Deep breath. I'll be honest, I am not sure where to start. Steve McQueen's second movie Shame is an unremittingly bleak account of sex addiction, starring Michael Fassbender and Carey Mulligan as a pair of damaged siblings living in Manhattan. Not for the fainthearted, I think it's only fair that I point out now, that anyone expecting to be titillated by Shame will be sorely disappointed. McQueen has chosen a tough subject; sex is so often the source of cinematic pleasure that it is all the more unnerving that this movie manages to depict a wide range of sexual escapades without any of them being remotely arousing.
Filmed in mainly cool grey and blue hues, McQueen sets the tone from the very beginning, with Harry Escott's mournful score emphasising the alienation of the key protagonists in at times operatic contrast to the functional, stark realities of their compulsions. Fassbender's compelling portrayal of Brandon, a sex addict whose compulsive behaviour escalates as he engages in increasingly risky scenarios, is a searingly memorable performance. We never really get to know Brandon beyond his carnal adventures; a half-hearted date with a colleague only serves to reinforce his pathological aversion to intimacy. Though anything approaching real emotion proves a turn-off for him, we're gripped, hoping against hope that he will be able to extricate himself from the cycle of behaviour which consumes him. The arrival of his sister Sissy (Mulligan) sheds no real light on the root of his addiction; though she alludes to the 'bad place' they come from, we never find out more than that about their origins. Sissy herself is an aspiring singer who looks eerily like Edie Sedgewick; her self-harming and shambolic lifestyle hint at the pairs' shared dark history. However, instead of this bringing them closer, her problems expose a disturbingly aggressive side to Brandon, whose aversion to intimacy seems to include even his ties to his sister.
Brandon is ostensibly your average wealthy New Yorker: well groomed, charming and very, very slick. But look closer: his hard drive at work is riddled with porn; he masturbates compulsively and picks up women in bars and uses prostitutes the way the rest of us would use hand towels, almost without thinking. The slick, stylised look of the film mirrors his outward demeanour - it's quite refreshing to see that a film can still look this good whilst tackling the most taboo of problems. However, when his married boss spends the night with his sister we see a chink in his sleek, perfectly attired armour - in fact, this is what leads to the climax (ahem) of the film. The finale is something of a carnal Hades, the loneliness and riskiness of Brandon's addiction portrayed in all its tawdry truth. However, the ambiguity of the final scene would suggest that in spite of what could be an opportunity for change, Brandon is too trapped in his behaviour to do anything other than repeat the cycle. Though frustrating, I found this to be a brave decision on the part of McQueen and his co-writer Abi Morgan. Sex addiction is presented without judgement; to have a character recover by the end of the film would be to oversimplify the problem - McQueen's amoral treatment is grown up and doesn't treat his audience like idiots. Likewise, the fact we are never given an explanation for the siblings' dysfunctional behaviour is also interesting: McQueen hasn't reduced anything in the movie to cliche or reductive psychobabble, instead preferring to present the issues unflinchingly and bravely - through the body first and foremost. This is a really interesting approach; all actors are asked to use their bodies for their art, but here the body tells a story of compulsions which language is dull to. The terse script underscores this approach.
Yes, I found Shame sordid and at times an effort to watch. It was definitely about twenty minutes too long, and some of Sissy's behaviour at times risked tipping the film over into melodrama. But this is a very brave movie, as mesmerising as it was difficult. It is not something one enjoys, or feels satisfied by, but it's not designed to be. Shame represents a challenge: to how we view sex generally, it could be argued, as we grapple with Brandon's own attitudes, amplified through his addiction. And certainly a challenge to other directors to produce a movie as bold.
NOTE: you won't be wanting your popcorn.
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