Review

Review Date: 18-December-11
Spoiler Rating: Medium
Juju Judgment: Juicy

Shame (2011)

It is oddly synchronistic that Shame arrived in theaters the same time that sexual abuse became a hot topic in the news. Although the subject of molestation is only briefly suggested at the end, its presence as a source of shame hovers behind every frame of the movie. It first emerges when the protagonist Brandon (a superb Michael Fassbender) returns to his New York apartment and surprises his sister Sissy (Carey Mulligan) in the shower. She stands naked during their ensuing spat with apparent mutual indifference, indicating that their family has a different view of boundaries and bodies than most.

Brandon resents Sissy's intrusion in his life. He thinks, or perhaps wishes, that they cannot relate to one another. He is fastidious, she is messy. He has a respectable job that pays the rent, she is a nightclub singer who bounces between cities and gigs. She has melodramatic relationships with boyfriends while he has no relationships at all. What he has is a penchant for porn, masturbation, and anonymous sex with hookers and other strangers. These pursuits take up most of his time, which is another reason why Sissy is in the way.

As directed with frank yet elegant style by Steve McQueen, Shame is a heartbreaking look at people who, presumably for reasons from their past, find adult relationships unobtainable or unendurable. It was clever of McQueen and co-writer Abi Morgan to focus on Brandon since we have seen (and similarly pitied) lost souls like Sissy before, and because our society rarely admits that virile men can be victims. By relying on sleaze to vent his self-hatred, to the point where he cannot make love to someone he likes, Brandon is just as lost as his sister. And when his handsome, well-groomed facade gives way to the sweating and thrusting, the movie seems to lament not only his emptiness but that of a world where the connection between human beings can become so twisted.

Copyright © 2011 The Jujube (M. I. Kim). All rights reserved.