S H A M E
Cast: Michael Fassbender, Carey Mulligan, David James
Badge, Marianne Nicole Beharie
Written by Steve McQueen and Abi Morgan
Directed by Steve McQueen
Running time: 99 minutes
The advance publicity machine on
Steve McQueen’s “Shame” implied that there was something prurient about this
film, whose central figure is a sex addict, struggling with his demons.
However, as intense and involving as it is, the last thing you could call it is sexy, despite the preponderance of nudity and several scenes of people copulating energetically. “Shame” is a story of addiction and a man battling his own compulsions. It’s a story about the agony of being unable to keep them in check and the toll that takes on his life. His name is Brandon and he’s played with what could be described as a kind of silent fury by the cool, aloof Michael Fassbender. But that aloofness is a façade, a mask Brandon wears to keep his unquenchable habit from being discovered.
Brandon is a sex addict who needs sex in one form or the other the same way an alcoholic needs a drink or a heroin addict needs a fix: often, as often as possible, several times a day. It’s not a question of satisfaction or pleasure; like any true addict, it’s about numbing oneself to the world in whatever way works. His computer is choked with porn; he’s masturbating several times a day in the office bathroom and he’s on the prowl constantly, having sex with whoever he can entice up to his apartment, then showing them the door. Willing women, prostitutes – it doesn’t matter as long as he gets off.
Like any high-functioning addict, he finds a way to make it work (though his boss is curious as to why his office computer is in constant need of virus removal). Brandon has created a ritual by which he lives, turning his gaff into a kind of fortress of privacy in which to indulge his shameful compulsion.
That is knocked haywire, however, when his sister, Sissy (Carey Mulligan), shows up unannounced and needs to stay with him. Suddenly his space has been invaded, his routine thrown out of whack, his ritual disturbed. It almost pushes him to a breakdown. He is like a junkie who can’t connect with his dealer because Sissy seems to always be hovering around. A scene in which Brandon, in need of his own fix, has to listen, while his sister romps with a new sexual playmate of her own, is as wrenchingly painful as any of the withdrawal scenes in “The Man with the Golden Arm”, "French Connection II" or “Requiem for a Dream.”
McQueen, who demonstrated the virtues of stillness in his debut film, “Hunger,” still understands the power of keeping his camera relatively locked down and his editing from becoming frenzied. He wants to take a long, hard look at a man in the throes of something deeply painful and achingly interior – and he does so, with Fassbender as his perfectly honed vehicle.
Many have already dismissed this film as being too cool, retaining too much of an emotional distance – but that misses the steaming intensity of Fassbender’s inner battle. Brandon is a man in deep pain; addiction is a disease, but also a symptom of something seriously disturbing that needs to be muffled in some way – by drugs, by alcohol or, in this case, by furious sex. Fury is indeed the emotion that comes to mind, when Brandon abandons himself to a sexual binge. There’s very little pleasure involved in the sex depicted in “Shame,” a film that features one of the year’s most deeply felt performances and one of the most tortured characters.
However, as intense and involving as it is, the last thing you could call it is sexy, despite the preponderance of nudity and several scenes of people copulating energetically. “Shame” is a story of addiction and a man battling his own compulsions. It’s a story about the agony of being unable to keep them in check and the toll that takes on his life. His name is Brandon and he’s played with what could be described as a kind of silent fury by the cool, aloof Michael Fassbender. But that aloofness is a façade, a mask Brandon wears to keep his unquenchable habit from being discovered.
Brandon is a sex addict who needs sex in one form or the other the same way an alcoholic needs a drink or a heroin addict needs a fix: often, as often as possible, several times a day. It’s not a question of satisfaction or pleasure; like any true addict, it’s about numbing oneself to the world in whatever way works. His computer is choked with porn; he’s masturbating several times a day in the office bathroom and he’s on the prowl constantly, having sex with whoever he can entice up to his apartment, then showing them the door. Willing women, prostitutes – it doesn’t matter as long as he gets off.
Like any high-functioning addict, he finds a way to make it work (though his boss is curious as to why his office computer is in constant need of virus removal). Brandon has created a ritual by which he lives, turning his gaff into a kind of fortress of privacy in which to indulge his shameful compulsion.
That is knocked haywire, however, when his sister, Sissy (Carey Mulligan), shows up unannounced and needs to stay with him. Suddenly his space has been invaded, his routine thrown out of whack, his ritual disturbed. It almost pushes him to a breakdown. He is like a junkie who can’t connect with his dealer because Sissy seems to always be hovering around. A scene in which Brandon, in need of his own fix, has to listen, while his sister romps with a new sexual playmate of her own, is as wrenchingly painful as any of the withdrawal scenes in “The Man with the Golden Arm”, "French Connection II" or “Requiem for a Dream.”
McQueen, who demonstrated the virtues of stillness in his debut film, “Hunger,” still understands the power of keeping his camera relatively locked down and his editing from becoming frenzied. He wants to take a long, hard look at a man in the throes of something deeply painful and achingly interior – and he does so, with Fassbender as his perfectly honed vehicle.
Many have already dismissed this film as being too cool, retaining too much of an emotional distance – but that misses the steaming intensity of Fassbender’s inner battle. Brandon is a man in deep pain; addiction is a disease, but also a symptom of something seriously disturbing that needs to be muffled in some way – by drugs, by alcohol or, in this case, by furious sex. Fury is indeed the emotion that comes to mind, when Brandon abandons himself to a sexual binge. There’s very little pleasure involved in the sex depicted in “Shame,” a film that features one of the year’s most deeply felt performances and one of the most tortured characters.
