sitting and a dry "So...do you enjoy being an actor?" The answer is moot, as Lotte slides in, and Maxine mounts. The supreme example of fantasizing about another while screwing your boring beau, it's also a hilarious and celebratory depiction of a lesbian awakening. Maxine impulsively shouts, "I love you, Lotte!" and Lotte reciprocates with a booming declaration of her own, inside Malkovich's prominent brow. Oblivious to the blooming romance, John asks "Did you call me Lotte?", but ends up preferring climax to interrogation, while Lotte is dropped onto the side of the New Jersey turnpike. —R. Emmet Sweeney

31. Storytelling (2001)
If nothing else, Todd Solondz's "Storytelling" made me proud to be a Canadian. Seeing it in theatres in 2001, Canadian viewers were aware of the fact that the highly publicized sex scene between a bread-white creative writing student named Vi (Selma Blair) and her black power professor (Robert Wisdom) would not be marred by the red box that covered most of the action in the U.S. release. In fact, the scene is actually dirtier with the box. Vi ends up at the home of her stridently anti-white professor, and tells herself "Don't be racist" after finding a stash of white girl porn in his bathroom. What follows is a hideously funny/awful scene between Blair and Wisdom, where the professor forces his "spoiled, suburban white girl with a Benetton rainbow complex" to say "Fuck me, nigger," while he rams her from behind. About as erotic as a soggy sneaker, the scene nevertheless effectively exploits its perverse combination of deep discomfort, porny parallels, Selma Blair highly compromised, laughable subversion, and — with the red box — the guiding hypocrisy of the Hollywood ratings system. —M.O.

30. Me and You and Everyone We Know (2005)
In seventh grade, my friend would sometimes greet me with reports on his instant-messenger sexcapades: "Check it out, dude! I was having cyber with this girl, and look — I printed it out!" But nothing in those gruesome transcripts could match one of the funniest indie "sex scenes" in recent memory, which occurs over instant messenger and can be summed up in pure typography: ))<===>((. No, we won't explain it — it's far too grotesque and hilarious for print. Rent Me and You and Everyone We Know, and you'll never look at nested parentheses the same way again. — Peter Smith

29. 9 Songs (2004)
When the average actor gets in front of a giant camera crew, heat lamps, and a director's scrutiny, sex is probably the last thing on his or her mind — or so we're told. This hardly seems to be the case with 9 Songs, the lyrical Michael Winterbottom flick about a climatologist who heats things up with an exchange student. The catch is that the film contains zero faux fucking — it's all natural, and the scene where Lisa goes down on Matt is far better than the blowjob stunt in The Brown Bunny. The critics can argue for days — is 9 Songs cinema or porn? — but we'll stay out of that one. The tingle-inducing realization that Matt's climax and Lisa's voracious enthusiasm are real is reward enough. — Jessica Gold Haralson

28. Henry and June (1990)
The first film released with an NC-17 rating, Henry and June seems as quaint as a fan dance today, but anticipation ages well. Adapted from the diaries of the infamously erotic Anais Nin (Maria de Medeiros), it's the story of a love triangle between Nin, the similiarly single-minded author Henry Miller (Fred Ward) and his wife June (Uma Thurman). Most memorable is Nin's hot pursuit of June — down a foggy street, into a hug that turns into a clinch, then into a passionate kiss on the dancefloor of a lesbian bar, then into bed. The action is conveyed mostly with eyes and fully clothed limbs, and it's a timeless portrait of longing fulfilled. — Michael Martin

27. Boys Don't Cry (1999)
Normally we don't go for sex scenes where all you see is some woman's face oohing and ahhing in alleged amorous rapture — it just seems like MPAA-inspired self-censorship. But this one's different, and it's to Chloe Sevigny's credit that she can make getting eaten out look exactly as good as it feels simply by staring at the sky and contorting her cheekbones. Knowing that it's Hilary Swank down there (done up very, very convincingly as a man) just makes it all the more erotic — and sublimely confusing. — Will Doig

26. Out of Sight (1998)
Steven Soderbergh's crime caper is a smart take on the simultaneous desire to pin someone down and lock them up. The slow burn begins in the first scene, when Federal Marshall Karen Sisco (Jennifer Lopez) and incorrigible bank robber Jack Foley (George Clooney) find themselves stuffed in the trunk of a getaway car together. The extreme close-ups intensify everything, from Lopez's heavy breathing to the sound of Clooney's finger nervously tapping on her thigh. This is back before Jennifer became J. Lo and Clooney was touted as the Sexiest Man Alive, but the attraction between the two is palpable. Later on, after several coy run-ins, Jack and Karen put their firearms aside to banter over drinks in a Detroit bar. Snow falls silently outside, Jack sips a glass of neat bourbon, and the film darts back and forth between their conversation and the night's inevitable seduction scene. Motor City, the missionary position and those plastic claw hair clips from the '90s have rarely looked so slick and sultry. — Kate Worteck

25. Female Trouble (1974)
In "Pink Flamingos," drag queen extraordinaire Divine had sex with her son, so when John Waters prepped his follow-up, 1974's "Female Trouble," he knew he'd have to come up with something really disturbing to top himself. And thus Divine does the impossible: she has sex with herself, as both halves of a typically Watersian tryst: female teen runaway Dawn Davenport and male sleazebag Earl Peterson. Earl picks up Dawn on the side of the road and forces her to have sex on a soiled mattress in a dump. Somewhere between the start of the sexual assault and the start of her pregnancy, Dawn begins to enjoy it. You can just imagine the delight Divine must have taken in informing anyone who told him to go fuck himself that he'd already tried that so they'd have to come up with something better. —Matt Singer


24. The Cooler (2003)
Bad luck magnet Bernie (William H. Macy) dusts off a Sinatra LP to set the mood. "Luck Be a Lady" slinks out of the speakers until Bernie shuts the dresser drawer too hard, scratching up Frank's velvety pipes. This doesn't faze Natalie (Maria Bello) one bit, because she's the beautiful cocktail waitress who's going to turn nervous Bernie's life around. And what better way to start than with a striptease! She shifts her hips, drops her shorts, and shakes the dice tattoo on her right ass cheek. Bernie's the winner. The scene works by highlighting the nervous fumbling and resultant humor that arises with first-time lovers. Bernie has trouble undoing her singlet, but after he succeeds, he climaxes in the blink of an eye. Natalie offers him forgiveness with ineffable grace, whispering those magical words, "You've got a great cock." That's what I call love. —R. Emmet Sweeney

