Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead opens with a sex scene that makes no apologies. Philip Seymour Hoffman and Marisa Tomei, both completely naked, in rear-entry position “doggystyle,” the camera holding on their nude bodies without cutting away for long enough to make audiences visibly uncomfortable. It is a bold opening for any film. For a 2007 mainstream crime thriller directed by an 83-year-old legend, it is extraordinary.
Getting Hoffman there was the challenge. Sidney Lumet knew his leading man was going to struggle with the nude sex scene more than Tomei. “I don’t think Philip has ever conceived of himself in the nude fucking onscreen,” Lumet said in an interview with Moving Image Source. “It’s just not something that comes his way.”
Tomei fixed it on the spot. She hopped onto the bed, got on all fours, slapped her bare ass, and said: “Come on Philly, let’s go.” Lumet’s response to what he witnessed: “I could kiss her. Because if Philip had any inhibitions, they were gone.”
“Marisa hopped up on the bed, got on her hands and knees, slapped her ass and said, ‘Come on Phil, let’s go!’ I could kiss her. Because if Philip had any inhibitions, they were gone.”
Sidney Lumet, Moving Image Source interview
The nude sex scene between Hoffman and Tomei made it into the film exactly as Lumet intended: raw, extended, and completely unguarded. Tomei’s naked body in that opening scene, the rear-entry position, the camera’s refusal to look away, set the tone for everything that followed. Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead went on to receive universal critical acclaim, with Roger Ebert awarding it four stars and calling Lumet a “living treasure.” It was Lumet’s final film before his death in 2011.
Marisa Tomei slapping her own ass to drag one of the greatest actors of his generation out of his own head is, by any measure, one of the great on-set moments in cinema history. The scene is in the film. It works. That is why.