Movies... Shortbus

So! Being the weirdo that I claim to be with every ounce of pride and dignity I have, yet again, added a new oddball treasure to my trunk. Shortbus a film by John Cameron, is that treasure.

ABOUT THE FILM

John Cameron Mitchell’s SHORTBUS explores the lives of several emotionally challenged characters as they navigate the comic and tragic intersections between love and sex in and around a modern-day underground salon. A sex therapist who has never had an orgasm, a dominatrix who is unable to connect, a gay couple who are deciding whether to open up their relationship, and the people who weave in and out of their lives, all converge on a weekly gathering called Shortbus: a mad nexus of art, music, politics and polysexual carnality. Set in a post-9/11, Bush-exhausted New York City, SHORTBUS tells its story with sexual frankness, suggesting new ways to reconcile questions of the mind, pleasures of the flesh and imperatives of the heart. ::{From the official website}::

What did I think of the movie? I thought it was heart invoking. I honestly saw past the erections and tits and saw the deeper meaning that echoed throughout the entire film. It made me realize a few things about myself that I had not known. One of which happens to be just how uptight I had grown up to be about sex. It is just sex, people. I do not understand why such a beautiful and all-be-it necessary facet of human kind has been tainted and trashed and turned into tabboo. It took me a long time to be able to trust someone enough to let them give me an orgasm. It wasn't until I started turning sex into a fun game that is lighthearted and inocent that I began to open up and express myself to my full potential sexually. When I first started having sex I thought I was a slut. Granted, I flaunted my slutiness like a rainbow flag at a gay pride parade, but nonetheless, it was still tabboo in my mind. I could talk about it, sing about it, think about it and read and write about it. But, when it came down to that pivitol moment when I was to surrender and have fun, I turned it into a chore. I made it into an overwhelmingly emotional experience. Sex has to have some emotion, yes, but I had it all messed up. I always acted like I was at a funeral or that it was the last fuck I would ever have, like a last meal for prison inmates on death row. I felt like a prisoner, a criminal. Then, magically someone along the road taught me that sex was not an emotional tug of war or a race to the finish line. They tought me that sex is a playful, childlike dance between two people that love each other. Now, the type of love I am referring to is the kind of love that we all share as part of a global society. Sex is something shared between people who love each other because they are there, together, as people of the earth basically. You have love for your own kind is what I am saying and in sex, that love is intesified and able to be expressed through a very good receptical act.

In this movie a sex therapist is having issues with her climax capabilities. More specifically, her lack of those capabilities. I began to relate to her as soon as I found out what she was trying to overcome. See... an orgasm is a very delicate plant. You want to be gentle with it at first. You want to water it a little bit and touch it softly. You need to give it a chance to let it grow. You cannot chop it off and build a log cabin out of it in the beginning. You are just going to realize you killed a perfectly healthy and beautiful potential and need to start all over again. Sexual experimentation is the only way to help your tree grow tall and strong. It is all about progress and development. I used to be so timid about sex that it would take me hours to get off. Now I can spray myself in the face on command. Sorry to be so exclicit. But did you forget whose blog you are reading?

Needless to say, I related to the latter character. The others I didn't so much. Not that I couldn't learn from them or understand(somewhat.. most of what... a little what) what was going on, but I could not place myself in the others' shoes and feel like they were my own. I couldn't realate to the gay couple or the gay model. I think that is just a slap in the face for stereotypes. Sorry, off on a trailing thought for a moment. I'm back now. So, this film really touched me. Or did I touch myself? Or did a buddy touch me? Or did he touch himself? What was I talking about? Oh yes! I am an emotional sponge. I soak up whatever people are throwing out there and it becomes me for a while until someone squeezes me the right way and it all seeps out. Maybe that conjured up some awful images. Maybe some pleasure invoking ones. I don't know. Either way, this is the seepage. I soaked up every drop of this film and in the following few days I will be thinking about it and projecting the ambience of it. Hopefully it doesn't get me into too much trouble.( haha )

So. There was my shortanalysis of Shortbus. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did! If you have not seen this yet, go buy it. You cannot rent it anywhere I don't think and there are no freeby sites that is has leaked to. So, go ahead, be old fashioned just this once. It is so worth it! :::Buy, watch and enjoy:::