New York City. Sofia is a sex therapist who never achieved an orgasm in her life, and senses her marriage with her indifferent husband Rob is dissolving. Attending her therapy is a gay couple, James, a lifeguard, and Jamie, a former child actor. James and Jamie have a threesome with Ceth. James attempts a suicide by taking too many pills and jumping into a swimming pool at night, but is saved by Caleb, a neighbor who has been observing his through the window for years. Caleb and James have sex, and James allows for the first time to be penetrated. Dominatrix Severin slaps Rob's butt, who hides his SM side from Sofia, but Severin doesn't like relationships. At Shortbus, a sex club, Sofia has a threesome with a couple and finally achieves an orgasm.
John Cameron Mitchell's second feature length film as a director, "Shortbus" is an anthology of three stories revolving around sexuality and its role in human relationships. Its flaws are the shaky camera, chaotic editing, the messy episodic structure, a few misguided ideas and occasionally vague character development, yet it has enough virtues and intricate plotting to deserve its existence, and owes a lot to the brave and honest performance by Sook-Yin Lee in the leading role of Sofia. Her character arc is interesting, since she is a sex therapist who, ironically, never achieved an orgasm in her life—while talking with her friend, Severin, in a pool tank, Sofia admits: "I wanna be welcomed into the secret society of women". "Shortbus" is very direct, and thus only suitable for the open-minded, non-conservative viewers: in its opening act, it introduces its main characters through their sexual activity—Sofia has sex with her husband Rob, but only fakes her orgasm; James lies with his head down, and his legs and penis above him, so that after the masturbation he ejaculates into his own mouth, but then becomes depressed and cries, and quickly hides it when his partner Jamie enters the apartment, showing how he has personal problems. James becomes one of the most nunanced characters in the entire film, suffering from child trauma and how he had to hide his gay side in his bigoted small town. His two most memorable lines are when he confesses to Severin: "I look back to things that were when I was 12 years old. I'm still looking for the same things now"; and when he confides to Caleb who saved him from suicide, explaining his relationship with Jamie: "He loves me as hard as the people who treated me like shit". On the other hand, Severin is a pointless character, and the story meanders too much, since the finale is kind of more obfuscated than it is clear.
Grade:++
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