Don’t recall my first Rated R film, but saw my first NC-17 feature at the age of 12. Abel Ferrara’s Bad Lieutenant, past midnight on IFC, back when it didn’t have commercials…
Either The Terminator or Dirty Harry, don’t remember which though. Still love em both.
Mine was Terminator as well. I guess that’s the go to for parents to break their kids in. At age 9 or thereabouts.
I saw Terminator with my brother at home when I was about 8 (my brother would have been about 6), and I saw South Park with friends about a month after (it’s kind of funny how South Park was one of the first – the basis of the plot is kids going to see an R-Rated movie)
I was very strictly prohibited from PG-13 movies until I was 13 and then from R movies until I was 17. I had to get my fill of boobs and violence from the oddly PG-rated Airplane! and Jaws, respectively.
The Witches of Eastwick and Evil Dead at the age of 5 on a private channel’s Friday Horror Film Night series. The Witches..was my favorite…I was a huge fan of Jack Nicholson, I “am” a huge fan of Jack Nicholson.
The Evil Dead is very special. Because, it is the only movie that actually scared me.
The Pawnbroker at age 11-12
d/p
Pan’s Labyrinth when I was 13. I didn’t realize most people watched r-rated films before being teens.
Pretty sure it was An American Werewolf In London. I was maybe 5 years old. To this day I still think it’s one of the scariest movies ever made. Seeing the original theatrical poster with David and Jack in their puffy jackets, staring over their shoulder at the moon gives me knots in my stomach.
Aged 7, Terminator like most but surprisingly i saw Tetsuo on TV not long after
As a kid, they often played many R-rated movies on our local television channel, CityTV, late at night, that I got to see if I stayed up. Or on what was then the multicultural channel 47 based also out of here in Toronto, they’d play giallo films or usually something with some t&a. So I can’t recall exactly which one it was that was first, but I do recall seeing a slightly racy film soft core Brit film called “Percy’s Progress”, which might’ve been my first r-rated flick, on CityTV.
Depressingly, my first R-rated film in a theatre was “Against All Odds”, with Jeff Bridges and Rachel Ward, that I snuck into. There wasn’t even enough Rachel Ward nudity in that film to feel like I was getting away with something.
Previous to that, my first R-rated film seen on VHS was Alien!
Witness with Harrison Ford.
Tarzan The Ape Man (1981) with Bo Derek. I snuck in with my cousin Rob. I was fourteen and he was twelve. Rob passed away last year. He was a great man, it was horrible film (not that I noticed at the time).
National Lampoon’s Vacation, saw at the drive-in for my 10th birthday, I was in love with Christie Brinkley
The Doors, in a hotel with my parents and sister when we were on some trip and it was on HBO. Came out in 1987 so I was probably six or so. If I remember correctly, there’s a scene where Jim Morrison’s girl walks in on him getting a blowjob from some freaky witch lady. It really really disturbed me, not only because It was some weird sexual thing I didn’t understand, but also because he was such an asshole to her.
Then a couple years later my older sister put on Faces of Death and wouldn’t let me leave the room. I was horrified and thought it was all real.
@Charles Deckert: I’m pretty sure that the Bad Lieutenant they show in IFC is the R-rated version
Robocop. Probably around 7 or 8 at the time.
And I totally thought it was awesome for all the wrong reasons. Brilliant movie though.
I think it was Titanic, if that was R rated.
I would always eagerly await Winslet being nude.
I was a freaky kid.
Lipstick (1976) with Chris Sarandon and Margaux Hemingway.
Who the heck are y’all’s parents??
Judgement day when I was 7. And Titanic is PG13? It had boobs and all, I saw it when I was 8.
The first one I remember seeing in theaters was The Insider when I was 9
Maybe Peckinpah’s The Getaway.
I think my answer might be the very same as Neil’s above, word for word.
I remember also that Jurassic Park was my first PG:13 film; it was a big deal at the time.
I believe it was “The Super Cops” (directed by Gordon Parks immediately following “Shaft” and “Shaft’s Big Score” – although I only just now learned that interesting tidbit). I was probably in Junior High. My mother went with me so I could get in (small town, no way I could have gotten in otherwise). I’d read the book already so she figured it was OK to see the movie. It wasn’t memorable.
Speed, age 10 or so.
@ The Dude
This was back in 2002. I saw Keitel’s penis, the bloody crime scene (stealing a glance at the victim’s breasts), the car side masturbation scene, the rape, the drug use (him chasing the dragon with Lund), him shooting his car radio and shouting “you fucking nigger!” and crying, and most of all that ending with our vantage point from across the street…
Any of that I am sure they tend to exclude on IFC now. I wouldn’t know though, as I gave up television (other than to facillitate co-opt with a DVD player and a VCR) at 16. A decision I do not regret, either.
@ DRUNKEN FATHER FIGURE OF OLD
Mine were, thankfully enough, a certain blend of careless and carefree so as to allow me to engage many things in my own privacy, though I had things to answer for every now and again at my own judgment, of course.
House of Leaves
I know my parents took me to The Blues Brothers when I was five.