The Dick In American Pie

The latest film in the American Pie series, American Reunion, contains a shocking scene – male full-frontal nudity including a semi-erect penis, albeit slightly squashed to one side by a transparent pan lid!!

I don’t mean shocking in an “oh matron” prudish way – I mean shocking because in all my years of going to the cinema I don’t think I have ever seen a semi-erect penis shot! We are bombarded with literally tonnes of images of breasts – at the cinema, in advertising, in the magazine rack at the newsagent – but penises rarely make an appearance in public, at least in the mainstream anyway.

Now, a quick Google search has informed me that there are at least three other films of the past three years that have contained a “penis shot.” I haven’t seen any of them – my bad! But to be honest, the fact that it is noteworthy that there have been only three or so films that have shown this suggests to me it is still a bizarrely rare feature in films. You couldn’t count in your head the amount of boob shots there have been in the films of the last three years!!

You might think that this is an unfair comparison and that a better one would be how many “vulva shots” have there been in mainstream films. Well… I’m pretty certain there have been none! But I think boobs and penises are actually a more fair comparison – they’re both out there, hanging around, feeling the breeze. The camera angles required for an “everyday vulva shot” are somewhat mind-boggling and are probably going to remain the sole preservation of porn for the foreseeable future!

So why so many boob shots and so few penis ones? Could it be that whereas guys ogle breasts, women generally giggle at penises? What guy wants a cinema full of women laughing at his dick??

I don’t think there will ever be a time when the amount of penis shots in films equals the amount of boob shots. But I think it’s about time we threw a few more penis shots out there – come on boys, it’s only fair!

Contact the author here: jmw@morningquickie.com