Has Nicole Kidman revived our appetite for risky on-screen sex?

The buzz around Nicole Kidman’s sex-drenched drama Babygirl – in which she plays a CEO whose life unravels after she has an affair with a young intern – has everyone asking: is the erotic thriller finally back? It’s the question you hear whenever high-profile actors sign up for something both steamy and dread-inducing: Florence Pugh in Don’t Worry Darling, Sydney Sweeney in The Voyeurs, Ben Affleck in Deep Water.

Yet none of these lusty efforts have rekindled a genre forever associated with one decade. The erotic thriller was bedded and beheaded in the 1990s.

For the uninitiated, the classic erotic thriller follows a standard template: a man (often played by Michael Douglas) gets involved with a sexually voracious workmate/intern/nanny/suspect who quickly reveals a more unhinged and eventually murderous streak. It’s the formula behind hits (Fatal Attraction, Body Heat) and misses (Body of Evidence, Color of Night).

Like nun-based comedies or films starring Pauly Shore, erotic thrillers were box-office catnip one minute and a punchline the next. Basic Instinct (1992) earned $US352 million worldwide. Three years later a string of high-profile flops had critics declaring the genre dead.

Michael Douglas and Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct (1992).

There have been attempts to jumpstart it. You won’t have heard of them. Who remembers Obsessed, the 2009 Fatal Attraction clone starring Beyonce and Idris Elba? Or Femme Fatale (2002) with Antonio Banderas and Rebecca Romijn? What about Rachel McAdams and Noomi Rapace in Passion (2012)?

Why did our appetite for sexy murder dry up at the turn of the millennium? The glib answer is that Michael Douglas got married. The real reasons are more nebulous: the proliferation of internet porn, a surge of Christian conservatism in the US, the tsunami of straight-to-video slop that brought disrepute to the whole genre.

A look at the period in which they flourished suggests more. The early ’90s were weirdly horny. This was the era of Madonna’s Sex book and Enigma’s sexy Gregorian chant-songs. Even Prince Charles was getting jiggy, as evidenced by leaked sex banter between the man who would be king and his then-lover, Camilla Parker Bowles.

For all the talk about sex, baby, this was also a time when some men felt hot and bothered for other reasons. As writer Beatrice Loayza puts it, by the late 1980s, “the good old days of horny-bastard-style seduction (ie. harassment) seemed to be under attack”. Stiletto-clad screen killers were particularly well-suited to “an era characterised by a sharp increase in wounded male egos”.

It’s hard not to see how misogynistic so many of the classics are. Fatal Attraction saw an ambitious, powerful woman (Glenn Close) grow increasingly obsessive over a colleague (Douglas). The film’s original ending was sympathetic to her loneliness, but test audiences demanded she be punished, and a new, more violent climax was filmed. Journalist Susan Faludi described audiences at early screenings: some men screamed “kill the bitch!” and “punch the bitch’s face in”, while women sat in uncomfortable silence.

Fatal Attraction didn’t invent this particular spin on male paranoia, but its $US320 million box-office haul spawned countless imitators that cleaved to its psychosexual hang-ups. This was a moment when culture was awash with hand-wringing over women in the workforce, the death of the nuclear family and masculinity in crisis. Fear of women wasn’t subtext: 1994’s Disclosure sees Douglas rejecting sexual advances by his boss (Demi Moore), who then publicly accuses him of sexual assault. Unsurprisingly, the film ends with him back at the top of the tree.

There were exceptions to these dynamics. Single White Female (1992) and The Hand that Rocks the Cradle (1992) involved one woman terrorising another. In Sleeping with the Enemy (1991), a woman (Julia Roberts) hooking up with a violent man is less titillating and closer to a horror flick.

Then there are films that keep the tropes intact but leave us firmly on the side of the villain. Basic Instinct (1992) ostensibly follows a burnt-out cop on the tail of an omnisexual sociopath, but Sharon Stone’s wicked performance is so much more engaging than Douglas’ bulldoggy perma-pout that it’s impossible not to cheer her on. Spoiler alert: she wins!

Two years later, The Last Seduction gave us an even more ruthless figure in the form of Linda Fiorentino (Bridget Gregory), frequently named as one of cinema’s greatest femme fatales. Every scene seems designed to illustrate just what a moral vacuum this human is. But we don’t love her despite her sins. We love her for them.

