Two recent releases on DocPlay turn the spotlight on some of the ways in which the Hollywood movie business has been transformed. Kristy Guevara-Flanagan’s Body Parts (2022) and Ursula Macfarlane’s Untouchable (2019) examine the changing of the guard from different vantage points. One looks at how films are being made nowadays; the other scrutinises the shocking behind-the-scenes practices of a modern-day mogul.
At one time, courtesy of the Hollywood Production Code and the people it was trying to placate, what happened on screen was very different. Kissing couples were required to keep both feet firmly planted on the floor; married couples were sentenced to separate beds. Rather than happening between the sheets, sex was something that could only be hinted at.
There might have been a bit of nudity here and there up until the early 1930s. But, after that – and until the phasing out of the Code a generation later – it was up to screenwriters and savvy directors to find a way of indicating there was a lot more than flirtatious conversation and three-second kissing going on between the romantic leads (and miscellaneous others). Discreet fades to black or shots of closed bedroom doors were signposts for sex.
Another Hollywood code at work, albeit unofficially. Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman : her body-double Shelley Michelle describes the process. Seen through a particular filter, one could, for example, see the classic Hollywood musicals as being all about sex.
The songs .