sex, lies, and videotape

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sex, lies, and videotape

74% Liked It
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sex, lies, and videotape

James Spader, Andie MacDowell, Peter Gallagher, Laura San Giacomo, Ron Vawter

Steven Soderbergh's provocative debut film concerns a shy loner who uses a video camera to extract intimate confessions from his married friends.

Id: 10756077

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Recent Reviews

sex, lies, and videotape Recent Reviews
  • irisheyes686
    September 19, 2009
    irisheyes686
    I didn't really care for this movie. It did have a good cast, but it was just really weird and pointless to me.
  • susanriley
    May 31, 2009
    susanriley
    I can appreciate this film as a modern milestone in independent filmmaking. The acting is pretty decent.
  • mrpopcorn
    April 17, 2009
    mrpopcorn
    "Nothing's what I thought it was. John's a bastard. Let's make a videotape."

    A sexually repressed woman's husband is having an affair with her sister. The arrival of a visitor with a rather unusual fetish changes everything

    ...( read more)REVIEW
    For all intensive purposes, this is Steven Soderbergh's directorial debut. That fact is never apparent once throughout the movie - not once. Soderbergh applies his great touch to this movie in very discreet ways. I think the most effective is in the way he sums up an entire relationship by showing quick sequences which feature exchanged glances or small, but revealing, interactions between two characters. That's what I mean about "discreet". He never gets up in your face with this film. He gives the viewer more of a fly-on-the-wall type of point of view. Which is perfect for the subject matter. Soderbergh also wrote (and was nominated for) the script. With all that said, I don't want to overlook the four great performances here by the main cast (James Spader, Peter Gallagher, Andie MacDowell, Laura San Giacomo). For all four of them, I feel it is their best performance ever. Each one of them really nails the character. This is especially true for Spader. At times he's confident, and self-righteous. At times he is desperate and pathetic.

    Great movie.
  • MovieGeek13
    March 19, 2009
    MovieGeek13
    Smart, dialogue-driven piece of cinema where it\s actually a lot of fun to watch all these characters cheat on each other. You start to wonder if this movie had an influence on Closer. James Spader delivers an outstanding performance.
  • ebs90
    January 16, 2009
    ebs90
    There's not much to say about sex, lies, and videotape wihout giving everything away... or perhaps giving everything is the same as giving nothing? Steven Sorderbergh's debut fully grasps the importance of human amibiguities, and thus creates a world full of open possibilities, w...( read more)here currents flow in every direction and with fluctuating intensity. I admire films that manage to craft multidimensional characters, and expose -seemingly effortlessly- how humans are not only one thing, how they can be contradictory, and yet perfect as they are. In sex, lies, and videotape, the four main characters exist in total opposition to our usual custom of labelling people as 'good' or 'bad'. In the lapse of less than 2 hours they manage to make plausible and moving changes that characterize them further as themselves, in all their potential, rather than shift them from 'nice' to 'mean', 'moral' to 'immoral'. That's more than I can say about most films.

    If you don't already know the story, I'd hate to ruin it for you, but a little bit of revealing can do no harm... Sex, Lies, and Videotape is about an unhealthy love triangle and a taboo-brekaing figure that comes into the picture to shatter it. James Spader is spot-on as Graham: perfectly mysterious, somewhat self-conscious, perfectly neither-here-nor-there. His performance never gives away too much or too little about this cryptic character that we don't really get to know all that well, but perhaps just enough. Graham is an old college buddy of John, a rising lawyer who's married to the excessively moral Ann and having an affair with her sister Cynthia. Graham comes clean during the first few minutes in which he is onscreen about his impotence, something that Ann finds fascinating, since she is thoroughly uninterested in sex, and gives his husband a virtually non-existent sex life (which he makes up for with Cynthia). From this point on, every character is on its way to a transgression, during which they refrain from becoming heroes or demi-gods, just happier, more conscious, more open people. Soderbergh puts each of them in confrontation with their fears and guides them to their most logical breaking point -and the entire process is touching, tough, it's deeply involving.

    Peter Gallagher, Laura San Giacomo, Andie MacDowell and James Spader are so fantastic. They act like the people they play (wow), down to every sinlge idiosyncracy, making every line they utter believable and familiar. They are never too classy or too poised or too carefree, they are who they are. Of course, it is greatly thanks to the script, which is intelligent without being witty, engaging without being effectist, and dramatic without going overboard.

    sex, lies, and videotape could be said to be about sex (although there is hardly any actual 'action' onscreen), but it's really about many other issues. I think what those issues might have been for me, could be different for somebody else, and so on. There's plenty to think of when the movie is over. And I think it's best just to lose yourself in it.
  • michaelcorleone
    December 20, 2009
    michaelcorleone
    Steven Soderbergh's masterpiece is a thoughtful dissertation of relationships, a subject which he explores with great insight and sensitivity. The power of this film isn't due to one particular component, but to the marriage of all its strengths. The acting is uniformly superb, S...( read more)oderbergh's direction is enticing and graceful, and the screenplay is downright brilliant. This is one of the great contemporary films to be released in America.
  • Liesebieke
    December 11, 2009
    Liesebieke
    Oh well, I have seen much better dramas than this one.
    The end of the movie was a bit... tricky.
  • TheAfterHours
    December 3, 2009
    TheAfterHours
    Soderbergh gives his usual unique atmosphere style to this film. Slow paced, strong character development and lots of breathing room. With that said, it's a good film. A fine portrait of a marriage falling apart and a new relationship being formed. All actors were in top form...( read more). The ending however, didn't do it for me. It was very anti climatic. However, I'm sure most people will find this indie drama enjoyable.
  • mattdlevy
    December 1, 2009
    mattdlevy
    I honestly do not see what the hype is about. Besides some decent dialogue scene, there is not really much else to say about the movie.
  • ythelastman89
    November 18, 2009
    ythelastman89
    James Spader and Peter Gallagher were so amazing in this. The plot is really interesting and plays with a lot of relevant subjects. The style of film making from Steven Soderbergh is really unique. It has a lot of great character driven moments with fulfilling endings.
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