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JUSTIN TANNER REVIEWS GOOD LUCK TO YOU, LEO GRANDE
Talking about a woman’s pleasure is one of the last great taboos in our culture. Which makes sense: it’s something men can’t control, or — from all appearances — have any idea how to go about achieving. “Good Luck To You, Leo Grande” — with its steadfast determination to not only show us a male sex-worker as a fully functioning human being and positive role model, but to also place front and center the story of a woman seeking (and finding) her own pleasure — is not only a great fucking film, it represents something on the lines of a cinematic revolution. Over a series of transactional encounters in an austere, grey-hued hotel room, they talk about sex, body-shame, the horrors of a loveless marriage, the pressures of living a secret life, family, children, motherhood, career, education; a novel’s worth of big ideas, expressed in the utterly true, rich dialog of Katy Brand’s generous script, and directed with effortless clarity and kindness (and an eye for the telling detail) by Sophie Hyde. And though most of the action takes place inside a hotel room, the actors are so alive, the editing so seamlessly embroidered to their every move and gesture, that at times it’s as exciting and breathless as a high-speed chase.
At first, Thompson suppresses her natural warmth and easy charm to play a woman who simply wants to get the sexual encounter over and done with. “I’m just not very good at waiting for things to happen. I’m much better when I — when they’ve happened and I’m — recovering,” she says, managing to wring multiple laughs out of the line. But there’s an exhausted loneliness about Nancy that seems like an immovable weight. Though Leo tries his best — and he is an ace at providing calm reassurance with absolutely honesty, the hallmark of a great sex worker — she’s already given up. And yet there’s a tiny, wafer-thin shred of hope gleaming underneath all her “preparing for the worst” bravado. And Leo, with gentle constancy, nurtures this hope, calms her fears, relaxes her tightness and starts to break through. But nothing goes as expected: The film may have Tennessee Williams’ “Sweet Bird of Youth” and N. Richard Nash’s “The Rainmaker” in its theatrical DNA, but where it takes us and how it gets us there is something altogether new, and constantly surprising. Thompson is both a deeply instinctual actor (who brings a natural, lived-in quality to her work), and a meticulous craftsperson (with impeccable comic timing and an ability to shape a scene and build a performance that is seamless and astonishing to behold). But McCormack, whose character’s job is to be as even-natured as possible, actually has the tougher role. He only has one motivation to play: Make the client happy. And yet his eyes (and preternaturally expressive mouth) adjust with every word Thompson says, registering tiny shifts of hurt, pride, surprise and anger with clarity and nuance. When she says casually “I’ve never bought anyone before,” he corrects her in the gentlest way but with absolute directness: “You haven’t bought me, you’ve bought my service.” Every time her rather reductive understanding about what it is they’re both up to encroaches on his work ethic, or frames his life choices as the result of victimhood or exploitation, he sets her straight. And slowly, their mutual enlightenment leads to a deeper understanding; the intimacy and trust grows, the clothes come off and the sexual education begins. From 1913’s “Traffic in Souls” to last year’s “Zola,” the film industry has leaned almost exclusively into the darker, more exploitative aspects of sex work, rarely taking on the subject without weighing it down with outside issues like murder (“American Gigolo”, “Klute”), class warfare (”Waterloo Bridge”, “Pretty Woman”) drug abuse (”Last Exit to Brooklyn”, “My Own Private Idaho”) and sex-trafficking (”Lilyas-4-Ever”,“Zola”).
Which makes “Good Luck To You, Leo Grande”, with its exhilarating absence of judgement and shame — and it’s sensibly presented case for legalization — a breath of fresh air. It also gets points for accuracy: In the 1990’s I made a lot of money writing for TV. And with too much disposable income lying around (and no boyfriend) I’d often find myself downtown in some blank, sterile hotel room, raiding the minibar and waiting for that inevitable knock on the door. It’s a specific and thrilling dynamic that’s cried out for dramatization. But with the exception of “Living Out Loud,” Richard LaGravanese’s under-appreciated 1998 film — in which Holly Hunter gets a happy massage from the delicious Eddie Cibrian — Hollywood has almost never gotten it right. Until now. Sex can still shock us. It shouldn’t, but it does. Pleasure is suspect, it’s inevitably attached to shame or guilt. At least it is to my generation. But Thompson, McCormick, Hyde and Brand (with an invaluable assist from editor Bryan Mason) bypass all that baggage. And by doing so provide the kind of cathartic release that only comes from seeing enlightenment and redemption acted out with an honesty so bracing it actually changes something in us. And in the end, without exploitation or titillation, “Leo Grande” arrives at a moment of such unvarnished candor, it takes your breath away. As Emma Thompson, in one deeply-earned act of self-effacing truth, manages to shatter over a century of Hollywood’s reductive illusions of beauty and self-acceptance.
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