23. Brokeback Mountain (2005)
Sleeping bag sex is awkward in the best of times, so having your first homosexual experience in a two-man tent is really stacking the deck. But the thing that makes "Brokeback Mountain"'s key sex scene so effective is its utter lack of planning. Jack Twist (Jake Gyllenhaal) and Ennis (Heath Ledger) wind up huddled together for warmth — the gold standard of come-ons — and when Jack makes an awkward pass an angry, heated struggle ensues that morphs into some rough and urgent sex. Shot in almost complete darkness and lasting under a minute (!), the scene manages to subvert the tittering expectations of the viewing public and also offer a credibly awkward and confused rendering of how such a scenario might play out. Almost entirely dependent on sound, Ledger and Gyllenhaal make more of a couple of gasps and growls (along with a jangling belt buckle and twin zipper zips) than many sex scenes can do with mood music and the fully monty. —Michelle Orange

22. The Wayward Cloud (2005)
The very first shot of Tsai Ming-liang's avant-musical pornocopia is a wide-lensed still of a sickly lit hallway; there's no music, no dialogue, and only two women passing each other over the span of a couple minutes. Yes, adventurous cinephiles often get gushy for this slow-burning Taiwanese talent, but his film's second shot could titillate and/or scandalize just about everyone: A nubile nurse (played by real-life Japanese sex starlet Sumomo Yozakura) lies spread-eagle on a white bed, naked from the waist down. It's a gorgeous but ridiculous image, as the only vibrant color is emanating from between her legs: a juicy, half-carved watermelon. Hsiao-Kang (Lee Kang-sheng), last seen selling watches on the streets in Tsai's pseudo-prequel "What Time Is It There?", would seem to have become Taipei's love doctor. He crawls toward the nurse's fruit, his tongue lapping at her seed, his prodding fingers getting stickier, the room filling with squishy noises — wait, is there or isn't there a melon? After she comes, Hsiao-Kang sticks a vagina-sized chunk of drippy pulp in her mouth, a bright-pink money shot to the safest sex known to man... or horticulture. —Aaron Hillis

21. The Kiss (1896)
The listing in the Edison films catalog reads "They get ready to kiss, begin to kiss and kiss and kiss and kiss in a way that brings down the house every time." Boy, do they ever. When May Irwin and John Rice reenacted an 18-second kiss (and kiss and kiss and kiss) from the end of the play "The Widow Jones" in early 1896, it hit the early film world with the force of a bomb. The popularity of the serial smooches (to say nothing of the ensuing scandal) ensured that the development of movies would forever be linked with the development of people getting it on in the movies. In some ways, these are the most important 50 feet of film ever printed. —M.S.

20. Bound (1996)
In this early effort by the Wachowski brothers (The Matrix, V for Vendetta), two women fall in love and connive to steal $2 million from the mafia. Jennifer Tilly plays Violet, a femme fatale in pencil skirts and red lips — a Vargas painting come to life. Gina Gershon's ex-con, Corky, is more masculine: smooth, defined triceps and delts, lips thick with snarl. The two meet when Violet accompanies her mobster boyfriend to an apartment building where Corky is working as contractor. Early in the film Violet places Corky's hand on her breast and then between her legs, saying, "I'm trying to seduce you," but Violet's boyfriend comes home before she can complete her conquest. The film's best-known scene was shot in a single take: the women lie on a mattress in Corky's unfinished apartment, the camera lingering on their lips and breasts, hovering behind and above the couple as Violet uses her hand to bring Corky to orgasm. Portrayals of lesbian lovemaking often fail to emphasize hands, an oversight corrected by the film's "sex consultant," Susie Bright. -- Sarah Harrison

19. Sex and Lucia (2002)
A babbling, whimsical love story about a Madrid waitress and her ill-destined novelist lover, a magical, ethereal quality permeates the film — the fate of its characters is ineffably linked to the moon and the tides — and features heavily in its sex scenes. The film cuts to the chase: it opens with Lucia (Paz Vega) and Lorenzo naked in the moonlit ocean, intertwined. Even if the rest of Sex and Lucia doesn't make much sense, you won't care — you'll be too busy watching Lorenzo and the intensely erotic Lucia, or Lorenzo and other-woman Elena (Najwa Nimri). -- Jessica Gold Haralson

18. Unfaithful (2002)
Spelling out the overt sex appeal of an Olivier Martinez/Diane Lane cinematic tryst isn't difficult, particularly when notoriously erotic director Adrian Lyne is behind said coupling. Yet Unfaithful's sex appeal doesn't lie in Olivier's chiseled abs or Diane's cougar street cred. The film continuously raises the stakes between Diane Lane's philandering character and her devil-may-care foreign paramour; the sex gets hotter as it gets more likely that Lane will be caught en flagrante delicto by her suburban colleagues. This is most evident in the scene where Lane is lunching with married girlfriends, and Martinez slips in to screw Lane silly in an open bathroom stall. "I have friends out there," Lane whispers, to Martinez' chagrin — he's having none of her qualms, pushing her upright against the creaky wooden door. When Lane re-emerges flushed and giddy after their bathroom quickie, her girlfriend tells her, "You have a button undone." It's a sly wink to the audience. If Unfaithful is wrong, you won't want to be right. -- Jessica Gold Haralson

17. Body Heat (1982)
Ned (William Hurt) is getting restless in his small Florida town — until he becomes infatuated with gorgeous, unavailable Matty (Kathleen Turner). Their flirtations are witty and charged, yet Matty rejects his every advance, finally throwing him out of her house and locking the door. As she stands in the doorway, challenging him, Ned tries every locked doorknob, then grabs a chair from the porch and smashes it through a bay window. This time, Matty is too excited to reject him; as she whispers encouragement, he pulls up her bright red skirt, removes her panties and makes love to her on the carpet, right in front of the broken window. Soon, their obsession will twist into something much darker — but at this moment, it's steamier than a Florida heat wave. — Gwynne Watkins

16. Coming Home (1978)
The story of a conservative military wife (Jane Fonda) attracted to a paraplegic Vietnam veteran (Jon Voight), Coming Home broke ground for political — and sexual — frankness in cinema. Voight's character, though paralyzed, gives Fonda's character her first orgasm through oral sex, a moment ecstastically enacted in close-up by Fonda. "I thought, maybe this is a way to redefine sexuality, sensuality; and make it less about genitalia and thrusting and be about what women know really matter, which is when the man is really sensitive to what we need," said Fonda in 2005. "For the day, it was a hot scene, wasn't it?" Fonda and Voight both won Oscars; their fearlessness during this now-iconic scene illustrates why. — Michael Martin

