The New Ornament of Hollywood: That's why the sex scenes disappear

"The end for eroticism" and "Death for sex in cinema": the texts that there has been a shift in the film and television world are many on American cultural sites right now. And as a cause, #metoo is often heard. But the question is whether this is sufficient explanation?

With the impact of pay-TV channels in the 2000s, the climax was reached by how much sex could be shown on television. The pay channels did not have to take into account anxious advertisers - on the other hand they had to attract audiences.

"The new era's TV series broke through a lot thanks to having so much naked and explicit sex - as in Game of Thrones and Westworld - that had provoked much of that product," says Fredrik Sahlin, a film critic at SVT.

But then metoo happened. The working conditions for female film workers in front of and behind the camera were noted. Stories of sheer abuse were interspersed with testimonies of gray zones where recordings of sex scenes were often mentioned as a borderland where much could go wrong. Discussions about what actors, with the body as tools, need to do and in what circumstances started. And with them came a fear of using "the male gaze" and making films only by and for men, believes Fredrik Sahlin.

- When it was time for the second season of Westworld, which came 2018, it was suddenly a very dressed up series.

But metoo is not the only factor behind the new, more ornate way of making film and television. Many speculate that, if not the availability of sex elsewhere, more specifically the Internet, will reduce the need for sex in popular culture.

Others refer to the many recent studies that show that the new generation of young people have less sex and are therefore less interested in eroticism.

- I think it's really about trends. There is a lot of talk on social media right now about being sex positive or sex negative and the latter has become the trend. You should not worry about your privacy and go into details, says TV producer Isabelle Wahlf.

Should you talk sex, you should have a reason, she thinks. It can be political or, for example, about health. But only six in themselves are done.

- We know that people have sex and how. We get it. We don't have to see it anymore.

Another important factor is the economy. The American cinema repertoire is increasingly occupied by huge movie productions, superhero movies and blockbusters demanding to withdraw billions. You simply cannot afford to lose a single potential bio visitor. And the more sex, the greater the risk of an age limit being set on the film.

- Together, two forms of anxiety, the economic and the moral, are currently working to create more spatial fiction, says Fredrik Sahlin.