PLOT, SCHMOT, IT’S THE SKIN THAT REELS THEM IN: ATOM EGOYAN IS DISTRAUGHT

The Toronto Star
September 22, 2005 Thursday

His latest movie includes a scene depicting non-traditional sex,
which is a shifting concept since almost every depiction of sex in
movies these days was once considered non-traditional but now amounts
to the new missionary position.

So let me rephrase that. His latest movie includes a scene depicting
not-yet-traditional sex: two men, one woman, going at it gangbusters,
directed – and acted – with what reviewers salute as scrupulous
attention to detail.

The way things are going, and once the United Church gets involved,
if he had waited until a few years from now and turned out the
identical scene, it would be regarded as a sentimental presentation
of contemporary spousal obligations being fulfilled by a happily
married triple.

For the moment, however, it’s a dirty part.

While I have never seen an Atom Egoyan movie, one that has cinema
buffs hyperventilating because there is a dirty part in it, as opposed
to because there is a cri de coeur for a lost Armenian homeland,
tweaked my interest.

It’s the only reason I’ve ever gone to movies.

Yet it turns out to be Atom Egoyan’s black capsule.