Homme au bain

It's impossible to know just how close to 'honesty' Christophe Honore comes in his film "Man at Bath" since this study of a gay relationship on the rocks gives us a set of characters that, if we relate to them at all, we do so with a fair amount of distaste. This is a very sexually explicit film but it is a film without love; the only character capable of love, you think, is Emmanuel and he's been denied it and in turn denies it to others. He's played by the gay porn star Francois Sagat with a reasonable degree of empathy; at least he's the only character on screen with whom you might identify with emotionally. Otherwise this film, which is also concerned with filmmaking as a livelihood and the process of 'acting' in general, is masturbatory in all the wrong ways. I am sure there must be a point to it as well as an audience but right now it's difficult to see either. On the plus side at least, one character has the good taste to read "Franny and Zooey" though he does so in the bath.