1980: Richard Gere and American Gigolo (Erotic 80s Part 3)

1980: Richard Gere and American Gigolo (Erotic 80s Part 3)

1980: Richard Gere and American Gigolo (Erotic 80s Part 3)

You Must Remember This - April 19, 2022 - 1:03:26

One of the most aesthetically influential movies of the ‘80s, Paul Schrader’s American Gigolo sets a template for much of what we’re going to discuss this season: it’s about sex as a conduit for wealth, masks and double lives, and the role of danger in desire. Today we’ll talk about the sexual persona of Gigolo star Richard Gere in the early 1980s; the ways in which Gigolo and other films from 1980 (Dressed to Kill, Cruising) grapple with straight male anxiety over gay male visibility; and the tension between the promotion of sex-positivity for women and the anti-feminist backlash.

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1979: Bo Derek and 10 (Erotic 80s Part 2)

April 12, 2022 - 1:10:31
The sleeper hit of late 1979 was Blake Edwards’s sex farce 10, a comedic vivisection of a male midlife crisis, which turned 23 year-old...

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1981: Neonoir, Body Heat and Postman Always Rings Twice (Erotic 80s Part 4)

April 26, 2022 - 1:09:19
The New Hollywood directors of the late 1960s and 70s were the first generation of Hollywood filmmakers to grow up studying Hollywood...

About The Show

You Must Remember This is a storytelling podcast exploring the secret and/or forgotten histories of Hollywood’s first century. It’s the brainchild and passion project of Karina Longworth (founder of Cinematical.com, former film critic for LA Weekly), who writes, narrates, records and edits each episode. It is a heavily-researched work of creative nonfiction: navigating through conflicting reports, mythology, and institutionalized spin, Karina tries to sort out what really happened behind the films, stars and scandals of the 20th century.