I very much feel this. I don’t mind sex scenes at all, but I do always wonder why these people are even interested in each other, how they got to that point. Then it gets all philosophical and people suggest ‘no one knows what makes anyone attractive’, but I’d have liked to see the minutiae spelled out in films, E.g. ‘Jack finds Jill sexy because of her sense of humour.’
Anyway, I guess I wouldn’t know as I have a terrible relationship with most ‘romantic’ films. Some I can acknowledge are good and technically impressive, but I don’t get the genre appeal and am never interested in what happens, because as you said, we know everyone will kiss, ****, break up, potentially make up (depending on the genre), and I do think it’s about that - I’d argue the most interesting thing is how they got to that point, the seduction, or even just the decision, Given variables XYZ, I want to pursue this with this person. But then, it’s such an esoteric question that I don’t blame filmmakers for ignoring it.
The ‘truncation’ and so-called need to be ‘efficient’ in plotting isn’t something I particularly get, either. In terms of ‘unpacking plot and developing character’, well, until we could call it that, did we even know that that’s what sex scenes/any other scenes were doing, it was all much more intuitive, wasn’t it? I just always find it very funny that people argue in all seriousness that a shot of the ‘weeping letter’ in Casablanca (where plot is literally written down) is narratively significant but a sex scene apparently doesn’t ‘advance the plot’ (though it’d likely be something like ‘Man becomes infatuated with woman, manipulated by baddies and compromised and betrayed from his association with her…’) blah, blah, blah. No Kubrick, but it’s a plot.
I think it’s a bit like different standards for different things.
I very often wonder why all sorts of things are needed in a film, and it seems to be that sex scenes are always isolated as the ‘unnecessary’ bit, yet the random childhood flashbacks, meaningless dialogues with strangers on the tube or are always helpful in advancing the plot and building up characters. I never feel like I get the logic there.
Anyway, I guess I wouldn’t know as I have a terrible relationship with most ‘romantic’ films. Some I can acknowledge are good and technically impressive, but I don’t get the genre appeal and am never interested in what happens, because as you said, we know everyone will kiss, ****, break up, potentially make up (depending on the genre), and I do think it’s about that - I’d argue the most interesting thing is how they got to that point, the seduction, or even just the decision, Given variables XYZ, I want to pursue this with this person. But then, it’s such an esoteric question that I don’t blame filmmakers for ignoring it.
The ‘truncation’ and so-called need to be ‘efficient’ in plotting isn’t something I particularly get, either. In terms of ‘unpacking plot and developing character’, well, until we could call it that, did we even know that that’s what sex scenes/any other scenes were doing, it was all much more intuitive, wasn’t it? I just always find it very funny that people argue in all seriousness that a shot of the ‘weeping letter’ in Casablanca (where plot is literally written down) is narratively significant but a sex scene apparently doesn’t ‘advance the plot’ (though it’d likely be something like ‘Man becomes infatuated with woman, manipulated by baddies and compromised and betrayed from his association with her…’) blah, blah, blah. No Kubrick, but it’s a plot.
I think it’s a bit like different standards for different things.
I very often wonder why all sorts of things are needed in a film, and it seems to be that sex scenes are always isolated as the ‘unnecessary’ bit, yet the random childhood flashbacks, meaningless dialogues with strangers on the tube or are always helpful in advancing the plot and building up characters. I never feel like I get the logic there.
Different strokes.
As for the need for truncation and efficiency, we should remind ourselves that cinema is brutally expedient. Large novels are compressed into a few dozen pages of script. It is easy for a long film to overstay its welcome with an audience. Editing for time is simply a must and it is quite common for filmmakers to have to play the game of figuring out what can be cut out.
As you note, sometimes scenes get us acquainted with the character and do not just advance the plot. If a betrayal is coming, then a "needless" depiction of intimacy may heighten the sense of betrayal that comes later. Whether this needs to be a moment of sexual intimacy is a question that the filmmakers must answer. Sex scenes can serve a purpose (I am just of the opinion that they most often do not). Moreover, how far we need to climb into the sack with our characters to be immersed in the character function is also an open question.
Telling a filmic story is not just a process of unpacking a plot to get to the point. If this were the case, we could stick to online plot summaries and get everything we wanted out movies, right? The film is also an experience of the plot as it happens and of our sense of (somehow) being there in the "reality" of it, immersing ourselves in an experience.