Welcome to The English Mansion’s Top Ten Commercial BDSM Films
The Fifty Shades of Grey phenomenon will yet again shine a massive spotlight onto the world of BDSM when the film is released in February 2015. Actually, fetishism, BDSM and general perviness abounds in a huge number of ‘Hollywood’ type films but very few focus entirely around them. I’ve endevoured to compile a list of the top ten best ones.
So, to get into this list the movie had to: centre around BDSM or very pervy themes (not just have one incredible scene); to be (fairly) well-known; and to prove it was mainstream to have at least one A-lister starring in it. So here is my list of the Top Ten Mainstream BDSM (ish) Movies.
1. Personal Services 1987 The British really do it best! An account of Cynthia Pain’s life as a madam in a suburban pervy brothel. Plus Julie Waters in a PVC catsuit.
2. Secretary 2003 with James Spader & Maggie Gyllenhaal. “Assume the position…” This film explored the relationship between a sexually dominant boss and his submissive secretary. Interestingly, Spader’s character was called ‘Mr Grey’.
3. 9 & 1/2 Weeks 1985 with Micky Rourke & Kim Basinger. Before 50 Shades of Grey there was 9 1/2 weeks.
4. Bitter Moon 1992 Directed by Roman Polanski with Hugh Grant & Kristin Scott Thomas. Eroticism, madness and sexual obsession. Where does the sexual relationship that has tried everything go…
5. Kinky Boots 2005 with Chiwetel Ejiofor & Joel Edgerton. Loved the Tranny dance scenes. Loosely based on a true story, a struggling British shoe factory develops a plan to produce custom footwear for TVs, CDs & drag queens.
6. Eyes Wide Shut 1999 Dir. Stanley Kubrick with Tom Cruise & Nicole Kidman. Cruise’s character stumbles into a secret society’s masked orgy.
7. Misery 1990 with Kathy Bates. An obsessive fan keeps a writer prisoner – no one will ever forget the hobbling, he can’t run away now – she was scary, really scary! (OK this is not strictly BDSM and yet its underlying femdom theme is unquestionable.)
8. The Rocky Horror Show 1975 with Tim Curry & Susan Sarandon. “I’m just a Sweet Transvestite from Transsexual, Transylvania.” Sexual deviance in all its glory.
9. Basic Instinct 1992 with Sharon Stone & Michael Douglas. More of a sexual thriller – bondage+sex=ice pick murder but the character of Catherine Trammel is etched into our psyches.
10. Quills 2000 Set in 1794, a fictional tale of the Marquis de Sade and his desire to have his stories published whilst imprisoned in a mental asylum. A fascinating exploration of hypocrisy & sexuality with Jeffrey Rush, Kate Winslet & Michael Caine
And if there was going to be runner-up it would be:
The Handmaid’s Tale 1990 with Natasha Richardson & Faye Dunaway. Sexual slavery and foot canings just to begin with!
I didn’t forget Exit to Eden 1994 it’s such a terrible movie it didn’t deserve to be on the list; or Preaching to the Perverted 1997 but it didn’t have an A-Lister, so didn’t make it. And Boxing Helena 1993 was excluded for both the above reasons.
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What about the Japanese film “The Audition”?
I was only going for mainstream films – no A-lister and not that well-known. I think I’ll perhaps do a ‘art’ top ten it would probably make it in. Another film with a memorable ‘foot’ scene 🙂
I did a blog post a long-time back on movies with some Female Domination content, a lot of them just have a few short, rather aesthetic scenes. One that was a really fun one was a small Canadian film called, “My Normal.” It had a few good scenes, especially one about half way in that features some foot worship, financial domination, and public humiliation. I usually try not to appear to spam anyone for links but you can find some more here : http://wp.me/p3H3YJ-B . It’s a popular article. Besides, once there you can also checkout a few English Mansion articles as well. Just forgive me for the poor formatting, it got all out of alignment when imported from blogger to wordpress.
It’s mainly a romcom, but Something Wild (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0091983/) has many moments of cheeky femdom that avoid any cliché. It’s sweet and tantalising, with a couple of A-listers (at the time) in Jeff Daniels and Melanie Griffith and some lovely 80s themes.
What a wonderful list of movies, Mistress Sidonia. Your article got me thinking.
With the list having to include at least one Hollywood A-List star, several of my initial ideas fell by the way-side (e.g. Too Hot to Handle – 1977; Irma Vep – 1996; and Die Heilige Hure – a 1998, German TV movie. Irma Vep is mainly about a latex clad actress….but has some bdsm undertones.
But one that has always been very powerful, is Batman Returns (1992). Michelle Pfeiffer as Catwoman, was an inspired choice (by Tim Burton). Indeed, somewhere in youtube there is an out-take of Michelle Pfeiffer using the whip (to cut off the heads of dummies in a store). She is exceptionally skilled (after lots of on-set training) in using the whip. VERY impressive.