Plucked from some of the sexiest movies that steamed up the screen, these famous movie kisses achieve the near-impossible: making the uncomfortable task of coworkers smushing their mouths up against each other look not only totally natural but downright sultry.
From black-and-white classics like From Here to Eternity to Kleenex-needed modern romances like The Notebook and even a superhero blockbuster like Spider-Man, these are 10 of the hottest movie make-outs on the big screen.
10 sexy movie kisses that get hearts racing
Cruel Intentions (1999)
Provocations abound in this 1999 cult classic, which follows a group of terribly wealthy — and often simply terrible — teens in uptown Manhattan. But none of the movie's acts of naughtiness are as notorious as the park-set seduction by manipulative schoolgirl Kathryn Mertueil (Sarah Michelle Gellar) and the woefully naive Cecile Caldwell (Selma Blair), during which the former teaches the latter how to French kiss. Kathryn does such a thorough job, in fact, that Gellar and Blair won the GOAT: Legendary Lip Lock Award during the MTV Movie & TV Awards: Greatest of All Time special more than two decades later in 2020.
Ghost
Leave it to Patrick Swayze to make ceramics hot. In the hands of anyone else, Ghost's most famous scene — which sees a shirtless Swayze as Sam Wheat join girlfriend Molly Jensen (Demi Moore) behind a sculpting wheel, their clay-covered limbs becoming further and further entwined as The Righteous Brothers harmonize from a jukebox — would be eye-rollingly cheesy. Instead, it's deeply erotic, a voyeuristic peek into the nature of their romance before things get, well, supernatural.
The Notebook
"It wasn't over. It still isn't over!" Noah Calhoun (Ryan Gosling) roars at Allie Hamilton (Rachel McAdams) under a deluge of Carolina rain, proving the veracity of his words with a searing kiss that warms the soaked-through pair. It was a dam-breaking not only for the characters but allegedly for the actors playing them, who went on to date for two years. "When that door got unlocked, I didn’t need to direct nothing. These kids were on each other," director Nick Cassavetes revealed to Rotten Tomatoes. "I think that was the moment, because they weren’t together before that kiss. But they were together after that kiss.” We can certainly see why.
Disobedience
It's another scorcher from Rachel McAdams, though this time she's paired with Rachel Weisz, as two Jewish women reckoning with romantic feelings for each other amidst the ultra-conservative Orthodox religion. There are several snogs between Esti and Ronit in Sebastián Lelio's Disobedience, but one in particular is a spit take, literally, with Weisz's Ronnie dripping saliva into Esti's mouth while they're making love. It's explicit, sure, but it's also incredibly intimate, signaling the depth of the connection between the two.
Titanic
Talk about the ultimate '90s swoon: Leonardo DiCaprio as Jack Dawson and Kate Winslet as Rose DeWitt Bukater sharing their first kiss during sunset at the majestic bow of the Titanic while "My Heart Will Go On" softly croons in the background. It's a moving, sensual kiss as fittingly epic as the movie that surrounds it, fully selling the level of devotion that the young pair conjures up during their tragically short time onboard.
Brokeback Mountain
The sheer intensity of that long-delayed reunion kiss between forbidden lovers Jack Twist (Jake Gyllenhaal) and Ennis Del Mar (Heath Ledger) is written all over Michelle Williams' face. Ennis has been waiting ever-so-impatiently for his old sheep-herding buddy to arrive for a visit, so much so that when he does he can't resist racing down the steps and meeting Jack outside, where they share a feverish and secret lip-lock — or so they think.
Crazy, Stupid, Love
Yes, Ryan Gosling again, but in Crazy, Stupid, Love, he's more the smooched than the smoocher. That would be Emma Stone, whose ticked-off, rain-soaked Hannah takes Gosling's Jacob by surprise when she interrupts his conversation and impulsively plants a big one on the lad in the middle of a bar. "Do you remember me? Do you still find me attractive? Do you still want to take me home?" she asks him when they finally come up for air, and his breathless responses are hilariously and understandably limited to one word: Yes.
Call Me By Your Name
Few characters have felt desire as fervently on film as Timothée Chalamet's Elio Perlman does for Armie Hammer's Oliver in Call Me By Your Name. The sexual tension between the two young men is damn-near suffocating in Luca Guadagnino's coming-of-age charmer, fueling long summer days of swimming and dancing and the shortest of short shorts, until finally, in a sun-soaked field found "somewhere in Northern Italy," Oliver finally gives Elio what he craves: a kiss as sweet and tender as a ripe peach.
From Here to Eternity
Often parodied but never equaled, the sandy embrace between Sergeant Milton Warden (Burt Lancaster) and another officer's wife Karen Holmes (Deborah Kerr) is one of celluloid history's most unabashedly romantic moments. Soundtracked by George Duning's soaring score, the famous beach scene finds the pair passionately lip-to-lip while lying down in the Hawaiian surf (which, as cinematic legend has it, was Lancaster's idea, much to the chagrin of those 1950s censors). When Karen gasps, "I never knew it could be like this. No one ever kissed me the way you do," you believe her.
Spider-Man
The first of the Spider-Man movies also features its finest make-out moment (no offense, Tom Holland and Zendaya.) The so-called "Spider-Man kiss" became a pop-culture phenomenon, not only for its novelty — in thanks for saving her life, Mary Jane (Kirsten Dunst) macks on the friendly neighborhood superhero (played by Tobey Maguire) while Spidey is hanging upside down, pulling his mask off just enough so she can gain access to his lips — but also for its palpable heat.
Be sure to also check out What to Watch's rankings of the sexy TV shows and supposedly sexy TV shows and movies that failed to bring the heat.
