CAUTION: NSFW
Denizens of CineDump, today we bring you the gift of love.
That’s right, friends, your favorite horror writing duo is going to help you relive all those times Thanatos and Eros stripped down and danced awkwardly for a minute or two. Welcome to the ten very best love (?) scenes in horror movie history. And don’t worry, we won’t tell your friends you read this. We promise.
10. Hellraiser: Inferno (2000)
Pennie Sublime: Yes, dear reader, it’s that kind of list, and we’re kicking it off with the best creatures to even come close to Clive Barker’s stunningly venereal vision of the netherworld. The Wire Twins look like something that would have crept, slinked and shimmied out of Barker’s original novella “The Hellbound Heart,” and more than any of the dismal sequels, these lovely ladies approach that uncomfortable mix of fear, pain, and arousal that made people captivated with the Cenobites to begin with. Sure, chains that eviscerate incestuous uncles are awesome, but the subdued, passionate, but freaky-as-hell fondling that happens in this clip is enough to give you two kinds of shivers--good luck just figuring out which kind stays with you longest. Bonus: Torso Chatterer shows up to perv on the unhappy threesome--I always knew he was the real freak in the bunch.
9. Fascination (1979)
Preston Fassel: The annals of Euro-horror are filled with guys who could’ve had a good thing going if they’d just been able to check their machismo at the door. Case in point, Jean-Marie Lemaire's douchey thief Mark might not have ended up on the dinner menu if only he’d been content to accept a role as Eva (Brigitte Lahaie) and Elizabeth’s (Franca Maï) love slave, rather than insist the women be in thrall to him. All parties involved get a taste of what could have been when Eva seduces Mark into ravaging her on the floor, with director Jean Rollin amping up the sexual tension by only allowing the audience to see her (very) pleased reactions. It’s more knee-buckling than anything he could’ve shown on camera—and enough to convince an equally enticed Elizabeth (creeping on the pair while she steals a revolver) not to ice him when she has the chance. Good job being a chauvinist jackass, Mark. You blew it—and not in the good way.
8. Mulholland Drive (2001)
PS: There’s not much to say about this scene that wouldn’t come out all breathy and strained. If you don’t feel something, you probably don’t have a pulse. No worries--Daughters of Darkness is coming up. See? There’s something for everyone.
7. Capture Kill Release (2016)
PF: There’s something incredibly wrong with Jennifer (Jennifer Fraser), but somehow that just makes things more exciting. Just look at the expression on her face when she decides she wants some. I mean, just look at it. She can do more with one suggestive comment and a saucy glance than whole bevvies of skinny dipping camp counselors. Yeah; here’s a woman who knows what she wants—and isn’t that the hottest thing of all? Sure, she’s really, really intent on killing someone, but if she could just parley all of that homicidal rage into rough, impromptu bathtub sex, maybe things would be okay.
6. Dead Ringers (1988)
PS: Jeremy Irons, if you’re reading this, you can tie me up with surgical gear and degrade me anytime you want. Any. Time. You. Want. You think I’m joking? I sat through Adrian Lyne’s Lolita for you, you bastard. Oh, and bring your brother-- the one from this movie. He’s cute, too.
5. Orphan (2009)
PF: In a rebuttal (heh) to the popular trope that married sex is boring sex, a fit-as-hell Vera Farmiga and her mopey hubby (Peter Sarsgaard) use a butcher block for all the wrong reasons. Might’ve rated higher if that creepy, killer dwarf hadn’t shown up mid-orgasm and ruined things for everyone. I’m glad she’s dead.
4. Daughters of Darkness (1971)
PS: Call me an old softie, but necrophiliac, cuckolding, vampiric sex just isn’t fun if you don’t feel something. Oh, when these two weirdos (Andrea Rau and John Karlen) join hands as the camera drags slowly down the whitest bodies this side of a pair of bog people, well, let’s just say I get weak in the crotch. Few of us make love like these two make hate.
3. Friday the 13th: A New Beginning (1985)
PF: Sunshine, fresh air, a secluded clearing in the woods and a sassy, vivacious girl to enjoy it with. Who could ask for more? Why didn’t my parents send me to Summer camp? Wait—this one’s set in a mental institution? Well, I probably could’ve done with one of those, too. Especially if I got to be bunk mates with a girl like Tina (Debi Sue Voorhees). She’s probably the most sexually-assured woman in any 80s slasher, and the good-girl-gone-bad routine is enough to weaken your knees even before she gets down to business. And once she does? You get the impression that she’s the kinda girl who’d show you a hell of a night but might make you breakfast the next morning and give you a call in the afternoon. Too bad she gets wasted by a crazy paramedic in the next scene.
2. Alléluia (2014)
PS: Okay, I am legitimately going to lose my Person Card for admitting that I got off to a scene based on some real life terrifying serial killers, but let’s be honest, you’re no better. You keep Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer on your coffee table. And you use way too much cologne. For real, that stuff gives rats cancer.
The real Lonely Hearts Killers are the reason we have the death penalty, but my future baby daddy Fabrice Du Welz knows how to make you momentarily forget all that and trick your mind into feeling the same helpless eroticism that drives his despicable heroine. Before the scene itself, we wander with Gloria (Lola Dueñas) into an oppressively lit restaurant where the only soundscape is Lucas Laurent’s gravely voice, teasing and massaging and caressing your cerebrum. Then, a quick cut to an unlit stairwell walk where Laurent keeps up the constant sex patter (bonus for foot fetishists--it’s all shoe talk) before starting to maul the visibly aroused Gloria. From there, the scene travels to her apartment floor and by that point, you’re seduced right along with her.
It’s a great introduction to two people who are supposed to be sexually obsessed with each other. But it’s only good for one time--so light some candles, drink a little whiskey (the good stuff. C’mon, you deserve it) and settle in. After you see the rest of the movie and what these two sickos do to other people, it’s hard to capture that same special feeling the next time around. C’est le vie, am I right?
1. Kiss of the Damned (2012)
PF: So, this is technically two scenes. I don’t care. This is half my article and I co-edit the site. I can do what I damn well please.
It takes a hell of a lot of talent to make a consistently sexy movie; it takes even more talent to wrap up enough pure, unbridled eroticism for an entire Anais Nin novel in two, brief sequences, and Xan Cassavetes does that with orgasms to spare. Over the course of the dipshit Paolo’s dual romance with a pair of vampire sisters—sultry yet vulnerable Djuna and raunchy-but-crazy Mimi—she hits every note. His initial romp with Djuna goes from BDSM kinkiness to tender lovemaking, while the no-pun-intended steamy shower liaison with Mimi is sheer lusty, forbidden abandon. Paolo’s in charge of things when he and Djuna get down to it, while Mimi almost literally takes the reins when she and the walking lump cross paths. (Seriously, the guy in this movie makes no impression. If he can have crazy vampire sex with two beautiful, sophisticated women, it really gives hope to all the charismatic yet schulbby guys in the audience). When all is said and done, everyone’s had a good time—what more could you ask for?