9 Songs (2004)
Matt, a young glaciologist, soars across the vast, silent, icebound immensities of the South Pole as he recalls his love affair with Lisa. They meet at a mobbed rock concert in a vast music hall - London's Brixton Academy. They are in bed at night's end. Together, over a period of several months, they pursue a mutual sexual passion whose inevitable stages unfold in counterpoint to nine live-concert songs.
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Sadly Over-hyped
Memorable, crazy movie
It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.
It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.
Clearly most people see this film the wrong way round. Focusing on the sex is not the point at all. It really is a pretty good reflection of what many people's humdrum lives are really like, But they come alive at the gigs all of which (apart from Michael Nyman perhaps) are buzzing with electricity, and also offer a great introduction to a few bands that you might not otherwise have bothered with.I have, you have, we all (?) have been there in the flat, infatuated with an alluring woman/man and had some great sex amongst otherwise dull lives. The sex is the counterpoint to the music - Matt really only remembers the great sex and the great music that punctuated their year together. And at the end of the film, she leaves and Matt is yet to fully move on, and life seems as bleak as the Antartic.The point about the quality of the sex is that it doesn't all have to be porn star sex to be great - just being really close to the person you love can be enough to elevate it to the highest plains.
There's one thing you can say for good, professional pornography. It's honest. It doesn't pretend to be art and most of the people making good porn know what they are doing and know their audience.This film is amateurish pornography parading as an art film. It succeeds at neither, but it did effectively ruin Ms. Stilley's career. (This was her first effort on film.) Basically this is one sex scene after another strung together with some very loud dated rock concert footage. The wine and cheese crowd will try and find some meaning in this thing. There just isn't any. All--every single one--of the sexual scenes is real. The film is unrated. The British censors gave it a certificate because they said it was vulgar but not obscene. I agree.There are very few sex acts you will not see and in close up with these two actors who claimed (of course) that it was all for art. They were testing themselves, they were pushing limits, they were all professionals and on and one. They are unable to simply say they had sex on film for money. O'Brien was 31 and she was 21 and a new actress. Why she let herself get conned into this role is a mystery.While the two actors claimed they really, really wanted to test their limits, it turns out they had limits after all. The director wrote a scene in which Mr. O'Brien would have graphic gay sex with another male. He admits he decided he wasn't ready to get that artistic. You will also see Mr. O'Brien have a real orgasm in some detail assisted by Ms. Stilley. She however, declined to consume his bodily fluids as was suggested.As Mr. O'Brien said in an interview, "It's just sex." And bad sex at that.
I enjoyed this film very much! Antartica and sex! What a fabulous combination! It calmed me down and I was mellow and happy. I would be probably more happy if I was in the place of the principal actor. But what the hell it really looked great, all in all.I was surprised that it got such a low review grade, but it was to be expected since modern audience expects Hollywood blockbusters, but this is not that type of film. Not that I have anything against above mentioned blockbusters, but rather I enjoy these types of films very much.It is a pity that they are not available anymore to the wider public, but that is trend in the last 10 to 15 years that good film get to be shown only at the festivals. I saw this one at the Sarajevo film festival.
So exactly tell me the point of 9 songs? Besides the good music (the only reason I bumped it up a point) 9 songs consists of nothing but sex. That's right, it's basically a bad porno, and it has no message contained. It's quite sad how this is getting sundance reviews and everything, while it's nothing but porn. So I can't really rate anything at all because it's actually nothing but porn. Porn. I mean, if that's really want you to watch, fine by me. But on a rating of quality and meaning, it has none. So the question is, how many people are going to watch it after what I just said? I'm going to go with lots. 2/10.