Speaking of Erotic thrillers that went STV, here is a classic case:
Ivan Reitman clearly loved to make erotic thrillers, so he produced "Killing Me Softly" with $25 million budget. Ivan Reitman managed to get a bankable cast (Heather Graham, Joseph Fiennes, Natascha McElhone) and an international acclaimed arthouse director (Chen Kaige), then MGM paid $8 million to pre-buy the film's domestic rights. Basically, everything looked promising.
But "Killing Me Softly" became a trouble production, mainly because MGM, the producers and Chen Kaige had big creative battles with each other..... (Joseph Fiennes said that Chen Kaige was treated like a first-time director during production) The result was that "Killing Me Softly" didn't get good audience response in test screening. Eventually, MGM sent "Killing Me Softly" straight-to-video, despite the film enjoyed box office successes in some major foreign markets (like Japan and Italy).
A then-bankable cast (Heather Graham, Joseph Fiennes, Natascha McElhone) and a $8 million acquisition cost could not save "Killing Me Softly" from STV hell; it indicated again that erotic thrillers had good chance to go straight-to-video.
More about the US release of "Killing Me Softly".
PS: Ivan Reitman later produced another erotic thriller "Chloe" with much lower budget (and without studio's interference). "Chloe" went on getting a respectful arthouse release and then becoming director Atom Egoyan's biggest moneymaker ever, but "Chloe" was still not a mainstream hit (even though I think that "Chloe" is more well-made and well-casted than most of erotic thrillers in the recent two decades, including "Basic Instinct"). Afterall, erotic thriller itself is a niche genre that can make many mainstream audience and film critics feel uncomfortable. ("Deception" could get wide release only because of Hugh Jackman's friendship with Fox)