15. Get Carter (1971)
Phone sex is rarely played for anything more than laughs on film — it's hard to make something so based on solitude and the thrill of the moment look less silly when presented for all to see. But when Michael Caine's titular gangster dials up his London-based mistress (a lingerie-clad Britt Ekland) in Mike Hodges' nihilistic 1971 crime drama, the two generate plenty of long-distance heat and nary a giggle. Maybe it's that Caine seems remains so unruffled as he gets Ekland all worked up with a gravelly monologue. Maybe it's that we know from the get-go that Ekland's the property of his boss, played by Terence Rigby, who interrupts the conversation by barging in at the end, prompting Ekland to breathlessly inform him that she's "just doing her exercises." Or maybe it's that Caine does his end of the talking by way of the only phone in the house in which he's rented a room — in the parlour, with his landlady sitting a few feet away in a rocking chair, turned away but obviously listening in. —Alison Willmore

14. Team America: World Police (2004)
Even with the cuts Trey Parker and Matt Stone had to make in order to secure an R-rating (the unrated DVD restores the sorely missed puppet defecation money shot), the infamous marionette sex scene in "Team America: World Police" is easily one of the most graphic in movie history. The sequence serves two purposes in the film: to mock the fact that these puppets can do all kinds of stuff the MPAA would never let humans do onscreen; and to pad the film with material so obviously and childishly filthy (like, oh, I don't know, puppets pooping on each other, for example), that the aforementioned censors would be so focused on removing it that they wouldn't notice the other, more subversive material slipping right under their noses. Despite all their positions and thrusting and mouth-to-ass action and such, the puppets still don't have any genitals to speak of — no doubt Parker and Stone's ultimate commentary on the pathetic state of the Hollywood sex scene. —Matt Singer

13. Y Tu Mamá También (2001)
In between tequila shots on the beach, Luisa (Maribel Verdú) critiques Julio (Gael García Bernal) and Tenoch's (Diego Luna) lackluster skill in the bedroom. (The culprit? Too much jacking off.) Intending to set them right as a favor to their future fucks, she induces them back to their cabin with a knee-bendingly erotic dance by the jukebox, Cuaron's camera tracking her as if hypnotized. Back inside, the two teens throw off her dress and plant sloppy kisses. Ever the teacher, Luisa calms them, and then goes down on them, her head sliding just out of frame. Julio and Tenoch's faces turn to rictuses of pleasure, so much so that they turn to each other, and kiss. There's no intent to prove that they're gay, just that they love each other, and that a good blowjob dissolves all arbitrary prejudices. —R. Emmet Sweeney

12. The Night Porter (1974)
Vienna, 1957. Said night porter (Dick Bogarde) and a married hotel guest (Charlotte Rampling) are damned (see them also in: "The Damned") to repeat their past after locking eyes for the first time in years. You see, he's an ex-Nazi torturer and she's a concentration camp inmate who survived by becoming his sex slave; the lovebirds have reunited. Apparently, the couple that steps in glass together, stays together, as the two are soon compulsively playing out roles in a depraved S&M romance/codependency that reaches its most memorably primal state near the end of the film. Finally too dangerous to leave Bogarde's apartment (war criminals trying to kill them and all), the two have both become victims of isolation and hunger. In bed, Rampling eyes their last jar of strawberry marmalade on the nightstand, grabs it, and gobbles by the handful. Bogarde restrains her arm, the glass falls and breaks, and Rampling dives for the food like a wildebeast. She eats teasingly, they grapple, he cuts her face with the broken jar, they lick each other clean, and then she rides him while manhandling her. Can't you see why they're made for each other? Jawohl. —Aaron Hillis

11. Ecstasy (1933)
Child bride Eva is married off to an older man who turns out to be uninterested in her physical charms — a fell blow indeed, when the charms in question are those of Hedwig Kiesler, just a few years shy of being rechristened Hedy Lamarr and finding her place as one of Hollywood's great beauties. Fortunately, an impulsive skinny dip in the lake one day has her meeting cute with virile laborer Adam (Aribert Mog), who she later can't get off her mind. Having paced away half the night, she eventually goes off to find him, and the two come together for what is likely the first sex scene in non-pornographic film — his head slides out of the screen, and the camera closes in on Lamarr's face as it trembles in the passions of the film's title (an expression that director Gustav Machatý apparently provoked by poking Lamarr in the ass with a safety pin). All this, in 1933! "Ecstasy" was considered such a transgressive commodity that when the film was first imported to the U.S., customs agents burned it. —A.W.

10. Young Frankenstein (1974)
Madeline Kahn is saving herself for her wedding day — much to the chagrin of her hard-up fiancé — when Frankenstein abducts her, spirits her away to the forest and tries to force himself upon her, only to find that she's all too willing. "No!" she cries. "I'm not that kind of girl!" Until he exposes himself and she let's slip the "woof" that says everything. Mel Brooks makes up for the fact that you don't get to see any of the action with more one-liners crammed between foreplay and post-coital cigarette than one would think possible. Kahn, as always, knocks weird and sexual off each other like a squash pro. "Seven always has been my lucky number," she says as Frankenstein moves in for another round. "You're incorrigible, aren't you? My little zipperneck." And when she breaks into song — "Oh, sweet mystery of life, at last I've found you!" — in her warbling soprano just as the monster enters her, you can see why people like our parents say the old black-and-whites were sexier. — Will Doig

9. The Big Easy (1987)
True chemistry is underrated, or at least difficult to find, in cinematic pairings. In this story of an uptight district attorney investigating — and falling for — a morally ambiguous cop, Ellen Barkin and Dennis Quaid have no shortage. Their sex scene is one of the most natural and steamy ever filmed, with its awkward stop-and-start pacing and penchant for dialogue over heavy breathing, illuminates and elevates the idea of the chase. Barkin and Quaid are either even better actors than they're given credit for, or they had a lot of fun off set.

