Cover the kids’ ears, because this is a movie for adults. It’s called I Want Your Sex, and it really means it.
We open with the sounds of a man who’s obviously deep in the throes of passion, except that when the picture comes on screen, that’s absolutely not what’s happening, and what’s more, he’s probably in big trouble. It’s the first moment that made me laugh out loud in a film that’s maybe not chock full of such moments, but that has enough to stay plenty entertaining while also being a full-throated endorsement of sex, sex, sex.
We quickly jump from the opening of the film to an earlier point in time, which is what all movies seem to do these days, but at least this one makes a cute joke out of it. Our hero is Cooper Hoffman, who you may remember from 2021’s Licorice Pizza, although he’s a far less confident character here. He’s in his early 20s, and he gets hired to be an assistant for a brash artist played by Olivia Wilde, who immediately clocks Hoffman as being pliable enough to be a perfect sex toy, and things get really wild as she dominates him in every aspect of life. It all leads to an inevitable collapse, largely because of the increasingly bizarre domination and eventual desperation Wilde has as an artist.
I’m not sure anyone really learns anything except that celebrating sex can actually be a good thing, and this last part is because the movie is made by Gregg Araki, who emerged in the 1990s as part of the New Queer Cinema movement, and who’s unabashed in his brightly colored, bold approach to sex and comedy. He says he kept reading that Gen Z wasn’t having enough sex, and whether that’s true or not, it inspired him to make this film. Cooper Hoffman and especially Olivia Wilde are fantastic, and even if some of Araki’s schtick eventually wears just a little thin, the guy makes the movie he wants to make. And if it all makes us a bit less afraid of seeing sex on screen, well, mission accomplished.
I Want Your Sex is in theaters.
