A rare combination: Films that are good and clean not common, but they do exist

Everyone knows that sex sells. Twas ever thus. Even in the first half of the 20th century — right through the 1950s and into the '60s — when mainstream advertising and entertainment were coy and hesitant on the subject, sexuality was hot.

That iconic photo of Marilyn Monroe's white skirt being blown upward as she stands on a sidewalk grate above the subway? Photographed in 1955. (I don't want to think about what a 2011 reboot might be like.)

Today, sex still sells and it's anything but coy or hesitant. These days it's everywhere, it's constant, it's too much — whether with vulgar double-entendres or graphic sleaziness. No descriptive slang is left unspoken, no matter how coarse, and no aspect of sex is off limits, no matter how disturbing.

Of course, it's not just sex. It's also bodily functions, crass behavior, profane language, gory violence, you name it. Everything in today's entertainment has gone over the top.

TV, the music business, advertising, books — all have forgotten that a little goes a long way. And especially movies, where everything is literal and 40 feet high.

Gore that goes too far can undermine a thriller, as demonstrated by the horror-level violence in "Drive." Too much profane language can mute the value of an expletive uttered during a tense moment, as in "The Rum Diary." And sex and nudity, especially in the crass, raunchy manner it is used in modern comedies, is a distraction that undermines the humor, as in … well, too many to name.

Sexuality is so prevalent I sometimes wonder if modern screenwriters think about anything else. Most PG-13 movies have so much sex they deserve R ratings and most R-rated comedies are so raunchy they'd make the Marquis de Sade blush. And romantic comedies? No thanks. Not until Hollywood learns to distinguish between romance and sex.

What about PG-rated movies? Well, they're few and far between, although "The Big Year" manages to keep it surprisingly clean, even as it touches on adult themes. On the other hand, the PG-rated "Johnny English Reborn" is surprisingly vulgar, going much further than one would expect from that rating. (Although the first "Johnny English," also rated PG, was much worse.)

Even so-called "family films" — movies aimed at families and/or children — are often troubling. Many parents are so desensitized that they reason, "Oh, there are only a few bad jokes," or "The jokes go over the kids' heads." But the real question is, why put jokes like these in a family picture?