8. Secretary (2002)
The elicit sexual relationship between obsessive-compulsive attorney Edward (James Spader) and his shy young secretary, Lee (Maggie Gyllenhaal), is a feast of mind games, humiliation, bondage and beatings. But both of them seem afraid to actually touch one another — until Secretary's revealing climax, where all the tension they've built up is finally released. Lee has just abandoned her wedding to another man and undergone a strenuous test to prove her devotion to Edward. Edward, satisfied that she loves him, carries her exhausted body to a hidden room in his law office, where he removes her wedding dress, bathes her in a cast-iron tub, and makes love to her on a grass-covered (yes, grass-covered) bed. It's the first time we see the tenderness beneath Edward's controlling manners, the first time Lee is comfortable exposing her scarred, naked body, and the first time we realize that these two crazy kids are actually gonna make it. — Gwynne Watkins

7. My Beautiful Laundrette (1985)
"Love in a Laundromat" should have been an Aerosmith song, if only because of this scene. At a time when gay rights was a bizarre fringe issue, Daniel Day-Lewis played a mod British punk with a Vanilla Ice hairdo who screws his Pakistani business partner in the office of their new wash-and-fold. Except that to say that they simply "screw" doesn't do it justice — it's nearly impossible to make filmic lovemaking genuinely romantic and holy-mother-of-God hot, but there it is. I don't know what's sexier: the shirt-removal-with-necktie-in-place disrobing, or the drinking of Champagne from one another's mouths (and if you think this sounds a little gross, I'm begging you: Try. This. At. Home.) After more than two decades this scene still holds up better than most gay sex scenes that are made today, which tend toward lewdly squirm-worthy or boringly safe for mass consumption. God, I love the '80s. — Will Doig

6. Betty Blue (1985)
One of the nakedest, craziest movies in a category that has never lacked for nude infirmity, the French romantic drama Betty Blue presents one of cinema's most combustible couples: the novelist Zorg and his doomed paramour Betty. Beatrice Dalle and Jean-Hugues Anglade spend most of this movie nude (in Dalle's case, nude and/or going berserk), and the opening scene, depicting a good minute of Dalle's shrieking, shoulder-gnawing orgasm beneath Zorg, is a fitting intro. Dalle struts, pouts, giggles and freaks as if the idea of the volatile siren were invented for her; despite the emotional pyrotechnics and downer ending, the film's unabashed sensuality and passionate advocacy of passion make it a turn-on for the ages. — Michael Martin

5. The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1988)
Though it's less overtly sexual than the famous scene involving mirrors and a bowler hat between free lovin' Sabina (Lena Olin) and physician Tomas (Daniel Day-Lewis), there's a strong argument to be made for the superior, complex sensuality of the encounter shared by Sabina and Tomas' timid wife Tereza (Juliette Binoche). Fascinated and wounded by the idea of her husband's lover, Tereza is drawn to Sabina as image and then as woman. Their meeting is a gorgeously conceived and shot sequence in which the photographer Tereza takes some nude photos of Sabina, Binoche's eyes welling with a mix of emotions that defy description, before Sabina takes the camera herself. In almost complete silence, the women negotiate each other as women, then as subjects, and objects, the camera a sort of stand-in for the absent Tomas. The sequence of Olin tugging down the failingly reluctant (and topless) Binoche's underwear for her own nude photo session is a marvel of direction, tone and performance. --Michelle Orange

4. Risky Business (1983)
If you've never seen "Risky Business" and all you know about it is the oft-clipped bit where Tom Cruise dances in his briefs to the sounds of Bob Seger, you're in for a shock. This movie is as explicit and downright sexy as any in Hollywood history; no scene more so than the first encounter between Cruise and Rebecca De Mornay's Lana, a classic Hollywood prostitute (i.e. she's gorgeous, aroused, in no way afflicted by STDs). The sex is intentionally dreamlike: Cruise's Joel calls Lana and passes out on the couch while waiting for her to arrive. He awakes to find her slinking into his living room. Before you can say "Hey, she forgot her underwear!" the two are going at it in front of a pair of glass doors that open ever so suggestively in time with their lovemaking. As legend has it, Cruise and De Mornay were in the midst of becoming a real life couple during shooting, and the chemistry comes across big time. It's a shockingly hot moment, especially for a guy wearing tighty whiteys. --Matt Singer

3. Mulholland Dr. (2001)
Highly unscientific research polls were conducted amongst friends, colleagues and strangers to clarify which sapphic showdown is "the greatest" from David Lynch's noir-subverting, latter-day masterpiece. For some, it's the tender first time between Hollywood amnesia victim Laura Elena Harring and the fresh-off-the-plane actress helping to solve her mystery (Naomi Watts), as they share a bed after a traumatic afternoon. Harring slips off her new blonde wig, then her robe, and just the lingering stillness of her twin peaks feels like a tease. Half-under the sheets, a kiss on the forehead goodnight becomes a pause of knowing lust, lez-be-friends soon tonguing and grabbing at each other for dear life. Watts is wide-eyed: "Have you ever done this before?" "I don't know," replies an honest Harring, "have you?"

Definitely hot, but points lost for the digital blurring out of Harring's genitals, even if to appease censors. The film's real blood-racer is such a left-field eruption of pure, palpable sex that it's as potent as the first time: Watts, her life now a dingy-bathrobed failure, makes a depressing cup of coffee (certainly not Lynch's new blend!). She strolls to the sofa, revealing a topless Harring -- what the fuck? In the reverse shot, Watts has on only denim cut-offs, her coffee mug now a cocktail. "You drive me wild," purrs Harring, before telling her straddling partner that they "shouldn't do this anymore." Watts stares her down and fingers her inland empire violently until Harring pushes her away. But what does it all mean, Mr. Lynch? --Aaron Hillis

2. A History of Violence (2005)
By the time humble, happy marrieds Tom (Viggo Mortensen) and Edie (Maria Bello) have violent sex on the stairs of their house, we've already seen them do it once. Earlier in the film, they'd acted out a few teenage fantasies while Edie wore a cheerleader outfit. Even though the scene contains what director David Cronenberg's been told is the first onscreen instance of 69 in an American film, the exchange is sweet and innocent, almost virginal. When they hook up again, the couple's veneer of wholesome Americana has been shattered and Edie's learned that Tom is really a mobster-in-hiding named Joey. She slaps him and he grabs her and the two begin to fight on the stairs (a locale loaded with symbolic meaning for a couple in transition). Very quickly, the wrestling turns to brutal, combative sex. In his DVD commentary, Cronenberg notes, "It was a physically difficult scene to shoot and an emotionally very difficult scene to shoot. We wanted to suggest that she's attracted and repelled by Joey, and she's still looking for the Tom that's in this creature." It's a credit to Cronenberg's direction and his actors' talents that all of that comes across in their impassioned faces and moans of ecstasy and screams of pain. It's a sex scene that's erotic and disturbing and it actually tells us something about the characters in it. In other words, it is perfect. --MS

1. Don't Look Now (1973)
The love scene in "Don't Look Now" was a late addition, conceived of when director Nicolas Roeg decided that something was needed to balance out all of the fighting between the couple played by Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland in Allan Scott's screenplay. And so he added what turned out to be the most tender, most emotionally complex, and yes, hottest sex scene on celluloid. Not the first thing you'd expect from a horror film, or, for that matter, from Sutherland, but the scene, which represents a kind of détente in a marriage strained by the recent loss of a child, is justifiably famous -- a portrait of a couple both intimately familiar with and in the process of rediscovering each other.

