The sessions (2012)
Director: Ben Lewin
Writer: Ben
Lewin, Mark O'Brien (article)
With: John
Hawkes, Helen Hunt, William H. Macy
Duration: USA
Production: 95’
One of the words that
pop up in your head watching this movie is heartbreaking
honesty.
Characterized as the
Festival Hit of the year, “The Sessions” made an impression on the crowd for
its obvious - almost unintentionally looking - naivety. It had gained an Oscar
nomination for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role for the indeed
extraordinary Helen Hunt and some more Festival awards with most important that
of Sundance (Audience Award and Special Jury Prize).
Based on the article
of Mark O'Brien, the same person we see on screen, the same unique character
that suffered from polio at age of 6 and used an iron lung until his death, the
true, inspiring story of a man who wanted to experience life in its full
extent. A man who was craving for real love, for true feelings of affection and
wanted to know everything about the magic of making love.
Mark is living a peaceful
life at his house. He has a special lady to clean him up, help him shop his
vintage shirts and feed him. After not feeling comfortable with his latest
assistant, he goes on a hunt of finding the perfect candidate. Through this
process he realizes how much he wants to seize being a virgin. How much he truly wants to experience sexual intercourse,
aka having sex.
He is a devoted
Catholic and with the ethical guide of his priest he decides to take this
journey and hire a sex surrogate. The priest, such an amusing character given
by William H. Macy, is his listener, his way of making amends with God himself,
but most of all is his true friend who watches a grown disabled man with a pure
heart to wish for something so natural and normal. He deletes any kind of
religious boundaries and manages to advise him as a true friend.
After he already
decided to act upon his decision to have sex and feel real love, he contacts his
therapist who introduces him to Cheryl Cohen-Greene, a professional sex
surrogate who has a normal, conventional life. The relationship they create
will change them both. To his journey towards manhood, Mark discovers how he
can love, how he can express himself and his tortured body.
And then except Helen
Hunt, you get an astonishing performance by John Hawkes. His facial expressions
of a simple, honest, full of humor disabled man transfer the uniqueness of this
true story into our own eyes as we watch his life transforming into the
beautiful experience it can be. By fulfilling only this simple wish, which for
any other is something so “easy to get”, he is finally the person who always
wanted to be – complete. Complete with love, sex, emotions, moments, happiness
and life, no matter the difficulties.
The simplicity that accompanies
The Sessions’ direction by Ben Lewin can be shown in the clean shots of his
characters. The colorful universe Mark lives in, even if for some can provoke
pity, Lewin manages to convey exactly the opposite. He makes you feel proud and
admire Mark for his integrity, his way of thinking, his romance, his own
extraordinary life.
The talent of Mark
deleting any kind of awkwardness and taboo concerning sex and its content is
also the director’s talent not to make it look weird in any context. Mark and his
character win everyone over with his innocence, his ignorance, his unlikeness. He
is sweet and so unpredictable beautiful, a beauty that comes from inside and
glows on the outside. What if he is marked by the “disabled” tag, the people and
their lives he touched with his simplicity are living proof that tags and
people don’t match.
Mark’s story is a
constant lesson to all of us who seek perfection and happiness in a life that
is most of all beautiful and interesting just the way it is.
