Fassbender, Mulligan turn in fearless performances in 'Shame'
There comes a moment in Steve McQueen's bold and visually aggressive NC-17-rated drama “Shame” when a parade of attractive, sexually grinding bodies loses its power to shock and titillate, and instead conjures up empathetic feelings of sadness and despair.
“Shame” examines the dehumanizing effects of sexual addiction, and it joins the higher ranks of notable movies that have confronted more socially acceptable forms of addiction such as Blake Edwards' “Days of Wine and Roses” (alcohol abuse) and Darren Aronofsky's “Requiem for a Dream” (drug abuse).
The opening scene in “Shame” takes place on a New York subway train.
A handsome and rakish, thirty-something man named Brandon (Michael Fassbender) begins exchanging flirtatious glances with a young woman (a sexually charged Lucy Walters).
They do not know each other. But her subtle body language rolls out a nonverbal welcome mat for his advances.
When the train stops and the doors open, the woman bolts, knowing perhaps that Brandon will follow her if he doesn't trip over his lolling tongue.
The chase is on, and we instantly understand the appeal that sexual addiction holds for Brandon.
The excitement of constant newness. The thrill of conquest. The freedom of no emotional strings attached.
For Brandon, his New York City lifestyle intoxicates him with a never-ending series of pert and perky partners who are into momentary ecstasy just as much as he is.
But the cracks in Brandon's personal foundation begin to show.
His boss David (James Badge Dale) warns him that his office computer has been jammed up with sexually explicit content, probably by outside spammers.
Does David suspect the truth? Probably not.
Then one night, Brandon comes home to find a woman taking a shower in his stripped-to-essentials bachelor apartment. But she's not what we might imagine.
She turns out to be his sister Sissy (Carey Mulligan), an emotionally unstable and needy young woman who obviously has no place else to go, so she came to Brandon for support and comfort.
He supplies neither. Actually, he views her arrival as a rude intrusion on his meticulously organized life in which work and relationships take back seats to his obsession for constant sex.
Addiction movies by their nature do not deal with happy, contented characters, but with people who misuse booze, drugs and sex to compensate for insecurities, guilt and other forms of disappointment or perceived failure.
One of the drama's drawbacks — or bold merits, depending on how you look at it — stems from a screenplay (by McQueen and Abi Morgan) that doesn't provide much background information on how Brandon and Sissy became so messed up.
There are hints that they shared a terrible childhood. “We're not bad,” Sissy says to her brother. “We just come from a bad place.”
To McQueen, the reasons why Brandon and Sissy never evolved into complete human beings don't matter as much as how they now deal with their spiritual voids and emotional emptiness.
This is not a pleasant movie, but a refreshingly mature, thoughtful depiction of an adult subject dramatized for adult audiences.
Fassbender, whom you might remember as the young Magneto in “X-Men First Class,” proves himself to be a brave actor capable of great empathy and insight into his characters. His Brandon appears to be cold and aloof, yet he undercuts those qualities with a little lost boy quality that keeps us spellbound.
Then there's the equally fearless Mulligan (last seen in the brilliant neo-noir thriller “Drive”), who aches with unbearable need just to be held and comforted — by anybody — that it turns her into a human sponge for attention.
The highlight of “Shame” takes place when Sissy lands a job singing in a bluesy bar. Mulligan slowly exhales the lyrics to “New York New York” with such melancholy pain that it almost produces tears.
In that moment, you realize that despite its wall-to-wall physical couplings, “Shame” isn't really about sex at all.
“Shame”
★ ★ ★ ½
<b>Starring:</b> Michael Fassbender, Carey Mulligan, Lucy Walters
<b>Directed by:</b> Steve McQueen
<b>Other:</b> A Fox Searchlight release. At the Century Centre Cinema in Chicago. Rated NC-17 for nudity, sexual situations and language. 99 minutes