Review: Shame

Professionals cannot agree on what constitutes sex addiction, or whether it is a real disorder, but don't tell that to Brandon (Michael Fassbender) - he's not a well-adjusted man, no matter how you might label what's wrong with him. Sex is meaningless for him, just a means to an end - and even the ends are joyless here. Shame concerns itself with the way Brandon lives day to day, if you can call it living, and what happens when his private world is infringed upon by his younger sister (Carey Mulligan).

Another film about addiction might look very similar to this one - with a central character who sneaks away on breaks at the office to do a line in the men's room, to stay out late shoving chemicals into his body, whose personal relationships are perfunctory or else nonexistant. But the vice here is sex. So Brandon is at all times preoccupied with getting his next 'hit' - he does sneak off at work - to the men's room - but to masturbate. He chums around with his boss (James Badge Dale) to troll for his next lay. He is out all night, screwing wherever and whoever he can. At one point this is not limited to women, and only in this film would that not be a comment on homosexuality. To Brandon, sex has no character, let alone orientation.

Fassbender has been described as courageous for taking on his role in Shame, a second collaboration between himself and director Steve McQueen, and that may be an understatement. There are long, long takes of him doing little, but they gradually steep the audience in his colourless, soulless existence. Fassbender is nude a lot, having sex a lot, and it never ever looks like fun, even a little. He clashes painfully with his sister because she is as much extroverted as he isn't. She interrupts his life of hiding and he deals with it badly. We have seen flashes of this type of performance from him in films like Jane Eyre, or (surprisingly) X-Men: First Class - he's a terrific choice for a tormented anti-hero. He pairs very well with Carey Mulligan, whose performance is not angry, but frustrated. She perfectly captures the way you can love family, the way you have to, because who else will? Of course she needs her brother, too.

These siblings are implied to have shared a past responsible for their deep sadness and dysfunction - Brandon, more quietly, while Sissy stands in lounges and sings her pain aloud. Never will you hear the lines 'I wanna be part of it, New York, New York', with more heartbreak. Their past isn't illuminated for us, the film isn't concerned with that.

The emotions Brandon exhibits, as barely as he does, inform the shape and colour of every scene as executed in camera, editing, and direction. Long takes where the camera barely moves for 7 minutes arrest us while Brandon goes through his day. Similarly, a single shot follows him while he goes for a late night run. We get no reprieve. That contrasts sharply with the moments when he is manic, frustrated and unfulfilled. The editing jumps, suddenly nothing can be done fast enough. The whole experience pulls your feelings around with detachment and volatility. McQueen traps us with Brandon, doesn't let us look away.

If your good moods are fragile, this is impossible to recommend. Roger Ebert put it best when he gave the film four stars then said he could never watch it again.

For more on Shame, listen to this week's Sticks + Stones Podcast, available on the internet (which is everywhere!!) - Also discussed: The Muppets, Take Shelter, Melancholia, and the films we're looking forward to this month. Listen here!