Throughout cinema history, there have been some iconic nude scenes that have transcended the bounds of the films in which they appeared. Our weekly column Anatomy of a Scene's Manatomy will take an in-depth look at these scenes, their history, their deeper meanings, and their legacy. This week, Joseph Gordon-Levitt fully sheds his child star image playing a gay hustler in Gregg Araki's NC-17 flick Mysterious Skin!
Breaking out of any mold is difficult for an actor, but shedding the "child star" mantle is one that nearly all adolescent actors turned adult actors seek to rid themselves of permanently. Some have done it by switching professions, like Ron Howard, who has had much more success behind the camera. Some, like Ethan Hawke, have done it by just never leaving the industry, while some, like Jerry O'Connell, completely reinvent themselves physically. Most successful, on the whole though, are those who go the more popular route of taking on a role that forever shatters any association with the actor prior to that moment.
Following in the footsteps of Christian Bale, Leonardo DiCaprio, Neil Patrick Harris, and others who boldly left behind child stardom with a serious departure was Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Before he even came to his biggest bout with child stardom on 1996's 3rd Rock from the Sun, JGL had over 20 credits to his name, including feature films like Disney's 1994 Angels in the Outfield remake and long-running stints on such TV shows as Dark Shadows and Roseanne. The success of 3rd Rock, however, made him most associated with the role of young Tommy Solomon, leaving his career in limbo when the show ended in 2001.
Gordon-Levitt didn't stop working between then and 2004 when he turned up in director Gregg Araki's latest film, Mysterious Skin, but that film definitely became a new demarcation line for his career as an actor. On paper, at the time the film was made, it might have seemed akin to career suicide for your average child actor looking to make the transition into adulthood. JGL plays Neil, a gay teenage hustler in the mid-80s who shares a dark secret with Brian (Brady Corbet) another teen with whom he grew up.
Spoiler alert: The pair were taken advantage of when they were eight years old by their little league coach (Bill Sage). Neil remembers it vividly and it informed his own warped sense of himself and his own sexuality. Brian, on the other hand, invents a narrative wherein he was abducted by aliens. He gets frequent nosebleeds, which he also attributes to the abduction. The film climaxes with this revelation as the two are reunited in their later teens and Neil recounts the events to Brian. Araki, a director who had no issue leaning into the more controversial aspects of his films in the past, filmed the scene very shrewdly, never having Sage and the child actors in the frame together, only using extreme close-ups on their faces to tell the story.
On top of all of this is the frank and explicit sexuality required of Gordon-Levitt in the role of Neil. Of his four nude scenes in the film, only one of them doesn't either end in violence or show the aftermath of violence. His most tender scene in the film is also non-nude, as one of his johns—played by the late character actor Billy Drago—takes off his shirt to reveal lesions and asks Neil to simply hold him. It allowed Gordon-Levitt the actor to show another side of himself, one that many viewers likely didn't think him capable of prior to seeing this film.
Those same viewers would certainly see another side of him altogether as he began his journey to twink crush idol in this flick. As I just mentioned, only one of his nude scenes is non-violent, so we should check that out I think. Stay all the way to the end for a slowed down peek at his peen...
So, adding up all of these elements: the controversial director, the explicit sexuality, the incredibly taboo subject matter... it's easy to see why, had it not worked, it might have been the kiss of death for his career. These sorts of bold experiments don't always pay off for an actor trying to ditch the ever-looming shadow of their child stardom. Thankfully, Araki proved himself a truly capable director, and Gordon-Levitt showed that he could hold the screen, by himself if necessary, but most assuredly as part of a solid ensemble.
The film didn't get released in North America until summer 2005, coinciding with the tremendous buzz coming his way for Rian Johnson's Brick coming out of that year's Sundance Film Festival. JGL was on his way to adult stardom, free from the constraints of the child star label. Sure, it would follow him through to his full-fledged stardom several years later, but by that point, he was being taken seriously enough by audiences that it was more of a novelty. A footnote to his now formidable career as an adult.
And it was all thanks to his devotion to his craft and the level of seriousness with which he approached playing this role in this film. When you think about it, it's really no wonder he ended up working with Christopher Nolan, a director who loves former child stars turned serious adult actors. But it's that "serious" part that helped set JGL apart from the pack, and he proved he was serious beginning with Mysterious Skin.
Catch up with our other editions of Anatomy of a Scene's Manatomy...
—Two of History's Manliest Men Wrestle Naked in Women in Love
—Ewan McGregor Has Got It, Flaunts It in Velvet Goldmine
—A Pair of Stars are Born in Y Tu Mamá También
—Harvey Keitel Goes Hog Wild in Abel Ferrara's Bad Lieutenant
—Viggo Mortensen is Naked From Every Imaginable Angle in Eastern Promises
—There's No Shame is Michael Fassbender's Dick Game
—Kevin Bacon Steals the Show Going Full Frontal in Wild Things
—How We Met Jason Segel's Dick in Forgetting Sarah Marshall
—Jack Reynor is Uniquely Vulnerable for a Man in Midsommar
—Jaye Davidson Knows All There is to Know About The Crying Game
—David Bowie Battles Rip Torn for Dick Supremacy in The Man Who Fell to Earth
—Al Pacino Doesn't Get In All That Deep for William Friedkin's Cruising
—John Cameron Mitchell's Ass Gives Hedwig and the Angry Inch the Perfect Ending
—Ross Lynch Makes One Sexy Future Serial Killer in My Friend Dahmer
—Rocketman Not-So-Boldly Goes Where Bohemian Rhapsody Refused
—Color of Night Brings Us the Return of Bruno's Dick
—Robert De Niro and Gerard Depardieu Get Serviced in Bertolucci's 1900
—Future Oscar Winner Mark Rylance Gets Real and Really Nude in Intimacy
—Louis Garrel Lets It All Hang Out in the French New Wave Biopic Godard Mon Amour
—Bronson Makes Tom Hardy and His Uncut Cock a Star
—Henry June Ushers in the NC-17 Rating with a Distinct Lack of Parity in Nudity
—The Gay Cowboys of Brokeback Mountain Do More Than Eat Pudding
—Pretty Boy Eddie Redmayne Makes One Very Pretty Danish Girl
—Tom Cruise's Dick Has All the Right Moves
—Christopher Atkins Rises Above the Curly Blonde Pack in The Blue Lagoon
—A Pre-Fame Sylvester Stallone Shows Us His Italian Stallion
—9 Songs Combines Real Music with Real Sex
—Willem Dafoe Gets a Hardcore Assist in Lars von Trier's Antichrist
—The Naked Men of A Room with a View are Real Period Pieces
—John Cameron Mitchell's Shortbus Pushes Every Button in Reach
—Okay, So What's Up with Ben Affleck's Abnormally Smooth Dick in Gone Girl?
