(Credit: Far Out / Cocinor)
Sun 28 December 2025 10:19, UK
Brigitte Bardot was the French answer to Marilyn Monroe – a movie star as well-known for being a sex symbol as she was an actor. Bardot was frequently defined by her looks, often receiving roles that centred around her sensuality and ability to effortlessly seduce viewers through the screen.
While she first appeared on screen as a teenager, it didn’t take long for male directors to transform her into a ‘sex kitten’, and she broke through into mainstream consciousness with …And God Created Woman by Roger Vadim. The director often made movies that centred on sexually liberated women, yet his intentions behind these movies certainly weren’t in the name of feminism. Vadim’s films, which often featured Bardot, typically explored her sexuality and framed her through voyeuristic shots of her semi or fully naked body.
…And God Created Woman is one of Bardot’s most recognisable roles, launching her career as an icon of French cinema. Compared to Hollywood stars, Bardot’s appearance on the silver screen felt innately scandalous. While Hollywood limited the amount of sex and nudity allowed in movies through the Hays Code, the French weren’t so opposed.
In Vadim’s film, Bardot is framed, hiding behind a sheet on the washing line, teasing viewers with her suggested nudity. Vadim gives the audience what they want by then showing her lying on her front, fully naked. While this isn’t shocking today, in 1956, before the sexual revolution of the 1960s, Vadim and Bardot were treading new territory.
That tension between image and agency would come to define much of Bardot’s career. While her performances radiated a sense of freedom and abandon, the framework surrounding them was almost always dictated by male desire. Bardot became a paradoxical figure, embodying both the promise of liberation and the limitations imposed upon women who were allowed to express sexuality only when it aligned with a voyeuristic lens.
Brigitte Bardot in ‘And God Created Women’. (Credits: Far Out / Cocinor)
What made Bardot so compelling to audiences was not simply her nudity, but the confidence with which she occupied the screen. Even when framed as an object of desire, she projected a defiance that felt unfamiliar to many viewers at the time. That ambiguity is what gave her image such lasting power, allowing different generations to interpret her either as a victim of objectification or as a woman reclaiming control within a restrictive cinematic language.
While the ethics of Vadim’s filmmaking intentions are questionable – his ex-wife Jane Fonda once described him as “misogynistic” – his work with Bardot helped to spark the sexual revolution that soon followed. There have long been debates regarding whether Bardot can truly be considered an icon of female liberation. Whatever your belief, it is hard to argue that she didn’t have volcanic power and influence. She inspired many women to throw away convention and traditionalism, ushering in a new wave of femininity.
In …And God Created Woman, Vadim constantly frames Bardot through an erotic, lustful gaze, which is unsurprising since they were married at the time. The movie shamelessly wields the male gaze upon Bardot, giving the film its complicated legacy as both an objectifying, misogynistically-charged piece of cinema and one that broke boundaries by depicting a newfound sense of female sexuality, which had rarely been shown to such an extent on screen before.
In one iconic scene, Bardot dances wildly, covered in sweat. She has no inhibitions, and Vadim often prioritises close-up shots of her face that emulate Bardot in the throes of passion. With all its intensity, the scene seems to act as a stand-in sex scene, and Vadim successfully sent temperatures soaring in theatres across the world.
When the movie was released in America, most viewers weren’t used to seeing such provocative, innate sensuality depicted in front of them. Much of …And God Created Woman found appeal in its deliberate teasing of the audience. In another scene, Bardot wears a wet shirt, tightly hugging her breasts and leaving little to the imagination – but enough to send audiences wild. The dance sequence’s panning shots of Bardot’s bare legs further teased viewers, leading many American theatres to go as far as to ban it from being screened.
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