Sexual Life (2005)

User Rating:

5.0/10   

Director:

Ken Kwapis

Writer (WGA):

Ken Kwapis (written by)

Genre:

Comedy | Drama

Tagline:

One fling leads to another!

Plot:

Disparate individuals rationalize their infidelities. |

Plot Keywords:

Infidelity | Argument | Camera | Virginity | Sex Outside

Awards:

1 win

Cast

Azura Skye	...	Lorna
Annie Heller	...	Cafe Waitress
Carla Gallo	...	Terri
Tom Everett Scott	...	Todd
Kevin Corrigan	...	Phil
Elizabeth Banks	...	Sarah
Fionnula Flanagan	...	Grandmother
James LeGros	...	Josh
Carmen Plumb	...	Pharmacy Girl
Anne Heche	...	Gwen
Shirley Knight	...	Joanna
Eion Bailey	...	David
Steven Weber	...	David Wharton
AmyKate Storey	...	Waitress (as Amy Kate Storey)
Tadashi Kondo	...	Desk Clerk

MPAA:

Rated R for strong sexuality including dialogue, and for language.

Runtime:

USA:96 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Certification:

Australia:MA | USA:R

Filming Locations:

Los Angeles, California, USA

Trivia:

Much of the film was shot at the now demolished Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles.

Movie Connections:

References Così fan tutte (1992)

A Clever if Acidic Dialogue About Relationships

Writer/Director Ken Kwapis ('About a Boy', 'Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants', episodes on TV series 'ER', 'The Office', 'Malcolm in the Middle', etc) knows his ways around the ups and downs of contemporary relationships, weighing the importance of the physical aspect of the union against the para-physical benefits and makes no prescription for which is of more importance. SEXUAL LIFE explores several couples whose married or about to be married status receives the testing of infidelity.

A wedding photographer is frustrated with his executive girlfriend's lack of intimacy and seeks physical satisfaction through an upscale prostitute who has her own rather solid ground views of her business. The photographer's girlfriend is finding physical satisfaction with her married architect boss who in turn is trying to hide his infidelity from his wife who in turn feels she must seek outside satisfaction with an old college flame who happens to be gay and she turns to a hotel clerk at the point of a fantasy liaison for gratification. The hotel clerk happens to be having an affair with an engaged African American girl and is frustrated about her impending marriage to a frustratedly 'correct' African American male who feels he is following a proscribed duty and seeks attention from the prostitute who opens the whole story. How these intersecting couples work out their dilemmas and resolve their individual needs for expanded physical needs in the presence of the safety of relationships is the clever puzzle Kwapis presents - with the conclusions primarily left up to us, the viewers.

The cast is homogeneously fine and attractive - Eion Bailey, Elizabeth Banks, Fionnula Flanagan, Anne Heche, Dule Hill, Sam Jaeger, Kerry Washington, Steven Weber, Steven Williams, Shirley Knight, James LeGros, Tom Everett Scott, and Azura Skye along with the minor characters. Kwapis keeps the flow integrated so that the story does indeed seem like a series of coincidences. The sexual scenes are more suggested than graphic and should not offend even the most skeptical viewer. This was, after all, a movie made for Showtime TV, but it stands very well as a tightly conceived and acted lesson about relationships. Well worth watching. Grady Harp