American independent film is launched into the mainstream by Steven Soderbergh’s sex, lies and videotape, starring James Spader as an... more

The 1988 baseball blockbuster Bull Durham confirms Kevin Costner as the ultimate squeaky-clean, all-American heartthrob, building on a sexual persona... more

The erotic thriller goes commercially mainstream with Fatal Attraction, a film which starts a national conversation about whether or not... more

Billed as the hottest Hollywood film since Last Tango, 9 ½ Weeks was considered to have missed the mark by... more

Just as the AIDS-related death of Rock Hudson was finally forcing straight people – and Hollywood – to acknowledge that... more

In a time of bombastic blockbusters (and Reagan’s re-election), two auteurs defy the norms by releases violent films about sexual... more

While the music video was still in its infancy as a cultural phenomenon, two films were released that were accused... more

1982 saw the release of three hit high school-set comedies about sex: Porky’s, The Last American Virgin and Fast Times... more

The New Hollywood directors of the late 1960s and 70s were the first generation of Hollywood filmmakers to grow up... more

One of the most aesthetically influential movies of the ‘80s, Paul Schrader’s American Gigolo sets a template for much of... more

The sleeper hit of late 1979 was Blake Edwards’s sex farce 10, a comedic vivisection of a male midlife crisis,... more

In 1968, the Production Code gave way to the ratings system, and the brief legitimacy of the X-rated movie. Today... more

Desperate to be seen as cool and not a relic of an earlier age in 70s America, Sammy gets into... more

In the mid-1960s, 47 year-old Dean Martin proves he's still got it by knocking the Beatles off the top of... more

Released in 1965, Sammy Davis Jr.'s autobiography became an instant classic, one of the most dynamic celebrity memoirs ever published... more

In the early 40s, both Dean and Sammy idolized Frank Sinatra. 20 years later, they became Sinatra’s cohorts in the... more

After the breakup of Martin and Lewis, Dino has to figure out how to stand on his own as a... more

Sammy tests the power of his new celebrity, on Broadway and in Hollywood, where he stars in the most controversial... more

In the first half of the 1950s, Martin and Lewis mint money as movie stars--and find unique ways to make... more

Dean Martin meets and begins collaborating with Jerry Lewis. Martin and Lewis — an Italian and a Jew — become... more