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Notes from the back row

The hottest of the hot

Everybody loves a heat wave. Canada Day weekend was the perfect mix of good movies showing in air-conditioned theatres, clear warm nights where a person could just sleep where they fell, and long, scorching days that bring out summer’s best – the bikinis. In honour of global warming and the brand new gas tax I present some good news — The Ten Best Movie Bikini Scenes Ever.

The movie Wanted opened to over $50 million last weekend so let’s begin with Angelina, who actually doesn’t do many bikini movies. She generally goes topless or swims in a wedding dress ( Hackers — that ruled) but 2001’s Tomb Raider proved to be a nice exception.

Number Nine — 1966’s One Million Years B.C. , with Raquel Welch rocking the height of animal pelt/cavewoman fashion. Prehistory never looked so good.

Neither did Jessical Biel, after her pool scenes in 2001’s Summer Catch. Shitty movie but great nostalgia for anyone who’s ever poached a pool with a really cute girl.

Next up, more from the old school and 1979’s 10 , the movie that made Bo Derek so famous the kids on the bus were still talking about her when I started kindergarten in ’81. Watch for the cameltoe.

Back in the water for Number Six — Jessica Alba pretty much saving Into the Blue by swimming like a mermaid for almost 90 minutes, and had many moviegoers wondering if the movie shouldn’t have been called Into the Blue Bikini.

It’s not uncommon for the stupidest movies to have some of the hottest chicks in them. Check out always-stellar Eva Mendes poolside in the 2003 conjoined-twin comedy Stuck on You. The movie is actually pretty funny too.

Tura Satana and Lori Williams aren’t technically wearing bikinis when they get in the lake but they go-go shake in them all through the opening credits of Russ Meyer’s Faster Pussycat Kill Kill , a 1964 classic that just misses bronze medal but wins for best title.

And at Number Three – Die Another Day , with Halle Berry doing what Ursula Andress did in Dr. No , exiting the ocean with style, grace and a big knife. Quelle Homage Halle, she’s the hottest bond girl thus far.

For the silver medal we get mathematic. The ancient golden ratio for beauty and proportion is something like 1.61803399 to 1. A few years back a computer designed a face out of millions of little triangles built on that ratio and the face was Elizabeth Hurley. After turning heads and dropping jaws in the first (and best) Austin Powers, Liz popped up in 2000’s Bedazzled   playing the freakin’ deavil in a red sequined bikini while holding an apple with a snake wrapped around her neck. Another perfect ratio of awesomeness to hotness and more than enough to make a person want to go to hell.

Can you beat female hot-Satan with a British accent? Yes you can.

The Number One Greatest Bikini Scene in film history is 1984’s Fast Times at Ridgemont High —. Phoebe Cates coming out that pool, the music kicks in, and BOOM! Filmmaking at its finest. Even though the shot was edited against Judge Reinhold jerking off on the toilet this one still wins hands down.

And that’s it. Will Smith’s movie is the only new flick this week. It’s called Hancock and it’s a flawed mixture of superhero, dramatic, romantic and comedy themes that loses all its satire early on and tries so hard to please everyone that it ultimately ends up a garbled, flat mess. No epic bikini sequences either, but a guy gets his own head shoved up his ass in a prison scene. Which will do, I suppose, in a pinch.