Not all sex scenes are created equally. There’s the weird, the funny, the sentimental, the passionate, the terrifying, and the downright hot – the last of which will be the focus of this list. While defining what is and is not a properly “inspirational” sex scene (ifyaknowwhaddimean) is certainly a subjective endeavor (and a revealing one), I’ve tried to choose a handful of scenes that are not only erotic but also worthy of cinematic merit. In other words, you can come for the sex scene and stay for the movie (pun intended).

5. Dirk Diggler’s first time on camera in Boogie Nights (1997)

Writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson’s breakout feature, a multifaceted tale of finding family and inventing identity in the late 70s/early 80s San Fernando Valley porn industry, is chock full of titillation, debauchery, and more sex than you could shake a stick at (even if it is 13-inches-long). Centering on the well-endowed Eddie Adams a.k.a. Dirk Diggler (Mark Wahlberg) and his meteoric rise to adult film stardom, Boogie Nights reaches its erotic climax during Dirk’s debut performance on celluloid with the foxy/strangely maternal Amber Waves (Julianne Moore) – girlfriend of blue movie auteur Jack Horner (Burt Reynolds).

A typically cheesy porn set-up (guy-interviews-for-job-and-has-to-whip- his-cock-out-for-sexily-straight-laced-female-interviewer) provides the context for the film-within-a-film, complete with blank-faced porn acting and stilted line delivery. Initially humorous and reasonably light in tone, the scene takes on a more intimate and sensual aura as the two commence with the planned missionary-on-the-desk revelry. Alternating between shallow-focused, handheld shots hovering over the bare, sweaty bodies and the lazily composed footage being recorded by the porn squad’s cameras, introduces a meta-level to the sex scene that detaches it from its seemingly sordid surrounding, imbuing the porn protocol with a sense of pulse-quickening immediacy and genuine tenderness. Directly addressing the voyeuristic position of the audience, the scene inter-cuts reaction shots of the crew – mouths agape, eyes widened – as they look on with awe at the hot, hot lovin’ (Jack Horner included). Self-reflexive to the max, the scene even depicts a dazzling inside-the-camera point-of-view shot of the sexcapades as the soundtrack picks up on every nuance of the couple’s grunts and moans – as well as Amber’s whispered desire for Dirk to cum inside her rather than give her the standard “money shot.” A fascinating sequence on the level of montage and an earnest depiction of how intensely personal sex can still be in a room full of cameras and on-lookers, Boogie Nights’ most interesting sexual sequence is one that demands repeated viewings. That’s right. Over and over and over and over again.