What’s notable (to me at least) about the sex in SHORTBUS is that in the beginning of the film, when the sex is unsatisfying, alienated, etc, it’s rendered in explicit detail. At the end of the movie, when the sex is connecting and nourishing, the photography becomes quite coy. In that respect, SHORTBUS follows the stock-standard formula for showing explicit sex — it’s only worth looking at sex if it’s bad/damaging/unconnected/etc. Given JCM professions about his own feelings/history around sex it’s not so surprising.

RE: Comic books

I think the freedom and creativity you see in comics is a direct result of economics; a few pens, some paper, and searing desire to create and anyone can produce a comic book. It simply doesn’t require the same marshaling of resources that making a film requires.

Similarly, there is a lot of very excellent still photography that tackles sex head-on, but this is almost always undertaken as a side project by photographers who make their money doing something else. Again, the resources required to makes stills are orders or magnitude smaller that making even small films.

Glad to know you’re still reading!

Is the art-house approach to sexuality necessarily bleak? I guess Shortbus was a break to that, but what it makes up in humor it loses in eroticism. However, when I hear someone describe the film as “just porn” I’m always surprised. What’s amazing to me about that film is that the sexuality appeared to have brought out a trust in the performers that isn’t commonly seen, if ever. And perhaps if people still call it “porn” (especially since I don’t find the sex titillating at all) there’s a discussion in there.

On the whole though, doesn’t the cinema’s barren approach to sexuality reflect the lack of discussion that society has put into it? That we feel that sex is a “dangerous topic,” means that we associate it with darkness. It seems to me that many folks feel the need to talk about sexuality in hushed tones and thanks to you for endorsing a more open view.

Perhaps strangely, I find the occasional joyful sex trip in comics more than cinema. Even though I grow tired of the industry on the whole, it does seem to have room for folks who couldn’t (or don’t want to) get their stories told anywhere else. A couple of light-hearted porn strips like Xxxenophile or Small Favors makes the porn comics world worthwhile. I still want to see serious discussion of Alan Moore and Melinda Gebbie’s Lost Girls.

Thanks for the brain-food. I’m still at the table.