Shame

A raw, relentless film about a man controlled by urges and addiction, Shame is a troubling but vital picture. Steve McQueen’s movie is about as potent and gutsy a movie I’ve seen in a long time and it leaves very little aside as it probes the world of sex addiction. It more than earns its NC-17 rating, showing a world that is indisputably sexual but far from alluring.

Pushing the boundaries for the sake of “being sexy” is far from the aim of Shame, but there is no other way to tell the story or present the character. We have to witness unembellished authenticity and it has to be unkind; we have to see it for what it is and not what a fantasy would command.

Michael Fassbender is Brandon, a good-looking man in his thirties living in a spotless, blank apartment in New York. He has a job doing something that requires him to have an office with a computer. His computer is filled with porn, as is the apartment. Brandon goes out drinking with his boss (James Badge) sometimes and scores with women that his boss can’t pick up. He also hires prostitutes when he can’t pick up women. The porn fills the gaps.

Brandon’s world is relatively contained and people don’t get too close. Women are a means to an end, so when his sister Sissy (Carey Mulligan) arrives all hell seems primed to break loose. The two siblings share a distance that isn’t helped by the fact that she now needs to crash at Brandon’s. For him, this couldn’t be a worse situation.

Brandon’s compulsion is a cloistered one. Women are by and large unidentified, sometimes even featureless, and he has no interest in a customary relationship. He, in perhaps a stronger moment, links carnal fitness with care and compassion when he’s out with a coworker (Nicole Beharie). Marriage is for the birds, he says. It isn’t “realistic.”

Fassbender leaves everything on screen in this picture. So does Mulligan. It is no accident that the first time we see each of them, they are fully naked. The two performers move well beyond the corporeal bareness, uncorking the bottle on two lives gone wrong. Sissy tries to be a lifeline for Brandon because she knows his troubles (somewhat), but Brandon wants to keep the door closed at all costs. He pushes her away and it seems like the two have hiked this trail many times before.

McQueen realizes that there are no easy answers for his characters. There is no aha moment where everything just gets “better” for the sake of inspiration. There is much misery, but more than anything there is an absolute sense of disgrace prowling inside Brandon’s mind. He can’t escape it. He’s not proud of it and he sure as hell doesn’t fancy himself some sort of bed-hopping lothario.

Shame is not easy to watch. Much will be made of the nudity and the sex scenes, but they are mechanical and cold-blooded. There is a tick of unpolluted desire, sure, but most of McQueen’s film runs to discreet heights of desperation. Brandon writhes with the burden alone because he doesn’t know how to do anything else.

Shame treats sex addiction seriously. It knows that it is not a punchline and it is not trivial. It is anguish, a pitiful sequence that must be repeated even as the rancorous bile sets in and the self-hate follows. McQueen demonstrates its impact with audacity and surprising kindness, presenting an important film that is particularly perceptive in this realm of carnal inundation.

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