Monday, March 6, 2023

Strong skills of deception

When I started to watch the new Amazon movie Somebody I Used to Know on Saturday night, from the description of the trigger warning I thought it might be the streamer's next The Voyeurs.

The movie allegedly contained "Strong nudity, strong crude sexual jokes, strong sex scenes."

Not quite.

I'd take them in order except that I'm not even sure I remember any of the strong crude sexual jokes. So let's start with the other two.

Strong nudity?

That was certainly the promise to the single male Amazon viewer trawling for flesh, because the movie stars Alison Brie, often considered to be quite the attraction to such a demographic. 

The movie doesn't lie about this -- parts of her naked body are seen twice -- but it's not in a sexual context at all. In fact, it's in the context of nudism. 

In the first situation, she streaks across a golf course. So does Kiersey Clemons. However, they're shot at least a hundred yards away, and it is not titillating in the least. 

The second is almost like a makeup call for the first. Brie's character is interviewing an actual nudist at the end of the story, who is seen fully from the waist up but is also in her 50s if not her 60s. The reverse angle shots of Brie are specifically shot in such a way to cover her up. Then at end of the interview, she does shift enough so that you are given a full view of her upper half -- almost as if the movie is saying "Okay, guys, here's finally what you came for, but ha -- you had to watch the whole movie first!" It's debatable that that's what they came for.

Strong sex scenes?

These don't involve Brie or Clemons. In fact, they involve Julie Hagerty, who'll be 68 in a couple months. 

In fact, they don't even involve any nudity from Hagerty herself. In one of the scenes you see the naked butt of her sexual partner, who I think is played by Leigh Guyer. In the other scene, you just see him under the covers pleasuring Hagerty, but that's more implied activity than anything visual. In either case, both scenes are played for comedy, like "Ha ha, old people don't have sex!"

Strong crude sexual jokes?

Did somebody pretend to fellate a bread roll at some point? I don't really remember.

In any case, the point of this piece is that while none of these descriptions may be technically inaccurate, the use of the word "strong" oversells them considerably -- and leaves you nowhere to go when you've got a movie that is really shocking sexually. 

Let's say someone was actually using these as a trigger warning, rather than a promise of goods contained within. Too many of these and it's a total boy who cried wolf situation, and suddenly you are watching Salo or Caligula and thinking "Oh my God what just happened."

However, in researching the artwork for this piece, I found at least Amazon has a totally honest alternative poster for Somebody I Used to Know -- honest in what they believe is the reason you're watching this movie, and honest in terms of what they're actually giving you. 

Behold:

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