The Top 20 Gratuitous Nude Scenes Of The 1980s

The Top 20 Gratuitous Nude Scenes Of The 1980s

I don't agree that all of these were gratuitous. In at least two cases they were essential to establish a point or a specific POV, or to maximize the dramatic impact of a revelation: Sixteen Candles and Just One of the Guys. If you contend that the nudity is not integral to Just One of the Guys, you'd have to apply the same logic to Crying Game, and it makes no sense in either case, because film is a visual medium, which means that showing something is almost always the most effective and dramatic means to communicate. Sure, she could have showed up at his doorstep in women's clothes, but that would have been inferior storytelling and would have been totally lacking in drama and suspense. Her unexpected flash was a great cinematic moment in an otherwise forgettable film.

In some of the exploitation films mentioned, I'm not sure that you can argue that the nudity was gratuitous, since nudity itself was pretty much the point of the movie or at least an important part of the film's "guilty pleasures."

A perfect example of genuinely gratuitous nudity would be that scene between Nadine Velazquez and Denzel Washington at the beginning of Flight, since it is completely irrelevant to the film's point or central plot, and does nothing to establish character. Mind you, I'm not arguing that the scene should not have been there, or that the scene should have been done with suggestion rather than explicit nudity. I think gratuitous nudity is a good thing, or at least it can be a good thing, because I go to movies to be entertained and to see things I enjoy. Nadine's naked body certainly fit the bill.