The Blue Lagoon (1980)
In 1949 Jean Simmons and David Houston starred in The Blue
Lagoon as the victims of a shipwreck who grow up in each
other's company on a romantic desert island.
Thirty One years
later producer-director Randal Kleiser remade their story, but
with Brooke Shields and handsome newcomer Christopher Atkins as
the children of nature.
The result was a visually stunning commercial for the natural life
in which, taking full advantage of the cinema's new
permissiveness, there was a great deal of sex talk and nudity.
The
fact that Shields insisted on a double to take her place whenever
the script called for her to appear naked (usually underwater) was
of no consequence.
Managing to be both explicit and coy at the same time, the film
concerned itself with the young couple's sexual awakening and the
inevitable consequences thereof.

It couldn't be taken seriously, and was probably never meant to
be. Its chief virtues were the attractiveness of its two young
players, the gorgeous Fiji-based photography, and the underwater
sequences (photographed by famous Australian husband and wife
diving team, Ron and Valerie Taylor).
Audiences responded to the film to the hearty tune of $43.6
million at the box office.
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