Christie and Sutherland start out in the bathroom -- she's in the bath, teasing him about encroaching love handles as he dawdles around in the buff. Later, lounging on the bed, they exchange kisses that lead to poignant, unplanned lovemaking, the scene intercut with shots of the two dressing for dinner afterward. In an interview with the Guardian, Sutherland suggested that the editing relieved any confrontational sense of scopophilia: "The audience never ended up being a voyeur, they watched a cinematic collage and were reminded of themselves." But more than that, it all serves as a compelling rebuke of that old Hollywood standard for love scenes: the clinch that leads to the fade to black. "Don't Look Now" is a reminder that everything that's commonly omitted in movies and represented by a quick cut or a flash of darkness is just as much a part of the story, and of life, as the conversations and confrontations that follow. --Alison Willmore

FLIX CLUB EDITED MOVIE REVIEWS

Jason Pyles, a former movie critic for Utah Valley State College's College Times, offers film reviews for the sanitized selections found at Orem Utah's Flix Club. The reviews can be found on his Blogger site Flix Club Edited Movie Reviews.


Film critic, Jason Pyles

CLEANFLICKS CARTOON

BY AARON TAYLOR/ April 10, 2007
The Daily Herald

THEY'RE BAAACK!

BY MICHAEL DOSSIER / April 9, 2007
The DVD Dossier

CleanFlicks, the Utah-based purveyor of censored movies, is apparently back in business.

The Associated Press reports (via Forbes) that they've now seized upon a loophole in copyright law that they believe allows them to edit films for "educational purposes." Judging by a recent visit to their website, it certainly looks like they've resumed their online business.

A court ruled last year that the sanitizing of movies on DVD or VHS tape - which is what CleanFlicks had done - violated federal copyright laws. At the time, CleanFlicks - and a few other firms with similar business models - were ordered to cease and desist and turn over their existing inventory to the movie studios who had brought suit against them.

But now, they're back... and they want to be your "family-friendly DVD rental resource," providing "movies you can trust" (with a library of over 1,000 titles, including those scandalous - but educational - favorites "All About Eve," "Brigadoon," An American In Paris" and "Damn Yankees" plus those very naughty TV shows "Bewitched," "The Jetsons," "Gomer Pyle" and "Saved By The Bell").

I trust the Directors' Guild of America and the movie studios who originally brought the suit will be doing so again, if only for "educational purposes."

LEGAL LOOPHOLE BRINGS BACK EDITED MOVIES

BY BARBARA DAVIS / April 9, 2007
Brigham Young University's Daily Universe

Utah County said goodbye to edited-movie vendors last summer, but local movie businesses have brought edited movies back by finding a creative way to justify their actions. Flix Club and Cougar Video are renting and selling edited movies, an action outlawed last July in the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado. The judge ruled that movie-editing businesses and vendors create injury to creative expression and should shut their doors and call off operations.

So how are these stores getting around this? The ruling that forced movie-editing companies out of business has a legal loophole. Daniel Thompson, owner of Flix Club, 908 S. State, Orem, said movie-editing stores are continuing to operate based on two criteria.

He said under the fair-use premise, editing is permitted if it is for an educational purpose. The second is that these businesses are not actually named in the lawsuit so they are not banned.

Flix Club edits videos such as "Glory" and "The Patriot" for local schools, said Thompson, former owner of the retail locations for Clean Flicks. But he also edits movies that may not be easily identified as educational and some wonder what is educational about "The Matrix."

Some businesses learned of this loophole and began operation a few months after the ruling. Scott J. Mikulecky, member of the Litigation Department of Sherman & Howard's Colorado Springs office and attorney for CleanFlicks of Colorado in the lawsuit that provoked the ruling, said he does not know the details of operations but is skeptical. "There is a valid educational exception," Mikulecky said. "The question is if [certain movies] qualify. I don't see how [some] movies can be made educational."

According to the Motion Picture Association of America Web site, the association is committed to promoting copyright protection and other intellectual property protection. This is so those who create movies, software, music or other works can make a living by creating products that enrich lives. It implements programs to help secure the original product and reduce editing. The Daily Universe attempted to contact a spokesman for the Motion Picture Association but did not have phone calls returned.

Dan Pia, UVSC student from Pasadena, Calif., said he believes movies are a creative effort of many people to produce art, and he is not buying the educational claim. "I think it is ridiculous to allow them [editing companies] to do this," Pia said. He said editing movies is both dishonest and hypocritical. "They are taking advantage of the legal loophole," he said. "And people are hypocritical because they are watching movies they wouldn't choose to watch without the edited parts."

But many families in the area want edited movies and support movie-editing companies. There is a need for edited movies in this area where family values are important, Thompson said. "They [studios] may not realize there is a market here for edited movies," he said. "It is not R-rated movies necessarily that need to be edited; it is about family values in general. The support people here have for edited movies is amazing."

Thompson added that if someone owns a copy of a movie, then the individual should be able to do anything to it. "What if you took 'God's Army' and added profanity to it?" he said. "My response is, do with it what you want. The principle of editing goes both ways."

ARCHIVAL FOOTAGE WANTED

The makers of a documentary on Cleanflix are looking for archival news footage--national news coverage of anything related to sanitized movies. Specifically, they are looking for footage from the February 27th 2001 Daily Show report with Vance DeGeneres, the September 19th 2002 CBS report with Dan Rather, and the September 23rd 2002 NBC report with Tom Brokaw. They would also be interested in any CNN or Fox News coverage as well as the Daily Show clip from October 1st 2002 and a debate between CleanFlicks founder Ray Lines and Showgirls writer Joe Ezterhaus from an unknown program and channel. You may contact the filmmakers directly at "cleanflixmovie at gmail dot com" or send the footage to them at PO Box 970908, Orem UT, 84057. The filmmakers will contact all copyright owners to request permission before using the news clips in their film.

