ASIN B000BGH29K
Rent this now from Netflix
also available to buy ($24.99) from
Amazon
Reviewed by Gary Meyer
(01/18/06)
Porn is a genre, not a pejorative, a genre most simply defined as the belief that sex has value in and of itself. As in any genre, there's good porn and bad porn. 9 Songs is great porn. Is it a great movie? Whether it's a movie at all -- as opposed to a bunch of stuff scotch-taped together -- is debatable. Don't expect traditional narrative values like plot and character development. Think of it as rock concert interludes between a collage of moments in a sexual relationship, moments so explicit, natural, and intimate that they make you feel more like a voyeur than a movie viewer.
Matt (Kieran O'Brien) and Lisa (Margo Stilley) meet at a Black Rebel Motorcycle Club performance in London. They immediately fall in lust. He's a ruggedly handsome glaciolologist, which allows director Michael Winterbottom (24 Hour Party People, The Claim, Jude) to insert occasional Antarctic icescapes -- luckily sans penguins -- and pseudo-profundities about the timeless existential void, material which almost seems designed to add sufficient educational value to evade obscenity prosecution.
She's a somewhat younger American in London for a while. Matt describes Lisa: "She was 21. Beautiful, egotistical (he should know), careless, and crazy." He's a good cook. She works at a bar. They enjoy rock concerts. They're sexually adventurous. That's pretty much all we learn about them.
Only snatches of the eponymous song performances are shown, as brief as the snippets of sex, concision mandated by the scanty nature of the entire project -- the closing credits start rolling at 1:05. But in addition to the sex, 9 Songs gets several things very right, starting with the concerts themselves, those psychedelic strobe-lit rainbow-glory dancing-in-place tribal rites of communal ecstasy. Among the featured performers are The Von Bondies, The Dandy Warhols, Super Furry Animals, Elbow, Primal Scream, and Michael Nyman. Lisa observes, "Only unhappy people are bad dancers." And what's wrong with dedicating your off-hours to sex, occasional cocaine, and rock and roll?
It's beautifully shot -- the cinematography (Marcel Zyskind) is all about light, whether lingering on the sun-dappled bodies of the lovers, sheening their surfaces, highlighting their curves, or careening around the harshly spotlit concert crowd, their faces shaded red and blue and green.
The many memorable sexual moments include: a close-up of Matt's hand squeezing Lisa's taut young breast, pulling on it so the nipple snaps back when it's released; the foot-job she gives his erect cock in the bathtub; and, heaven be praised, some non-clichéd fellatio for once, with a non-clichéd come shot as she pumps him out onto his belly.
They take turns on the bottom for some kinky role play that excites them both tremendously. Lisa's blindfolded bondage experience begins with light-hearted banter, but frees her like nothing else. Matt urges her: "Forget who you are. Forget where you are." This scene is the film's centerpiece and the longest sex episode. He spins a fantasy of her being watched by strangers. While he goes down on her, she elaborates on it between gasps and sighs. The close-up of her face, a black sash across her eyes and her mouth struggling to speak while contorting in pleasure, is one of he sexiest things you'll ever see.
In another blindfold session, he gently throttles her throat. She tells him, "Do it harder," then leads his hand down between her legs. Later, he's tied to the bed while she walks on him and prods his package with her knee-length black leather spike-heeled boots. Many boot fanciers will rent the DVD for just this scene.
Matt takes a break from cooking to watch Lisa buzz herself off, listening to her orgasmic groans. He gives a man-of-the-world shrug and goes back to the kitchen.
They share a lap dance at a strip club. The musicians, Matt's briefly glimpsed tent mate, and the stripper are the only other characters in the film.
Matt and Lisa's dialogue is banal, non-committal, as if it would be unhip to become emotionally involved. He seems to push her away at every turn:
"Did you put sugar in my tea?"
"Possibly."
"Do you think I look like a boy?"
"Yeah, that's why I like you."
"I'm gonna take a shower."
"You should do; you stink."
Though she can be just as distant. When Matt asks about Thanksgiving plans, Lisa assures him that he wouldn't like the American friends she's spending it with.
They're sad sometimes and have a spat or two, thought it's unclear exactly why. Based on the barest of hints we're offered, we can't begin to fathom what's happening in their relationship. We wonder if they'd even describe it as a relationship. The I-love-yous they exchange after he plunges naked into frigid surf to prove his devotion seem deeply ironic.
It's all so casual, low-key, and verité that the sex is very convincing -- we don't feel like we're watching actors play a sex scene. With their cool, naturalistic performances when they're not blending bodies, it never seems staged. That the actors are obviously having real sex with real penetration, emphasized by their use of condoms, adds to the voyeuristic verisimilitude. They seem naturally graceful, never choreographed or tedious.
9 Songs is perfect third-date cinematic wallpaper. Put it on repeat and you can catch a little ecstatic sex and music while you're catching your breath between your own escapades. Like Matt and Lisa's relationship, it's not important how it begins and ends, where it came from, or where it's going. What matters is the moment, and if the moment's good enough, that's all that matters.
