Interview: On Casting and Politics of Sex with the Director of "The Sessions"

Amir here. TIFF has been over for more than a month but I still have one interview left to share with you. With The Sessions opening in theaters today, it was the perfect time to share my chat with Ben Lewin, the film's director. We touched upon everything from the politics of sex and nudity in Hollywood to the influence of his own experience with polio on building the character of Mark O'Brien. It's a film I encourage everyone to see because it's surprisingly funny and incredibly heartfelt, and features two of the strongest lead performances of the year. (In case you missed these back in September, here's my review of the film and my interview with one of its stars, William H. Macy.)

 

Amir for TFE: I can’t think of a better place to start the interview than nudity.

Ben Lewin: Neither can I!

Amir: Because, in general I’ve been accustomed to seeing certain types of people have sex on screen in Hollywood films and everyone else’s sex life is barely ever shown, as if, you know, people in their 40s or black people don’t have sex. It’s unbelievable and I really appreciate that we get to see something very different here. Was the film always so explicit since the idea was conceived in your head?

Ben: I think if you read Mark O’Brien’s article, there’s no other way. The essence of it was that he was learning the ABCs, what goes where, what do you do, and I think the explicitness is part of revealing his naiveté and how childlike he was when it came to sex. I was only keeping faithful to his original work, which was really what inspired me. Every time I felt like I was losing my way in the script, I’d go back to his text and rediscover what turned me on in the first place. The first thing that struck me when I read it was the frankness. The explicitness doesn’t make it sexier, it just makes it more ordinary.

My point exactly! Everybody at every age does it. You don’t have to look like a star.

I’d never imagined myself going there though...[MORE]

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The Edge of Linky

Geekologie What if Disney villains had won? Fun illustrations of our favorites including Ursula & Maleficent 
Pajiba reads my mind on the Olivia Newton-John / John Travolta Christmas Album !!! Well they read my mind except the part where the article is all obsessed about John Travolta's fake hair instead of Sandy & Danny reunited again! 
Film Dr 10 Notes on Looper and the reciprocal nature of violence
Fleshbot *NSFW* Daniel Radcliffe gets naked for The F Word and Kill Your Darlings. After this and Equus... maybe he's telling us he's a naturist? 

Gawker Liam Neeson does his naked part for charity on "Ellen"
Badass Digest interesting piece on the splintering of pop culture. Film may no longer rule, but neither does anything else.
Playbill Miss Pettigrew Lives For a Day, the musically inclined feature that starred Frances McDormand, Amy Adams and Lee Pace may be headed for the Broadway musical stage 
In Contention Beasts of the Southern Wild won't be honored at the SAG Awards who have ruled it ineligible. This could put a dent in Quvenzhané Wallis Best Actress hopes if you ask me since SAG has historically liked little girl performances even more than Oscar.

Team Experience
Pop Elegantarium Alexa loves Looper and Looper paintings by the director's brother
Stale Popcorn Glenn kicks off a miniseries 31 Horrors with Cat People (1982)
MNPP JA loves Barry Levinson's The Bay 
Serious Film Michael survives ocean storms with The Life of Pi 

Exit Music
The hilarious Rebel Wilson sang from her "breast voice" for her Pitch Perfect audition

LaBeouf in the Buff

I know this is old news but this song by Sigur Rós has been stuck in my head all week and hurts my heart (in the good way). Also I love the NSFW music video.

This is exactly what would happen if Kate Bush and Shame's Steve McQueen had angry sex after a screening of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (they both hated it) and then nine months later a music video shaped baby was born.

Hit Me With Your Best Shot: "Pink Narcissus"

In the Best Shot series we challenge participants to watch a pre-selected movie and choose what they think is the best shot... according to their own fluctuating rules about what "best" means. Next week we return to widely seen classics with The Royal Tenenbaums (2001) -- will you join us? --  but this week I wanted to challenge everyone with an influential avant-garde gay indie known as Pink Narcissus (1971). 

original newspaper ad... cinema village still shows hard to see movies. "MARGARET" played there recently

You can see modern echos or just plain stealing from Pink Narcissus in everything from Michel Gondry music videos to Pierre et Gilles celebrity portraiture. I like to imagine that it's a movie the young Todd Haynes watched non-stop before making Superstar, his Karen Carpenter biopic with Barbie dolls. Truly creative artists, don't need a big budget. They just need the will to make art. Even if it takes them years with their friends (see also: David Lynch's INLAND EMPIRE)

Due to the adult nature of the material this NSFW edition has to go after the jump.

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Stripper of the Day: "Ricky The Rocket"

While "Magic Mike" is in theaters we're looking back at memorable movie strippers

It's hard to know what possessed Oscar winning director John Avildsen to make the very trashy A Night in Heaven (1983), and less than a decade after his Rocky triumph at that. But make it he did. This one time paycable regular is about a schoolmarm community college professor named Faye (Lesley Ann Warren) who falls for a student named Rick (Christopher Atkins) once she sees, uh, more of him at her local bar's Ladie's Night. It takes place in Florida and considering that this is the only major theatrical motion picture about a male stripper before Magic Mike which also takes place there, does this mean that Florida is the capital of pelvic thrusts and loincloths... or just ceaselessly horny?

By day Rick's cocky glibness irritates Faye in speech class where she flunks him. But by night she discovers that he's "Ricky The Rocket", a star attraction. Ricky The Rocket immediately recognizes her during his space-age routine and in the film's cleverest visual beat, he's temporarily backlit by a halo as he moves toward her. 

His body may be heavenly but Rickie is no angel.  And he's definitely not safe for (Faye's) work...

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