The Decline of Sex Scenes in Popular Movies: A Shift in Audience Preferences Revealed

Popular movies show less and less sex. This is evident from research with the film data group Stephen continues in collaboration with the British magazine The Economist. For example, in 2023 there was almost 40 percent less sex than in 2000.

The research examined the 250 highest grossing international films each year. The biggest decline is in action films and thrillers, and the least in romantic films.

Film journalist Hedwig van Driel knows what’s at stake here. “The film industry is growing as a global market. But sex scenes are reducing your market. In America you can’t quickly reach an audience under the age of thirteen, sometimes even under the age of eight ten.”

She finds it amazing that men in Marvel movies increasingly need to have a perfect body – they are often on screen without a T-shirt. “Everyone in the movies is busy with having the perfect body, but then they don’t do much with it.”

But Van Driel believes that change is happening. “We were of course in a more conservative era, but the success of the film was so well received Poor things shows a change.” That film, starring Emma Stone, won four Oscars and has many explicit sex scenes. Van Driel: “I think: sex is back.”

But it seems generation Z is too to be less interested in explicit sex scenes. That is also obvious research from the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA). He says that young people want to see less sex and more stories that are similar to their own lives; a life with more platonic relationships and less focus on romance.

Stephen Follows’ research focused on the biggest international films, but there has always been a lot of genre in Dutch films. Film journalist Van Driel: “I don’t think that’s changed that much in the last twenty years, but there’s still a lot of old-fashioned sex in movies.”