FRESHLY SCRUBBED FILMS

Art by Leia Bell

BY DOUG FABRIZIO & ELAINE CLARK / March 21, 2007
National Public Radio, Radio West

Doug Fabrizio discussed the sanitized movie phenomenon with Daniel Thompson of Flix Club, Vince Horiuchi of The Salt Lake Tribune, and Dean Duncan of Brigham Young University today.

"Last year, the US District Court decided that movies edited by companies like the now-defunct CleanFlicks are in violation of copyright law. Logan-based Flix Club has stepped in to fill the void under a "fair-use" loophole. Radiowest will discuss the consumers who are willing to pay for these sanitized movies, and the artists who want their work to be left alone."

The show is available for download in its entirety at KUER.org

APOCAFLICKS

The skit Apocaflicks: The Curse of the Unedited Movies was originally performed by BYU's award-winning comedy troupe Divine Comedy at the Varsity Theatre in the fall of 2006. Divine Comedy, performs several times each semester on the campus of Brigham Young University. We've posted the script below in original format with production notes. Does the end of the world somehow revolve around movie editors, CleanFlicks? Read below to find out. The script was penned by Ryan Crocker with contributions from the Divine Comedy players.


APOCAFLICKS: THE CURSE OF THE UNEDITED MOVIES
By Ryan Croker

With Paul, Matt, Trevor, Jono, Lisa, Taylor, Brian, Ryan, Laurel, and Sarah.

We open with a short video showing newspaper clippings detailing the rise and fall of Cleanflicks. We see the some text explaining what happened, i.e.

On July 6, 2006, a federal judge in Denver presiding over a lawsuit between CleanFlicks and 16 Hollywood directors ruled that CleanFlicks' editing violates U.S. copyright laws. The judge ordered CleanFlicks to "stop producing, manufacturing, and creating" and renting edited movies, and to hand all inventory to movie studios within five days of the ruling.

"It is with great regret that we write to inform you that CleanFlicks is going out of business soon. As you may have heard or read, after three long years of legal struggles, a judge in Colorado has ruled that we cannot sell or rent edited DVDs anymore. While we thought very strongly about appealing the decision, the potential costs and risks to the company, its customers and shareholders was just too great. Accordingly, we have agreed to close our doors after a brief winding-up period.
...We want to offer our sincerest apologies for not being able to provide you with edited DVDs...We appreciate your support of our efforts to provide high-quality, family-friendly movies, and we will try to make this difficult process of closing our operations as painless as we can for all our loyal customers."
In the background, the words fade, except the word “painless” which turns to blood. In the background we hear screams and cries, and we eventually see a Cleanflicks store that looks as if it’s been burned out and destroyed. Finally, we see the words 28 Days After. The video ends and Matt stumbles on stage, wearing pajamas as if he’s just woken up.

Matt: Yawn. Oh, my! I feel like I’ve been sleeping forever!

Matt walks to Center Stage.

Matt: Why is it so dark in here? Trevor! Did you forget to pay the electric bill again?

Matt looks around.

Matt: Hello? Well, let’s see what we have in the fridge.

Matt mimes opening a fridge. Trevor makes a noise offstage.

Matt: Trevor?

Trevor shuffles onstage gnawing on a severed arm. His makeup is that of the LIVING DEAD!

Matt: Trevor? What are you eating?

Trevor: Grrrrr. Arrrghh. (Trevor spits out what he was eating on Matt)

Matt: Oh no, you did NOT just shoot that green *crap* at me!

Trevor: Fooooood.

Matt: What kind of monster are you!?

Trevor stops eating and looks at Matt. He tosses the arm offstage.

Trevor: Braaaiinnnsss!

Matt walks across the stage, Trevor shambles along behind him.

Suddenly Sarah appears from the other side of the stage, walking like a Zombie. And dressed like one too.

Sarah: Brains!

Matt: What is up with these Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies!?

Trevor: Brains!

Both start walking toward Matt. Matt cowers girlishly in fear. Suddenly, Paul and Taylor rush in, Taylor brandishing a severed arm. Paul is dressed is a weird fur/leather ensemble.

Paul: Hey freaks!

Taylor holds up the arm like a stick.

Taylor: Here boy, here boy!

Trevor takes the bait and gets excited about the arm. Taylor throws it offstage. All three Zombies look after it.

Brian appears from offstage, holding the arm.

Brian: Did someone just throw a severed arm at me?

Everyone just looks at Brian.

Brian: Seriously. That’s gross.

Suddenly, Trevor lunges for Brian.

Trevor: Brains!

Trevor’s momentum carries both him and Brian offstage. Sarah follows.

Paul: Hey you! Let’s go!

Paul grabs Matt’s arm and leads him offstage. Taylor follows. Once they are gone, Trevor returns to the stage with the arm in his mouth. When he sees no one there, he lowers his head, chagrined, and walks offstage. Paul, Taylor, and Matt come from the other side.

Matt: Thanks for saving me, but what was going on back there? My roommate was going crazy and he had some crazy friends, which is really crazy because Trevor doesn’t have any friends!

Taylor: What do you mean, “What was going on back there”? Where have you been for the last month?

Matt: Asleep, mostly.

Paul: What! How can you have been asleep for a month?

Matt: Well, I had mono…

Taylor: Ah.

Matt: Well,….uh…So can you explain to me what’s going on?

Taylor: Sure. Tell me, do you like movies?

Matt: I like Air Bud and The Legend Of Bagger Vance!

Taylor: I’ll take that as a yes.

Paul: Are you familiar with Cleanflicks?

Matt: Absolutely. Without them, I wouldn’t know what to think!

Taylor: Okay. Well, last July the U.S. Supreme Court made a ruling declaring Cleanflicks illegal. They were forced to close down on August 30. Exactly 28 days ago…

Matt: Sadness! But what does it all mean?

Paul: Don’t you see! Without Cleanflicks around to edit people’s movies anymore, people just started watching anything and everything. No one knew the danger, all of that violence and profanity, it filled people with rage, they started running around biting folks, and spreading the insanity. It’s a madhouse, I tell you, a madhouse!

Paul falls on his knees, crying.

Matt: How horrible! But without Cleanflicks around to tell you what you can and can’t tolerate, how did you both survive?

Taylor: Everyone turned into a zombie. We’ve had to take refuge in the Provo Public Library.

Paul: It used to be the original BYU, you know.

Taylor: We don’t have time for interesting historical facts. Let’s get moving!

Time passes. Somehow. As time passes, Brian reappears on stage, chased by Trevor and Sarah, he runs around as they chase him and he runs offstage.
Lisa, Ryan, and Jono appear from offstage. Jono is dressed like Bruce Willis in Die Hard.