For all the talk of their supposed demise, perhaps the erotic thriller never really left us. Look at TV: recent years have seen reboots of Fatal Attraction, Presumed Innocent and American Gigolo. In Europe’s arthouse cinemas, the stream of erotic thrillers never came close to drying up.

Even Babygirl’s Kidman is proof that the genre has always had legs – for all the icy roles she often plays, she’s also starred in a string of sexy thrillers, including Malice, Eyes Wide Shut and Dead Calm (the UK Telegraph this month anointed her “Hollywood’s most sexually daring star”).

If there is a widespread revival of the erotic thriller, it might be Kidman we can credit. When Amazon Studios boss Jennifer Salke was a week into her job, Kidman asked her “where are the movies like Basic Instinct and Cruel Intentions and No Way Out, those movies that you want to watch at home?” Salke took heed, and began commissioning what she calls “sexy date night” content.

The next year has plenty that fits the bill: this month’s Companion, the date-gone-wrong thriller Drop, James Wan’s Soulm8te. Basic Instinct’s director is back in the saddle too, developing the erotic thriller Young Sinner. And with nun comedies having another moment in the sun (Sister Act 3 is out this year), we’re only some sexy monks and Pauly Shore short of a full-blown ’90s flashback.

Babygirl opens on January 30.

Erotic thrillers it’s OK to love:

Bound

Jennifer Tilly and Gina Gershon in Bound.

Before The Matrix put them on the map, the Wachowskis (sisters Lana and Lilly) debuted this impressive crime caper. It’s often named the best erotic thriller of all time, and despite the tiny budget it oozes the style and original vision that would go on to become their trademark. The plot – a mob wife tries to screw over the mafia with the help of her lover – is knotty and rewarding; it has also been lauded for depicting a lesbian relationship that isn’t pandering to the male gaze.

In the Cut

In The Cut starred Meg Ryan in a role that upended her status as America’s sweetheart.

Jane Campion’s take on the genre is a sweaty, feverish affair that makes a bunch of bold choices – not least the against-type casting of Meg Ryan as a writing teacher with a turbocharged libido (the role was originally created for Nicole Kidman). The film is lurid, bloody and highly sexed, but it’s also home to tiny rewarding flourishes – a toddler playing on the floor of a strip club; a bridal party waiting for a subway train. It was also the trigger for a famously tense interview between Ryan and Michael Parkinson.

Blue Steel

Jamie Lee Curtis and Ron Silver in Blue Steel.

Jamie Lee Curtis plays a rookie cop who begins to suspect her new Wall Street broker boyfriend is a stone-cold sociopath. Kathryn Bigelow’s third feature is both a tight thriller and a vibes piece – there’s only a little explicit raunchiness but there’s no denying the sexual tension that infuses every frame. Underrated at the time, the film is now regularly taught in cinema courses.

Basic Instinct

Michael Douglas and Sharon Stone play a cop and killer in Basic Instinct.Credit: Getty

As he does in Starship Troopers and Robocop, director Paul Verhoeven serves up genre cliches only to undermine them. The sex and gore is turned up to 11, but what distinguishes the film is how meta it gets. Sharon Stone’s Catherine Tramell is an erotic thriller author whose latest book is based on the detective investigating her for the murder of her previous lover (whose death was predicted in her last book). Confusing? That’s just the first act.

Wild Things

Neve Campbell and Denise Richards in Wild Things. Credit:

For the first half of this sordid affair, it’s very much not OK to love this film, but don’t take anything at face value. It’s so committed to screwing with its audience that the end credits include five additional scenes upending what we’ve believed so far. Star Kevin Bacon described the script as “the trashiest thing” he had ever read but found its constant surprises irresistible.

The Handmaiden

Kim Tae-Ri in The Handmaiden.

The most visually ravishing film on this list also claims some of the best twists in the genre. Park Chan-wook’s 1930s period piece is a ravishing melodrama full of kink, betrayal and unforgettable set-pieces. His Cannes best director-winning follow-up, Decision to Leave, was a masterclass in sensuality without sex, but this one shows no such restraint.

The Last Seduction

Linda Fiorentino in The Last Seduction.

Linda Fiorentino rejected a supporting role in Basic Instinct because she wanted to play the lead. She got her chance here, as a self-described “total f---ing bitch” and clearly loving every moment. The film is a kind of sex-positive crime comedy – think Breaking Bad with more back-alley fumbling – and though the woman at its heart might not be a role model, we know who we’re rooting for.