For tonight's Netflix viewing, how about a film with graphic, unsimulated sex scenes which was banned in its native country?
Yep, a film that was too full-on to be shown in cinemas is now available to watch at the click of a button, if that sort of thing sounds appealing.
This Indian-made film from 2010 was directed by Qaushiq Mukherjee, known as 'Q', who had the vision of creating an abstract film with elements of sex weaved into the storyline.
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And with anything involving sex in cinema, some people had their reservations.
However even the most risqué directors might not have opted for Mukherjee’s decision to include unsimulated sex scenes in his movie.
So you can understand why some people got into quite a huff about the film. Since even in the most believable film sex scenes, more often than not the two actors aren’t actually doing the deed.
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They’ll use crafty camera work to create the illusion. This film? Not so much.
The film is called Gandu, which translates to 'a******e', and it's now available to stream on Netflix.
The film follows a teenage rapper who steals from his mother's lover to fund his love for drugs, all while trying to make it in the music industry.
There are numerous graphic sex scenes between Gandu’s mother (Kamalika Banerjee) and her lover Dasbabu (Silajit Majumder), which main character Gandu (Anubrata Basu) walks in on.
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If that wasn’t explicit enough for you, in one of the film’s most controversial scenes, Basu has a fully erect penis in a sex scene with co-star Rii Sen, with Q saying that the pair had real-life sex.
What makes it even weirder? Sen was actually in a relationship with Q when they shot the scene.
She told Open magazine: “There were physical workshops that helped us shed our inhibitions and become real. If someone were to touch my boobs, it's natural that I'd be aroused.
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“But it is the aftermath that is important. How do you feel after such a shoot? I wasn't shattered or anything after I shot Gandu.
“I was shooting lovemaking scenes with my co-actor that were being shot by my boyfriend. Now, how weird is that?"
You can probably understand at this point why the film may have been viewed as taboo. In India the flick didn’t get its first screening until July 2021 at the Osian Film Festival.
But despite the many controversies that have followed the flick over the years, critics have received the film positively as Gandu boasts a decent score of 68 percent on review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes.
Topics: Sex and Relationships, Film and TV