Lie with Me (2005)

(On Cable TV, November 2022) Mainstream movies stopped being erotic in the 1990s for a variety of factors, both economic and politically reactionary. But that just means that the raw erotic film went slightly underground—in low-budget productions of dramatic (rather than exploitative) interest made for film festivals and arthouse theatres. This being said, tagging Lie with Me as being “of dramatic interest” or being mentioned in the same breath as “art house” is pushing it—this romantic drama about a woman with an oversized sexual appetite and her difficult relationship with a man perhaps too well suited to her is clearly meant to be more introspective than exploitative… but still feels voyeuristic and jejune in many ways. This low-budget Canadian production features Lauren Lee Smith in the lead role (in a performance that most will correctly describe as brave, and that from the first self-pleasuring moments) with Eric Balfour in the main male supporting role. The two main characters’ relationship may or may not be healthy—at best it’s the kind of thing that will get older viewers muttering, “Eh, young people these days” (even if the film is now old enough to drink in some jurisdictions). Writer-director Clement Virgo takes a big chance by featuring un-simulated on-camera sex, but as it turns out, Lie with Me is more undone by a meandering, frustrating third act (and an overall dramatic arc that’s far more conventional than its sexy images or edgy characters would suggest) than from the frank way it’s presented. I liked the matter-of-fact presentation of Toronto’s The Annex neighbourhood, and that the film boldly goes where mainstream cinema is really afraid to go. Unfortunately, there’s a hard limit to the material being used here, and Lie with Me isn’t quite capable of creating empathy with its outlandish characters.