The Sex Gourmet – Don’t Look Now (1973)

#1 Julie Christie & Donald Sutherland

There is nothing more satisfying and enjoyable than seeing sex translate well on screen. After watching many actors lock crotches and dance the dance, finding that one scene that stands out above the others is actually quite a hard task! How many times have we seen the classic throw down and mechanical navel fucking that happens so often in modern cinema?

Sex is our reason for living. We are entitled as humans to watch and enjoy the most base driving force of our reptilian brains. So seeing sex realistically portrayed in a film tickles my pink and gives reason for breathing.

The sex scene I would like to talk about today is the delicious tryst between Laura and John Baxter played by Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland in Nick Roegs 1973 classic ‘Don’t Look Now’. Our 4.5 minutes of heaven opens up with our married couple laying about, half-clothed on a messy Venetian hotel bed. John, naked, sitting upright while Laura is beautiful and languid, laying perpendicular to her husband. While they chit-chat in that private and knowing way couples do, John casts a very appreciative glance up and down Lauras body and goddamn if its not the sexiest thing I have ever seen. Pure ownership here, John loves and wants his woman.

Moving alongside her to read the magazine in front of her he clasps her hand and moves his fingers lightly over her skin. Laura in a slow and tantalizing motion trails her fingers down the side of his long body (oh how I love a tall skinny man!) ever so slightly teasing him, merely inches away from his cock. From then, our sexual encounter begins.

Johns head nuzzling her stomach, pushing away her flimsy blouse that all of a sudden is too much in the way. What adds a further dimension to this sex-scene is at this point we cut away from their lovemaking and Roeg cleverly shows us both Laura and John putting their clothes on. Laura’s smooth tanned legs as she slips on her black panties, John putting on a tie, and we realise that we are viewing their memory of the sex that has just finished.

We cut back again to the bedroom dance, John pulling Laura onto his lap with fervour and a glorious moment of what could be actual penetration. It is hard to believe that both Donald and Julie did not have sex in this scene, and it is still a talking point about whether they did or not! The movement of Laura as she straddles her husband, her boyish and athletic figure grinding on John while they kiss feverishly. At one point his arm is very awkwardly around her neck and shoulders during heated movements, another element of realism to this. Who said sex was easy?

We cut away again and see Laura staring at herself in the bathroom mirror while John picks his suit jacket. As she buttons up her cardigan, the tip of her tongue protrudes very slightly as she watches herself quite obviously reveling in the memory of her husbands tongue exploring between her legs.

We are back now to sweat soaked bed-sheets, our lean and sinewy John moving between his wife’s thighs, back muscles contracting and relaxing in wonderful masculine movements. We see them both, wet mouths half open with nearly pained expressions as they both finally arrive crashing into each other breathless and exhausted. Lauras arm over her forehead while John sidles close in that lovely post-coital rest. Cutting back again to Laura in the bathroom, fully dressed, and smelling the sheets where their effort and essence still lies, she then drops them in the washbasket.

This is a beautiful 4.5 minutes. It is an honest sex scene with a couple who have been through so much trauma that the film reveals right at the start, and how they quite literally fuck the pain away for a brief window.

9/10 : convincing grief fuck.

by Claire Fagan