The Best Kissing Scenes: The Classics, Part 1

Movies are basically so, so simple; just sex and violence – a visual form of human nature’s the most primal instincts  – Eros and Thanatos, the visceral urge to create and destroy. Read your Freud. Then read the best and most insightful film critic, Pauline Kael, who titled one of her books Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. What’s simpler than that?

So it came as no surprise when the MLB got many, many requests for best kissing scenes. Two heads, projected on a screen as big as the side of a house, framed in a perfect diagonal, eyes closed, lips pressed: Can any visual be more sensual? (Maybe watching Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers dance, but that’s another blog). Audiences have craved good kissing scenes since movies began (“The May Irwin Kiss” in 1896 – no, it doesn’t make the list). And today, screenplay after screenplay write for that kiss, stars know such scenes can make a career, and every year polls ask audiences to vote on the best kissing scenes.

As the song goes, “if you want to know if you love him so, it’s in his kiss.” These scenes prove how true that is.

PANDORA'S BOX
Three decades of silent film during the 20^th century brought us plenty of romantic kissing scenes; but nothing tops Louise Brooks (yep, Rudolph Valentino is a distant second). Of her many movies, this dancer from Kansas with the the-girl-next-door looks and bobbed hair, became world famous for her role as the phenomenal Lulu, a self-described tramp, using her sexuality to control and manipulate men (she seems to love only her pimp).  Made in Germany and directed by G.W. Pabst, “PB” was hot, racy stuff even in the openly sexual pre- Hayes Code year of 1929. And it’s just as good today.

It’s out on DVD from the Criterion Collection, but the MLB was able to catch a quality-print-theater screening many years ago. I came out in a wordless, seductive haze. In this scene, Lulu, just out of the bathtub and in her robe, is seducing her stepson (she’s murdered his father, sort of, maybe) to go away with her. Is she really in love with him? Using him to get away from the cops? Both? Neither? The palpable, organic sexuality of this scene comes from the natural way Lulu moves forward to wrap her arms around him, pressing her body to his in a passionate kiss. "You're a fool to fall in love with me," she seems to be saying. "It won't end happily." He doesn't care. Neither do we. We have no choice but to go along.

GONE WITH THE WIND

There's so much high-power romance in GWTW it's hard to decide on the best scene. The MLB picked  this one because, well... just look at it. The Atlanta sky, aflame in orange and red, frames Rhett and Scarlett’s simmering passion. “There’s a soldier of the South who loves you Scarlett.” Their heads fill the screen, Rhett meets her lips and the swoon factor shoots through the roof. This iconic image became the gold standard for posters and the covers of romance novels for decades. Part of why “Gone With the Wind” still reigns as the domestic box office champ.

CASABLANCA
"Kiss me as if it were the last time," Ingrid Bergman lovingly pleas to Humphrey Bogart during their time together in Paris. He does: a kiss of desire, love, and pain. No kiss is just a kiss when it's done this way.
In 2009 this scene was elected "best kiss" by a poll
United Kingdom dental patients. Honest to God.






LADY AND THE TRAMP

Pidge and Tramp chewing the same strand of spaghetti as they are serenaded by the sweet accordion stylings of “Bella Notte.” You hardly notice they’re animated canines. This classic scene of sharing a back alley, moonlit bowl of pasta is the sweetest kiss in movies.

Added note: Marlon Brando does a hilarious take on this in "The Missouri Breaks." He's on one end of a carrot, his horse is in the other. You can take it from there.

FROM HERE TO ETERNITY
                                                                                  Talk about classic: Deborah Kerr and Burt Lancaster horizontal on a Hawaiian beach, lustily in each other’s arms, as the surf ebbs and flows over their full body clutch. “Nobody ever kissed me the way you do,” Kerr breathlessly swoons. Imagine, it was her part because Joan Crawford dropped out.

COMING UP:

Kissing Scene Classics, Part 2 

Then, "Notebook" fans come alive, wet kisses in the rain.

Later, kissing scenes from modern films