Ryan: Hey guys. I’m glad you’re back. I didn’t expect you until Thursday.

Taylor: Tomorrow?

Ryan: No… the day AFTER Tomorrow. But it’s good that you’re here now. We’ve resorted to burning books to stay warm. We can’t stay here much longer.

Jono: Oh, I’m so glad you’re safe. He hugs Taylor.

Taylor: Knock it off, Willis! She shoves Jono away. Everyone, this is Matt. We found him when we were patrolling King Henry.

Jono: Hi Matt! He hugs Taylor. She shoves him away again. Where you from?

Matt: In West Philadelphia, born and raised, on a playground, where I spent most of my days.

Jono: Well, my name is Willis. I’ve been sent from the future to stop the zombies and kill Brad Pitt!

Everyone looks at each other, confused.

Jono: And then I was trapped in an office building at Christmastime!

Ryan: Okay, moving on… I’m Ryan, I work at the local S-Mart. I just found this book called the Necronomicon. It has a fascinating article about zombies. It says that zombies can be killed by removing the head or destroying the brain. What could that possibly mean?

Matt: How did you all survive?

Taylor: I’ve spent the last couple months catching up on DVD’s of 24 and Lost. I didn’t have time to watch any rated R movies.

Laurel: Rated R Movies! AAAAAAAAAAA! We’re all going to die!

Ryan: Settle down.

Lisa: Speaking with a Russian accent. I am from Russia. There, we have no movie ratings. In Russia, movie rates you! Since I don’t know what a rated R movie is, I can’t be affected by it.

Matt: You mean people in other countries don’t follow the Motion Picture Association of America! You don’t let them determine your righteousness?!

Lisa: Yes. Thank goodness for oatmeal!

Matt: All of my illusions are crashing down around me!

Laurel: I was just hanging out in a graveyard with my brother. We were doing genealogy. (ala 6th Sense) I research dead people.

Jono: How often do you research them?

Laurel: All the time

Paul: And as for me, as I’m sure you’re curious, my name is Dan. And since I’m probably the last Dan left in the world, you can call me the Omega Dan.

Matt: How did you get here?

Paul: I was an astronaut from the distant past! I crashed here only to find that in the future, you’d destroyed it all, you maniacs! You blew it up! Dang you, dang you all to fetchin’ heck!

Paul falls to his knees, crying.

Matt: to the others If he’s an astronaut, where are his astronaut clothes?

Paul gathers himself and gets to his feet.

Paul: When I got here, I went skinny dipping in Utah Lake. Someone stole my clothes. So I had to make do with this leather get-up you see here.

Laurel: Skinny Dipping! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! Laurel goes into hysterics. Jono slaps her. She slaps him back. Jono goes into hysterics.

Jono: AAAAAAAAA! Jono runs away.

Matt: Okaaaay. So what do we do now?

Taylor: Now, we survive. The world is overrun by flesh-eating monsters. There’s not much we can do. They’ve seen too many rated R movies. They’re not even human anymore, just like UVSC students. For now, let’s rest. Laurel, you, Willis, and the Omega Dan here take the first watch.

Time passes, Jono, Laurel, and Paul leave the stage. Everyone else sits down.

Ryan: This necronomicon says that we can destroy all the zombies, but I can’t make out what the book says. Klatu, Verata, Hall Ess Torm? I just don’t get it!

Just then, Jono, Laurel and Paul run in.

Laurel: Everyone! They’ve found us. I don’t know how, but they’ve found us! Run for it! AAAAAAAAAAAA!

The Two Zombies start walking across the stage. Everyone gets up and panics.

Ryan: Oh my gosh…(Trevor bites his hand off)

Matt: (punches Trevor, like Independence Day) Welcome to Provo!

Jono: I can do this. I can handle it. Let me handle it.

Matt: What?

Jono: No Matt! Don’t volunteer. I know you’re younger than me, but you have your whole life ahead of you! He turns to Taylor. I don’t want to close my eyes, I don’t want to fall asleep, ‘cause I’d miss you babe, and I don’t want to miss a thing.

Taylor: Willis, what are you doing? Let’s just run away. Can’t you see how slow and dimwitted they are?

By this time, the two Zombies are following each other around in a circle.

Jono: No! I can do this! Because I don’t want to miss a thing!

Taylor: Okaaaay…

Jono hurls himself at the bomb as everyone else runs away. Suddenly, the room goes dark, and on the screen, we see: EDITED FOR CONTENT. When the lights come back on, Jono and the Zombies are gone. Everyone else wanders onto the stage.

Matt: Wow! What an amazing getaway! That car chase was the best thing ever!

Lisa: In Russia, cars chase you!

Ryan: Too bad it was so gory, Laurel died, and I replaced my hand with a mixer. (holds up where his hand used to be, there is a mixer in its place)

Matt: So how did it get like this? Most people in the world don’t care about movie ratings.

Ryan: Once people got infected with all of the violence and profanity from unedited movies, they just went bezerk. At first it was just here in Utah County, but once one of the infected people bites you, you become just like them. Soon Utah was gone, and then the rest of the world.

Taylor: We do have a very aggressive Missionary program. rimshot

Matt: Is there anything we can do to cure them, to make all of this aggression go away?

Lisa: In Russia, aggression makes you go away!

Ryan: Lisa’s right, we can’t stay around here, there’s got to be somewhere where the scourge of unedited movies can’t be found.

Taylor: It’s too bad we can’t make our own movies. I’m, sure they’d be pure, wholesome and lacking in artistic qualities. Like “Church Ball” and “Charly”.

Ryan: I know! This word I’ve been trying to discipher! Halestorm! Halestorm studios. The zombies have something to do with that.

Taylor: Sounds like a plan, but Halestorm studios are way across town and we’re in enemy territory.

Matt: Dan, you’re an astronaut, right?

Paul: Yes, from the distant past!

Matt: Well, do you have any technology that could help?

Paul: Well, I was thinking that we could hole up in a shopping mall. Think of it, all the Cinnabon you could eat!

Ryan: No, don’t you have any astronaut powers or anything?

Paul: Okay, fine. I’m not an astronaut. I just came back from a Charleton Heston Festival. HestFest ’06. So much better than HestFest ’05. Seriously.

Matt: How does that help us?

Paul: I have these original Ten Commandment props. Holds up cardboard cutouts made to look like the ten commandments. And this can of soylent green. Now with 30% more people!

Taylor: That doesn’t help us at all. Let’s keep moving.

