Concussion. 18-April-2015. 2:30 pm

Stacie Passon

Concussion (2013)

English

Robin Weigert, Maggie Siff

Lets say you have everything you could wish for. You are married to the woman of your dreams, and you have two lovely kids. You live in comfort, have interesting friends, and much of your time is your own. But you are an utterly, hopelessly, miserably unhappy woman. What the hell is wrong with you?

Well, for starters, you are not having any sex, and the marital bed is about as warm as a science lab in the Arctic circle. Worse, you fear you may be turning into a “Stepford Wife”, a robotic soul-less housewife, your once-free spirit pulverized in the food processor. Thankfully, there is an obvious solution for your dissatisfaction: lesbian prostitution. And so it is that, unbeknownst to your wife and kids, you become a sought-after, high class sex worker. On your terms. You interview your clients first, and have right to refusal; you meet them when it suits you, and you dictate the rules. You soon discover that this job is great fun, and that you are actually pretty good at it. You discover that working your way through this wide range of women, each with their needs and their foibles, is an opportunity to explore your wildest yous, and to feel useful too. But how long can you keep this adventure from spilling into your other life? And do you really think there will be no consequences?

In this wonderful film, first time writer-director Stacey Passon (with ‘Go Fish’ and ‘The L Word’ goddess Rose Troche in the producer’s chair) gives a jolt to the history of lesbian cinema, with the gift of an intelligent sexy story with bite. A few years ago, director Lisa Cholodenko had tried to do the same with ‘High Art’ (1998). There’s clearly a dialogue going on here, and in some ways ‘Concussion’ is a corrective to the straight-sex feast that was Cholodenko's ‘The Kids are Alright’ (2010). Another portrait of the state of the lesbian nation in the early 21st century.

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