Nude Scenes: Holly Hunter, Stefania Casini, Marisa Tomei, Susan Sarandon,  Gillian Jacobs, Helen Mirren, Amy Locane, Laura Dern, Eva Green, Mathilda May, Nancy Allen, Sissy Spacek, Dana Delany, Scarlett Johansson

Nude scenes by quirky character actresses

Holly Hunter, Stefania Casini, Marisa Tomei, Susan Sarandon,  Gillian Jacobs, Helen Mirren, Amy Locane, Laura Dern, Eva Green, Mathilda May, Nancy Allen, Sissy Spacek, Dana Delany, Scarlett Johansson

Holly Hunter

Nude in: The Piano (pictured – top); Thirteen (pictured – bottom)
Like Helena Bonham Carter, Holly Hunter is one of those classy, critically-beloved actresses you’d never imagine doing a nude scene. And yet… and yet… Where was I? Must’ve drifted off for a second while gazing at those screengrabs. Ms. Hunter obviously is comfortable displaying her tiny-but-cute frame when the role calls for it.

Stefania Casini

Stefania Casini nude

Stefania Casini nude

Nude in: 1900 (pictured – top); Blood For Dracula (pictured – bottom)
An Italian beauty who appeared in a string of cult flicks in the 1970s, Stefania Casini can be seen in such movies as Suspiria and Andy Warhol’s Bad. She’s sort of a mean, Italian-accented version of Laraine Newman. I first saw her in Blood For Dracula (a.k.a. Andy Warhol’s Dracula) and was delighted to find that it was far from the only thing on her resume.

Marisa Tomei

Nude in: The Wrestler (pictured – top); Untamed Heart (pictured – bottom left); Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead (pictured – bottom left)
Marisa Tomei became the crush of many after her Oscar-winning turn in My Cousin Vinny. (And who knows? Maybe after her role in the first season of A Different World.) Even George Costanza on Seinfeld had a crush on Marisa. It seemed like her fans had to wait forever before she finally started doing nude scenes in the 2000s. Little did we know that there was an “international version” of Untamed Heart in which Marisa takes off her bra for Christian Slater. Before we leave Ms. Tomei, here’s a very nice animated GIF:

Marisa Tomei nude

Gillian Jacobs

Nice, right?

Gillian Jacobs nude

Nude in: Choke (pictured)
Sometimes, life is just too good. You know what I mean? Here we have one of the cast members of TV’s best live-action comedy series, Community, and she is showing off what seems to be a flawless figure. NOTE: Having seen these photos, you might think that you want to see this movie. Trust me, you don’t want additional context for these images. The scene as it plays is not terribly sexy. It’s not sexy at all in fact. Stick with still pictures.

Susan Sarandon

Susan Sarandon nude

Nude in: Pretty Baby (pictured – top); Joe (pictured – bottom); White Palace, The Hunger, etc., etc.

Susan Sarandon is in roughly the same class as Julianne Moore when it comes to screen nudity. She’s been extremely forthcoming about displaying her anatomy over the years. She was doing nudity from her very first film, in fact. I think a quick visual comparison between that film, the completely bonkers Peter Boyle vehicle Joe, and the later Pretty Baby demonstrates how Sarandon… uh, developed as an actress over the years.

Helen Mirren

Nude in: Savage Messiah (pictured – top); Age of Consent (pictured – below); Caligula; Calendar Girls

“Shakespeare’s whore” they once called her. Now it’s Dame Helen, thank you very much. The photographs above will easily demonstrate why Helen Mirren has been so willing — eager, even — to get naked on camera. She continued to display her still-formidable assets for years after these films, and may God bless her for that. If you’d like to see Dame Helen strutting around completely nude, then gaze upon this clip:

Amy Locane

Nude in: Carried Away (pictured); Going All the Way
“I’m so tired of being good,” Amy Locane complained in Cry-Baby, the film that made her one of my lifelong crushes. Well, she didn’t have be good for long, as demonstrated by her uninhibited “bad girl” role in Carried Away, directed by and starring Dennis Hopper. The screen captures above scarcely convey the sheer amount of Locane exposure in that particular film. Seek it out at the earliest convenient opportunity.

Laura Dern

Nude in: Wild at Heart (pictured – top); Rambling Rose (pictured – bottom)
Her career has ranged from extremely mainstream (Jurassic Park) to decidedly artsy (Inland Empire), but hugely underrated actress Laura Dern has really only played an out-and-out sexpot in the two films mentioned above. Never mind, those films will keep us well-supplied with Dern nudity throughout the upcoming winter months.

Eva Green

Nude in: The Dreamers (pictured); Camelot (TV series)
Eva Green’s nude scenes in The Dreamers, more explicit than even the pictures above would indicate, make further nude scenes unnecessary. You could make a 3D full-body hologram of Ms. Green based on the visual information in that film. That being said, however, it was awfully thoughtful of her to go naked (repeatedly) in her recent Starz series Camelot.

Mathilda May

Nude in: Toutes peines confondues (pictured – top); La teta i la lluna (pictured – bottom); Becoming Colette; Letters to an Unknown Lover; and, yes, Lifeforce.

Just as 95% of the world’s oceans remain unexplored, so too does 95% of Mathilda May’s onscreen nudity. Because of her iconic appearance as a naked space vampire in Tobe Hooper’s sci-fi extravaganza Lifeforce, the public has largely ignored the French actresses’ many, many other unclothed moments onscreen. She’s been unfairly reduced to the status of a one-hit wonder.

Oh, what the hell. Here she is in Lifeforce.

Nancy Allen

Nude in: Carrie (pictured – top); Dressed to Kill (pictured – bottom)
Nancy Allen took a lot of flack from critics in the 1970s and 1980s because most of her prominent screen roles came in motion pictures directed by her then-husband Brian De Palma. But I think she more than proved herself, and she even went on to appear in non-De Palma movies like Robocop.

Sure, De Palma put Ms. Allen in a shower scene or two. But, come on, wouldn’t you do the same thing under the circumstances? FUN FACT: See the lady sitting down in the upper right-hand picture? Edie McClurg. I don’t lie.

Sissy Spacek

Dana Delany

Nude in: Exit to Eden (pictured – top); Light Sleeper (pictured – bottom)

Scarlett Johansson

Of all the actresses to do full frontal nude scenes in multiple motion pictures, who’d have guessed Dana Delany would be one of them. Many viewers probably fell for Dana after seeing her on China Beach, but for me it was an episode of Moonlighting in which she played one of Bruce Willis’ old flames. Anyway, please enjoy the following scene from Exit to Eden, which is twice as nice because her lovely sidekick Stephanie Niznik is full frontal in it as well.

Sort of nude in: Lost in Translation (pictured above)
Extremely nude in: The leaked photos shown below.

UPDATE! Ms. Johansson, finally heeding the pleas of a weary world, has now done full-frontal and rear nudity for her science-fiction film, Under the Skin. I am proud to add some screenshots from that motion picture to this article. Enjoy.This one’s sort of a cheat, I admit, but I could not resist. Since first seeing Scarjo in Ghost World and The Man Who Wasn’t There a decade ago, I have dreamed of the day when I would gaze upon the flame-haired actress in all her glory. That day has apparently arrived. Miracles happen, even today. The world is in a dreary state these days, and I feel that these photos could well be the tonic for what ails us.