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'9 Songs' mixes graphic sex with rock 'n' roll

By BOB TOWNSEND
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

"Oh, we're so pretty, oh so pretty vacant," singer Johnny Rotten of the Sex Pistols snarled in "Pretty Vacant," one of the British band's most perfectly petulant punk anthems.

Those lyrics might easily describe 21-year-old Lisa (Margo Stilley), the uninhibited and uninhabited female lead character of "9 Songs" — the latest film from British director Michael Winterbottom ("Welcome to Sarajevo," "24 Hour Party People"). They could also explain Lisa's lover, Matt (Kieran O'Brien).

Tartan Films USA

'9 Songs'

B-

The verdict: Explicit sex and "now" bands rock this pretty, vacant art house ditty.

Director: Michael Winterbottom
Starring: Kieran O'Brien, Margot Stilley
Run time: 69 minutes
Release date: July 22, 2005
Rating: Not rated, but includes explicit sex scenes.

On the web
Official movie site

"9 Songs" is controversial because it revels in "real" sex between Stilley and O'Brien — which is erotic in a cold, calculated kind of way, more in tune with the stagy, sexy fashion photos of Helmut Newton than the current crop of verite video porn. And like the jerky, faraway concert footage of tetchy post-punk bands that Winterbottom weaves between shagging sessions, the entire film is constructed to feel emotionally and physically distant — even when it's minutely focused on particular X-rated body parts.

The story of the brief Lisa-and-Matt love affair and breakup unfolds as a series of sketchy remembrances narrated by Matt, an English glaciologist speaking from exile in the icy reaches of Antarctica. Matt first picks up Lisa — a "beautiful, egotistical, careless and crazy" American living in London — at the uber-hip Brixton Academy.

From the start, he sets the film's earnest tone, saying, "When I remember Lisa, I don't think about her clothes, or her work, where she was from, or even what she said. I think of her smell, her taste, her skin touching mine." And, wham-bam, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club pounds out the first of the nine songs that punctuate successive scenes (the Von Bondies and Franz Ferdinand, among others, also appear).

In choosing to tell this tale primarily in explicit physical terms, Winterbottom takes a lot of risks. Sometimes, those risks pay off in visually lyrical moments. Other times, the whole thing breaks down into peep-show parody.

If you're a fan of the "now" bands on the soundtrack or an art film buff (or a dirty old man), "9 Songs" may appeal. Otherwise, you might want to heed another line Rotten spits out in "Pretty Vacant": "I don't believe illusions 'cause too much is real."