EROS Movie Review

This was the first film I reviewed for Psychologies magazine in London. I don't think they published it. Didn't want it going into my trash... EROS is an anthology of three short films about erotic love. Wong Kar Wai, Steven Soderbergh and Michelangelo Antonioni examine the subject from very different perspectives. The one thing these three directors excel at is atmosphere. Rather than leading with a strong plot, the films are more of a mental exploration of the complex and subtle emotions we feel when in love. In “The Hand”, a young tailor’s apprentice falls for a manipulative Hong Kong courtesan (Gong Li), but the only way he can express his love is by making her the most beautiful clothes. Wong, who received international acclaim for “In The Mood for Love”, uses minimal dialogue, attention to detail, music and repetition to maximum effect, encapsulating the pain of unrequited love - when the things that most need to be expressed cannot be said. In Soderbergh’s “Equilibrium”, Robert Downey Jr., plays a manic advertising executive who discuses a recurring sexual dream with therapist, Alan Arkin. Their session examines how through the course of daily living, we become subject to erotic amnesia. In Antonioni’s “The Dangerous Thread of Things” a fourty year-old married man has a passionate encounter with a sexy young woman. Littered with Jungian sexual symbols - towers, waterfalls and horses, this is perhaps what the erotic dream state is like. Rather than tell us stories about characters in love, EROS leaves everything to interpretation, unlocking the memory bank that is so fiercely guarded by everyone who has ever been confounded by romantic desire.