Shame [Review]

Steve McQueen returns to direct again, after initial venture Hunger (also with Michael Fassbender) achieved critical acclaim. Its tone deadly serious, Hunger dealt with IRA politics and hunger strikes in 1980s Ireland. Shame is an equally adult romp (no pun intended), though one of a completely different nature.

Brandon (Fassbender) is a successful thirty-something businessman in the Big Apple. On the surface, he has it all; charm, wit, money, women - but it soon becomes apparent that the latter of those four successes is more than a headache for the compulsive personality of Brandon. Driven to a diet of physical encounters with women (and men) to feed his ferocious appetite, Brandon’s lifestyle becomes problematic further still when troubled sister Sissy (Carey Mulligan) shows up.

Though it’s clear both shared a corrupted childhood, McQueen won’t spill, and their past remains a mystery. The film is ambiguous not only to that end; a loose structure only hints at Brandon’s development - more than a linear plot, Shame is rather an exploration of a condition. It’s beautifully done, though, with Fassbender again making his mark on modern cinema as one of the best actors around at the moment. Anguished, temperamental but charming in the giant office block that is downtown Manhattan - McQueen’s cynical reflection, perhaps - Fassbender deconstructs Brandon’s corporate pawn façade powerfully and eloquently.

Sissy is anything but her brother: where his means of suppressing his troubles is predominantly to remain cold, stone-faced and unemotional, hers is with an upbeat, active glee (subtly emphasised by McQueen through her lurid wardrobe colours, compared to the bland grey suits of Brandon) - but one that shows cracks as if they were to turn at any instant to canyons, shattering her resilience to the world. She self-harms for fun, reduces her brother to tears with a haunting, slowed rendition of ‘New York, New York’ and subjects herself to easy sexual encounters (notably with Brandon’s married employer).

On the outside, the two couldn’t be more different. Root below skin-deep and their plights are intertwined. Brandon pushes Sissy away, yes; his lustful craze seemingly extending to even his sister, he does all he can to keep her at arm’s length - but the two need each other more than Brandon lets on. The pair are superb - Mulligan carrying the same coy, knowing smile that she so effortlessly threw at Ryan Gosling in Drive, though this time hiding a very different life of disaster behind it, and Fassbender a haunted soul that matches exquisitely the haunted score.

Of course, the inevitable occurs - it’s a little too graphic at times, feeling somewhat unnecessary (particularly in one of Brandon’s later excursions, with more than one woman). The overbearing feeling of dread also remains, as we sit and watch in a horrid fear that Brandon might succumb to his compulsions while his sister is present. But Shame to some extent overcomes these through McQueen’s gifted direction and the two leads’ terrific performances; in all, it’s a powerful, engaging triumph, which sheds light on a different kind of addiction - but one that should be treated no less lightly.

✰✰✰✰✰

See also: Hunger (2008)

Dir: Steve McQueen

Cast: Michael Fassbender, Carey Mulligan

Film4, 101 mins, 13/01/12

Synopsis: Brandon lives a seemingly comfortable life as a corporate drone in modern Manhattan - but beneath the surface lies a sex-addicted, troubled soul, who relishes in the physical and rejects the emotional.