Shame

This one is going to be a really tough one to write. This and the one which will follow. A movie called Martha Marcy May Marlene. Both movies which promised quite a bit and in all honesty I would be lying if I said they failed miserably. They were both just art house cinema in the truest sense of the word. To be fair, the poster for SHAME clearly called out, “THE MOST PROVOCATIVE AND COMPELLING FILM OF THE YEAR” amongst a few other adjectives such as Mesmerising and Dynamite and Exquisite and Emotive. All of these amongst clusters of 5 stars. But then no one said that it was all of this for the art house cinema buff. Like the people who would love Terrence Malik’s Tree of Life to bits. Surely you get the drift by now.

So I was suckered into a movie directed by Steve McQueen. Who turns out to be nowhere close to the more popular and better known star of Bullit. Nopes. This gentleman is an acclaimed (unheard to me) director with one other art house movie before this which I am certain has several layers just like Shame had. This Steve McQueen to his credit is a bold African American director. One would understand why I use the term bold after you are about 30 odd seconds into the movie. Even without watching his previous movie, I am quite certain it would be one where he tells it like it is. For e.g. if the a bullet to the head means blood splattering all around then that would be the way it has to be shown.

It is probably the reason why Shame would seem like a soft pornographic movie – ok correction – pornographic movie. In the first 5 minutes you would have seen how well endowed Michael Fassbender is and a couple of graphic sex scenes are thrown before the first 30 minutes are done and dusted. And before the movie is done with, you would have experienced different situations from your fantasies. Let me try and recount them. With one woman in a dark alley against a large container (probably a garbage bin). With a high end prostitute at home. With a seriously attractive African American woman. With another prostitute recounting your fantasy of doing it with the woman pressed against a glass window. Getting a blow job from a man. Doing it with 2 women.

The purists would say this is art and not pornography. To portray the story of a person who has a sex addiction problem is very brave indeed. How else would you show a movie about the topic. But for the not so mature audiences which include this writer, who I must say is not used to such topics being dealt with so openly, it will be quite difficult to sit through without squirming in your seat. I just found the movie too slow and randomly edited but the performances were very solid indeed. Full points for bravery. 6 on 10 for the movie.

Watch the trailer at http://www.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi3969097241/