Go Naked in the World is a 1961 film directed by Ronald MacDougall.
Nick Stratton comes back home to San Francisco after getting out of the Army. He goes to a club one night and meets the gorgeous Giulietta Cameron (Gina Lollobrigida). Soon Nick and "Giulie" are head-over-heels in love. Meanwhile, Nick is trying to avoid his father Pete (Ernest Borgnine). Pete, a wealthy construction magnate, is a domineering who wants to control every aspect of Nick's life. Pete is determined that Nick will join his construction business and marry the girl that Pete has picked out for him, and he is not about to listen to what Nick wants.
What Nick wants is Giulie. But there's something Nick doesn't know about her. Giulie is actually a high-priced prostitute—and Pete is one of her clients.
Tropes:
- Buxom Beauty Standard: Pete, who is gross and crude, talks up the girl that he's setting Nick up with. Apparently she's busty, because Pete says "It's a pleasure to look at her, you know, up here,"and makes a gesture towards his chest.
- Driven to Suicide: Giulie, knowing that it will neve work out with Nick but also that he'll never let her go, kills herself.
- Erotic Eating: During a montage that's meant to suggest Giulie and Nick having a lot of sex, Giulie is shown very slowly and deliberately eating an apple.
- Foot Popping: Giulie pops her foot when she and Nick are passionately kissing—but she is also kicking a ringing phone off its cradle. (The phone is ringing because a customer wants her services.)
- High-Class Call Girl: Giulie charges $1000 in 1961 money.
- Handshake Refusal: One of the two men in Acapulco who know Giulie from her hooking days extends his hand to Nick. Nick refuses it.
- High-Class Gloves: Giulie the fancy hooker often wears high-class gloves to complete her fancy look.
- Hollywood Heart Attack: An ugly confrontation with his son atop his new construction project causes Pete to keel over. He's taken to the ground on a stretcher and is diagnosed with a heart attack. Then he proceeds to completely shake it off, and that very night is dancing merrily at a party.
- Melodrama: Heightened emotions, passionate lovemaking, tears, and a tragic romance that ends in a suicide.
- Ms. Fanservice: Giulie spends the whole movie packed into tight dresses, except for a couple of times where she's in lingerie.
- My Girl Is Not a Slut: Nick flies into a rage when he learns the truth of what Giulie does for a living, and angrily breaks up with her. He never does figure out how to deal with it, and later, when the two of them are vacationing in Acapulco, he freaks out again when Giulie is greeted by one of her old clients.
- Rape as Drama: It's ambiguous due to 1961 censorship, but it seems that Giulie is gang-raped in the sleazy Mexican bar. A crowd of men advances on her, Giulie looks up in terror—cut to the next morning and she's walking home with a Thousand-Yard Stare.
- Significant Wardrobe Shift: As Giulie is walking home after (possibly) getting gang-raped, she sees a white cotton dress on a line, and steals it, leaving her fancy fur wrap in its place. She then commits suicide, the white dress being a symbolic act of purification.
- Streetwalker: As Giulie the very fancy prostitute is going into a swanky club, she makes eye contact with a much less fancy streetwalker, walking the streets. The streetwalker gives Giulie a wink.
