If you've never see this biopic about Tina Turner, I do suggest it. I hadn't seen it since back in the early 90's around when it came out on video, and Charlie had never seen it, so we just checked it out a few weeks ago. It didn't lose much for me in the 30ish year gap between viewings. However, this time I noticed the lady-gasm part because that's what I do these days.
So this Tina Turner biopic has a very small depiction of orgasm, and here we are - doing an SSL Review. It's not a top notch SSL review, but the movie itself is quite good.
The SSL Review (for those that don't know about them)
Only depiction or discussion of female orgasm and/or female masturbation and/or the clit are eligible for SSL Review. Nothing else counts, including plain 'ol sex if it doesn't include anything listed above. I specifically critique the realism (for instance, were the physical things happening to that women while she orgasmed things that could realistically cause orgasm for a woman?) and also speak on what the depiction/discussion reflects from and adds to the larger cultural discussion around lady-gasms and female sexuality.You can see all the SSL movie Reviews HERE (and as always you can find all the SSL TV Reviews HERE).
The Scene in Question: Her First Time
The scene is, unfortunately, a pretty common first time scene from a movie. Tina is quite young, and Ike is a grown man with a wife and a couple kids. They are in missionary position in a bed. She's nervous, but excited ('cause you know, he's a charming established man and she's naïve to the world and sex is fresh and all that). It's not rough. There's a bit of gentleness to it, but he is clear in his intentions and moves forward with decisiveness.
The couple is covered mostly, so we only see the insinuation of insertion and gentle pumping of the hips. Tina seems largely motionless in her bottom half - as in she is getting pumped into and not working to control the pelvic movement or how their bodies are moving together. There is also not manual (by her or him) or oral stimulation to her genital area either before or during the intercourse. All that to say, the only stimulation that we can sensibly assume she is getting is the stimulation of a penis inside her vaginal canal.
We are not seeing her clitoral glans area getting any love; no hands, no mouths, no sense of grinding of the clit area against his pelvis (given the in-out movement by him and the seemingly lack of pelvic movement from her). Because for real - if a lady ain't taking some action during the intercourse movement to get her clit against him and consistently keep it there for grinding purposes, I dare say that her clit will be left in the cold. At the very best, if she isn't putting the effort in to keep her clit grinding against something during the intercourse, that poor clit might get the rare privilege of getting grazed from time to time but little to no hope of consistent friction or pressure. All that to say, Tina had no sensible stimulation to cause her orgasm in this scene.
And yet, she seemed to orgasm in this scene at the same time Ike did. Ike, of course, is getting the stimulation he needs to come. His organ of sexual pleasure, his dick, is fully encompassed by her vagina. So his orgasm makes sense, but her organ of sexual pleasure, her clitoris, is not, so her orgasm makes no real sense on even a basic anatomical level (Seriously - contrary to popular belief, the vaginal canal is not the organ of female sexual pleasure and stimulating it - i.e. intercourse alone- has never caused a recorded orgasm in all of scientific literature. Seriously.)
I won't say that the scene made a big show of her orgasm. It was subtle moaning that sort of came to a point at the same time he seemed to subtly climax and then subsequently stop the pumping into her. It honestly could be interpreted as simply moaning that followed his lead or a gentle faking, but nothing about that scene or the subsequent scenes made one feel she was dissatisfied with the sex. The overall feeling was that she enjoyed it and that her moaning came to a point during his orgasm which all together gives the feeling that this sex act was as orgasmic for her as it was him.
An Unrealistic, Sadly Normal Scene that Reinforces Ingnorance and Keeps the Sexual Culture Fucked Up for Female Orgasm
And that, my friends is the problem with this scene and all the many scenes like it. Despite there was no indication in the scene that her clitoral area was getting any stimulation at all, the scene was set up in a way that an orgasm was indicated and we the viewers likely assume a female orgasm happened. It's actually really ridiculous. It's no different than a scene where a guy is getting his balls tickled without the penis ever getting touched. Yet, he seems to orgasm and not only that, but both the characters in the movie and the viewers take it at face value, as if it is completely expected and normal that he came. As if his ball-tickle orgasm wasn't ridiculously unrealistic or some weird fluke played for comedy.
Point is, our culture understands how males orgasm - basically - and we expect some realism in the depictions (or assume ridiculous depictions are comedic). We as a culture do not have a realistic understanding of how females orgasm and so we blindly accept (and creators blindly create) scenes like this that subtly reinforce the unrealistic assumption that women should be as orgasmic during pure intercourse as males should.
It might seem like a small thing, but these types of scenes permeate our media and our minds; adversely affecting male and female expectations of sex and pushing the cultural norms of sex towards acts that are orgasmic for males but simply are not for females...but with the added fuckery of people not consciously realizing how very not orgasmic intercourse alone actually is for females.
It's kind of a mess, and you might think that this 30 year old scene is a sign of old-school depictions of sex, but it's not. at all. It's as common and accepted now as it was then. Those cultural norms and expectations haven't changed much, but I believe changing media to be more realistic could help. And that's why I keep SSL Reviewing this shit.
Vulva Rating
Granted, this is not an unusual scene, but it is a deeply unrealistic one when it comes to the female orgasm. To be fair, I don't think there was any ill intent or trickery from the creators on this. They, like the viewers were just incorrectly educated about lady-gasms, so a scene like this feels realistic even though it absolutely is not. That's a big problem though. So, I give this a 2 out of 5 vulva rating. It's low, but not so low. I'm being nice because there was no ill intention here. Only ignorance - and a wide-spread type of ignorance at that.
(!)(!)
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