9 Songs

Shortbus (Unrated Edition)
$27.98
Sofia (Sook-Yin Lee) is a relationship's expert. Her husband Rob (Raphael Barker) open this film with a very graphic sexual encounter. Whilst Sofia finds the sex satisfying, ironically, given her profession, she is yet to have an orgasm. This quest becomes one of the themes of the film.

She meets clients James (Paul Dawson - who looks a lot like Mark Whalberg) and Jamie (PJ DeBoy), a gay couple having their own relationship problems. They recommend to her to attend a club called "Shortbus" which is an anything goes sex club.

Sofia protests to all that she is in a very happy relationship with her husband, whom she loves. Her relationship with him seems to be happy. She stumbles upon a group of lesbians including Severin (aka Jennifer) (Lindsay Beamish) who we see earlier in the film as a dominatrix. Severin can't form a relationship with anyone. Sofia breaches professional guidelines by both acting as counsellor for Severin, and having sex with her.

That's the problem with this film. Whilst it is trying to promote a 'guilt-free' sex enviornment ultimately several of the lead characters continue to have relationship problems. All they end up doing is realigning their sex partners. This then becomes the social engineering message of the film. That: relationships don't matter, sex does. I found this annoying given that the film argues against itself in that several of the characters still desire to have relationships. Sure James and Jamie become a foursome (with the addition of Caleb, their stalker (Peter Stickles) and Ceth (Jay Brannan)), but the others do not progress to their own desired outcome. A celebratory sing-along at Shortbus at the end of the film does nothing to hide this point.

Lie With Me
$7.99
There is just not much going on here. It's not strong at anything. Perhaps a candidate for a drive-in classic but where is the real tragedy ?

9 Songs
$25.48
This movie has all three. Personally, I could do without the rock'n'roll and the drugs don't do much for me, but the sex scenes are the best I can remember seeing. They involve two people whom I would probably like if I knew them, they don't go in for arrogant or slutty behaviour and their lovemaking is not impossibly prolonged or athletic. And of course, it's not simulated. It may seem odd to praise a film entirely on the sex it contains but, given the paucity of similar erotica elsewhere, I find this one outstanding. I suppose one could rip the disc and edit out the concerts, though that would further dilute the sketchy story line that exists in the uncut version.

9 songs - Unrated Edited Version
$19.99
This movie has all three. Personally, I could do without the rock'n'roll and the drugs don't do much for me, but the sex scenes are the best I can remember seeing. They involve two people whom I would probably like if I knew them, they don't go in for arrogant or slutty behaviour and their lovemaking is not impossibly prolonged or athletic. And of course, it's not simulated. It may seem odd to praise a film entirely on the sex it contains but, given the paucity of similar erotica elsewhere, I find this one outstanding. I suppose one could rip the disc and edit out the concerts, though that would further dilute the sketchy story line that exists in the uncut version.