We review the most scandalous mainstream movies from the 1960s to the 2000s. Some of them were banned when they were made, but with the passage of time they became cinema classics. We start with Catherine Deneuve in Belle de Jour and finish with Michael Winterbottom's explicit 9 Songs.

Belle de Jour, France, 1967. Written by Luis Bunuel and Jean-Claude Carriere. Directed by Luis Bunuel.

Starring: Catherine Deneuve, Jean Sorel, Michel Piccoli.

Plot: The film tells the story of a respectable young surgeon's wife who secretly works in a brothel.

Catherine Deneuve in Belle de Jour

Critic's view: Roger Ebert writes, It is possibly the best-known erotic film of modern times, perhaps the best. That's because it understands eroticism from the inside out -- understands how it exists not in sweat and skin, but in the imagination.

Critic's view: Edward Guthmann, San Francisco Chronicle: Starring a ravishing, letter-perfect Catherine Deneuve as Severine, a bored Parisian housewife who dabbles in prostitution, Belle de Jour is a wise, enormously enjoyable film about the power of fantasy -- a toast to the importance of dreams.

Buy Belle de Jour.

Runners-up: Contempt (1963); I Am Curious (Yellow), released in 1967; I Am Curious (Blue), released in 1968.

By Athina Simonidou

GO TO: Scandal movies of the 1960s /.../ 1970s /.../ 1980s /.../ 1990s /.../ 2000s

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