SBS On Demand: Movies for your long, hot summer nights

Forget the rising temperatures, these movies at SBS On Demand are guaranteed to raise a sweat.

The Ring Finger

'The Ring Finger' Source: SBS Movies

FEU: Crazy Horse Paris

M
France, 2012
Genre: Documentary, Sexuality
Language: French
Director: Bruno Hullin
Starring: Lumina Classica, Nooka Karamel, Baby Light
What's it about?
Bring on the dancing girls. Doco maker Bruno Hullin captures the dancers at one of Paris’ most iconic cabaret clubs, Crazy Horse, in a dazzling performance masterminded by none other than celebrated shoe designer Christian Louboutin. So there’s something for all the foot fetishists out there, and quite a bit more on show besides.
 

Room in Rome

MA15+
Spain, 1991
Genre: Romance, Sexuality
Language: Spanish, Italian, Russian
Director: Julio Medem
Starring: Elena Anaya, Natasha Yarovenko
What's it about?
The Skin I Live In star Elena Anaya plays Alba, a Spanish woman who falls head over heels for Natasha Yarovenko’s Russian Natacha on her last night on holiday in Rome. Holing up in her hotel room, they reveal intimate secrets about each other’s lives, but who is telling the truth? A steamily erotic comedy drama from writer/director Julio Medem, re-teaming with Anaya after Sex and Lucia, it’s a one-night stand to remember.
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Cold Showers

MA15+
France, 2005
Genre: Drama, Sexuality
Language: French
Director: Antony Cordier
Starring: Johan Libéreau, Pierre Perrier,Salomé Stévenin
What's it about?
Putting aside the fact the French name makes the film sound less appealing, writer-director Antony Cordier’s debut feature romps around the tumultuous nature of burgeoning teenage sexuality. Working class Mickael (Johan Libéreau) already has to put up with new rich boy Clément (Pierre Perrier) taking his place on the Judo team, but when he introduces him to girlfriend Vanessa (Salomé Stévenin) in the bedroom, this threesome gets complicated.
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Wild Reeds

M
France, 1994
Genre: Drama, Sexuality
Language: French
Director: André Téchiné
Starring: Élodie Bouchez, Stéphane Rideau, Gaël Morel, Michèle Moretti,
What's it about?
Speaking of frisky French teens exploring sexual identity, André Téchiné’s Wild Reeds is one of the best. Set during the Algerian War, the hormones unleashed here are just as explosive. Holed up in boarding school, closeted François (Gaël Morel) has the hots for and starts fooling around with farm boy Serge (Stéphane Rideau), who’s happy to get his rocks off but really wants Maïté (Élodie Bouchez).
Wild Reeds
Source: SBS Movies
 

Vampyros Lesbos

MA15+
Germany, 1971
Genre: Horror, Sexuality
Language: German
Director: Jesús Franco
Starring: Ewa Strömberg, Soledad Miranda
What's it about?
Vampire films usually call to mind lightning strikes in grim Transylvanian settings or rain-sleeked London streets. Not so in cult director Jesús Franco’s '70s psychedelic lesbian romp Vampyros Lesbos. Set on a mysterious Turkish island ruled over by the temptress Countess Nadine Oskudar, she lures naïve young lawyer Linda Westinghouse (Ewa Strömberg) to her pleasure palace via saucy dreams. It’s as daft and undressed as it sounds.
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Turn Me On, Dammit!

MA15+
Norway, 2011
Genre: Comedy, Sexuality
Language: Norwegian
Director: Jannicke Systad Jacobsen
Starring: Helene Bergsholm, Malin Bjørhovde, Henriette Steenstrup
What's it about?
Female sexuality is front and centre in writer-director Jannicke Systad Jacobsen’s debut feature, a comedy of horny teen errors. Starring Helene Bergsholm as Alma, frustrated in a remote Norwegian mountain town, it goes off with a thwarted bang, opening on her mid-frenetic phone sex self-help, soon disturbed by mum. With the boy of her dreams out of reach and her friends freaked by her fantasies, taboos gets stripped in this warm and fuzzy frolic.
Turn Me On, Goddammit!
Source: SBS Movies

Hugh Hefner: Playboy, Activist and Rebel

MA15+
Canada, 2009
Genre: Documentary feature, Sexual
Language: English
Director: Brigitte Berman
Starring: Hugh Hefner
What's it about?
Hugh Hefner, flamboyant king of the Playboy empire, needs no introduction, but Canadian director Brigitte Berman gives it a red hot go in this fun doco. Star-studded talking heads include James Caan, Joan Baez, Tony Curtis and Jesse Jackson, with the millionaire’s hijinks given equal weight with his battles against government moral crusading and censorship. While it could probe deeper, alternative takes from detractors including Pat Boone and Susan Brownmiller are welcome.

The Ring Finger

Rating MA15+
France, 2005
Genre: Drama, Sexuality
Language: French
Director: Diana Bertrand
Starring: Olga Kurylenko, Marc Barbé
What's it about?
In the weirdest failing of occupational health and safety laws, a cut finger at the bottling factory where she works sees 21-year-old Iris (Bond girl Olga Kurylenko) wandering the streets dazed. Stumbling across a bizarre laboratory of painful memories run by an unnamed doctor (Marc Barbé), it’s not long before a shared shoe fetish has them at it on the floor, inextricably bound together in this trippy tango.
The Ring Finger
Source: SBS Movies

Restless

MA15+
Finland, 2000
Genre: Drama, Sexuality, Romance
Language: Finnish
Director: Aku Louhimies
Starring: Mikko Nousiainen, Laura Malmivaara
What's it about?
Ari (Mikko Nousiainen) treats the Finnish city of Turku as one big sexual playground, priding himself on never sleeping with the same woman twice. That all changes when he gets the hots for Tina (Laura Malmivaara). Determined to become a one-woman man after all, it’s all going swimmingly until the dirty dog meets her circle of girlfriends and can’t help hopping into bed with each of them.


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5 min read
Published 22 December 2016 10:53am
Updated 22 December 2016 11:27am
By Stephen A. Russell

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