SEX, LIES, AND VIDEOTAPE
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Copyright 1989 Mark R. Leeper
Capsule review: An intense film about a cold, sterile marriage that is put under pressure by the husband's mistress and by his college roommate who now makes a hobby of interviewing women about their sex lives. An award-winning film made on a shoestring budget. Rating: high +1.
SEX, LIES, AND VIDEOTAPE is an independent production that could well be a hit like EASY RIDER was. Both films were longer on style than on budget yet used their low budget to give the film a more authentic feel. Just as the youth movement used EASY RIDER to define itself to itself, yuppies may will find this film defining their feelings about sex for themselves.
At the core of the film are Ann and John Millany, played by Andie MacDowell and Peter Gallagher. They lead a sterile, colorless life together, each married to the other's image as a status symbol. Neither has much passion or even affection for the other. In very proper fashion Ann regularly sees a sterile, colorless therapist with whom she discusses her sterile, colorless sex life. But John is seeing another woman on the side, one who does not think of sex as if it were a spider that crawled into her house. And Ann is puzzled by Graham (played by James Spader), an old friend of John's who now makes his hobby interviewing women privately about their sex lives. This activity as a symptom of Graham's disturbance forms the psychological basis of the story.
SEX, LIES, AND VIDEOTAPE is an intense film about people with sexual problems. It is more about attitudes and discussion about sex than it is about sex itself. The film has a cold sexual tension that is mostly devoid of eroticism. Viewers will leave having less of an urge to have sex than to talk about it. In fact, for better or worse the film is very likely to spawn a fad for amateur Kenseys all across the country to go out interviewing people about their sex lives.
First time writer and director Steven Soderbergh undoubtedly made a very hot commodity for a modest $1.2 million budget. He creates not so much characters we have some feeling for as a set of walking case histories that are intriguing without being appealing. The characters have a depth that saves what would otherwise be a very soap-opera-ish plot While I cannot say that detailed films about people's sex lives are really my cup of tea, I would still rate SEX, LIES, AND VIDEOTAPE a high +1.
Mark R. Leeper
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