Matt, Taylor, Paul, Lisa, and Ryan run around the stage

Paul: Careful around the HFAC you guys, this place is crawling with the most vile, disgusting, horrendous creatures imaginable.

Matt: Cursed zombies?

Paul: Worse.

Ryan: Hey, you guys look, Vocal Point is putting on a concert.

Paul: No! The horror!

Lisa: In Russia, Point vocals you.

Taylor: Their songs of mindless optimism might cheer us up. Let’s listen.

Vocal Point comes on stage, it is Trevor, Jono, Sarah, Laurel

Trevor: (does crappy vocal percussion) Beat, box, beat, box, cymbal crash, etc.
Jono/Laurel: (does “In the Jungle”) A-wheem-a-wop, a wheem-a-wop
Sarah: (singing) In the Jungle, In the Jungle, the Lion Sleeps Tonight…

Matt: Man, Vocal Point isn’t good this year. I’ve heard tunnel singers better than this. Another rimshot

Taylor: Something’s wrong! This can’t be Vocal Point, there’s women in it!

The zombies suddenly throw off their robes and stand revealed as zombies.

Ryan: Zombies!

The zombies attack. Lisa is bitten by Trevor and dragged off the stage. Ryan is fighting with Jono, who he manages to fend off with his mixer/hand. Paul is tackled by Sarah. Matt and Taylor are poking Laurel with sticks.

Paul: Get your festering hands off me, you darn dirty zombie!

Paul throws Sarah off him and runs offstage. He appears seconds later with a gun, which he uses to kill Sarah. Seeing this, all the zombies scatter.

Taylor: Thanks, Omega Dan.

Paul: Thank the NRA!

Matt: Now that’s what I call a close encounter.

Taylor: And Lisa’s dead.

Paul: Meh.

Our intrepid survivors walk across the stage. Time passes, somehow. They find themselves at some ruins.

Matt: Where are we?

Taylor: This is, or was, the Halestorm Studios.

Paul: But how could it have been so damaged in such a short amount of time?

Matt: I think I have a clue. Look at these posters of the movies they were working on.

Matt steps forward, behind him we see a projection a ruined wall with movie posters behind him. Gladys Knight Rider, Quorum Leap, Saints on a Plane, Peyton Buhler’s Day Off, The Fast and the Furious: Provo Drift.

Ryan: How horrible! Gladys Knight Rider?

Matt: Quorum Leap?

Taylor: Saints on a Plane?

Paul: Peyton Buhler’s Day Off?

Matt: This one actually looks cool, The Fast and the Furious, Provo Drift.

Ryan: Are you insane? I bet you also listen to boy bands.

Matt: So?

Paul: What were they thinking?

Taylor: Guys, I think that this place was destroyed BEFORE the zombies started attacking.

Matt: But that would mean…

Paul: Don’t say it.

Ryan: That it was Mormon Cinema, and not Cleanflicks that was responsible for the zombies. People were so upset about the poor quality of movies that they had been producing that they became rage filled zombies.

Paul: You maniacs! You blew it up! Dang you, Mormon Cinema, dang you all to fetchin’ heck!

Matt: But if the zombie infection started here, that would mean…

Taylor: They’re here…

The zombies walk in. The music from Thriller starts playing and the zombies begin to dance.

Paul: Is there no one to deliver us? Let my people go!

Brian: Sorry I’m late. I came as soon as I felt like it.

Taylor: Who are you?

Brian: I’m the president of the USA! The BYUSA!

Ryan: What are you doing here? You planning to organize a dance or something?

Brian: We don’t tolerate sarcastic voices like that at BYU! Kill him!

Zombies kill Ryan

Brian: To me, zombie minions!

Paul: He controls the zombies!

Matt: Gasp!

Brian: The zombies needed a strong leader. They elected me. Now give me that gun!

Paul: You’ll take my gun when you pry it from my cold, dead hands!

Brian: My pleasure. (uses can of Whoop-A and kills people)

Paul: Western Family can of Whoop-A is made of people. It’s people! (dies)

Brian: (to Matt and Taylor) You can’t possibly win. Look at my motivational skills! In less than an hour, zombies from here will join others from around the world, and they will be launching the largest undead attack in the history of mankind. Mankind. That word should have new meaning for all of us today. Because of all the zombies. We will be united in our common undead interests. We will not go quietly into the night! We will not vanish…without a fight! We're going to live on as undead! We're going to survive! Today we celebrate our Zombie Independence Day!

Matt: Oh, you have SO got to die!

Taylor: Is there no hope? Why must we be consigned to this state of endless woe?

Matt: (EFY song, but he doesn’t sing) Like stones in the river, we are tossed and turned, bruised until the edges are gone. (some of the zombies start dying)

Brian: (covering his ears) What are those horrible lyrics?

Taylor: Matt, that’s it! Horrible EFY songs kill zombies, why didn’t I think of that before?

Matt: Because it was already used in the ending to Mars Attacks. (singing) Remember the promise, remember who it’s from…

Trevor: Ah, my ears, my undead ears!

Sarah: Groaaaaannnn!

Laurel: Make them stop!

Brian: Doesn’t anybody have any missiles left?

Taylor: Sing, keep singing!

Matt: (sings like Little Mermaid)

The zombies all die. Matt and Taylor are left standing in a pile of corpses.

Taylor: Well, Matt, it looks like it’s just you and me in this brave, new world.

Matt: Taylor, there’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you.

Taylor: Oh, what’s that?

Matt: I’m not like other guys…(puts on one glove and sunglasses)

The music from Thriller starts playing again.

GOOSH!

End.

Props:

Matt: Pajamas

Taylor: Normal clothes

Paul: A fur/leather outfit reminiscent of the original Planet of the Apes. He also needs a toy shotgun, some fake ten commandments, and a can of Soylent Green.

Ryan: A fake hand, a Necronomicon (This is a book made from human skin with a scary face on it. Find a picture from Army of Darkness to see what it looks like.) I also need a small, battery powered mixer or something to that effect that I can use to replace my lost hand.

Jono: He is dressed like Bruce Willis in Die Hard. This means a “wifebeater” and bare feet.

Lisa: A fur Russian hat would be nice. Otherwise, normal clothes.

Laurel: Normal clothes.

Trevor: Zombie Makeup

Sarah: Zombie Makeup

Brian: A Suit

Other: Jono, Lisa and Laurel become zombies halfway through, so we’ll need some quick zombie makeup for them. We also need as many fake arms as we have, and a fake leg. (I’ve seen those somewhere). Matt has the Can of Whoop-A.