"Kinsey," the new film by director Bill Condon ("Gods and Monsters," 1998), is an exploration of science, sexuality, and taboo. The movie sets out to examine the dangerous subject of sex through the eyes of Alfred Kinsey (Liam Neeson), the famous 1950s sex researcher.
Ultimately, however, the film collapses under its own weight by trying to depict too much of Kinsey's life.
Using the device of Kinsey answering his own sex survey, the movie traces the man's history. Kinsey grows from a sexually confused boy with an overbearing father (John Lithgow) to a respected professor at Indiana University. He devotes his life to studying the gall wasp until he meets freethinking student Clara McMillen (Laura Linney), affectionately nicknamed Mac. The two get married and after a particularly painful wedding night, Kinsey becomes interested in sex.
After becoming an unofficial sex expert on campus, he teaches an instantly popular sex class. He realizes that there isn't enough scientific information to properly inform the students, so he sets off to accumulate sexual scientific data and finds himself running into powerful personal and social obstacles.
The film has already started to cause controversy. Its frank treatment of sex and its depiction of the man that some conservative groups blame for inspiring the sexual revolution have caused the film some problems in our post-wardrobe malfunction media universe.
Notably, New York television station WNET has rejected advertising for the movie. It is ironic that a film about a man who spent his life trying to separate sex from morality makes people ethically uncomfortable.
Kinsey's and his research staff's promiscuous nature takes to the background as the larger story of the sex surveys becomes the focus. This leads to the simplification (not distillation) of complex conflicts that play out only over a few scenes. Loose plot threads never tie up.
One frustrating example is when Kinsey's son comes into conflict with his father's constant sex talk; the issue is never developed and doesn't come to a resolution. The unbalanced story of "Kinsey" shows the movie has untapped potential.
Despite that problem, the parts of the film that do go deeper succeed. The acting is top notch. Lithgow plays the frustratingly pious father, Linney is warm and understanding as Mac, and Peter Sarsgaard brings intensity to his role as Clyde Martin, Kinsey's bisexual assistant and occasional lover.
Neeson's is the standout performance. As Kinsey, his dry, scientific mind brilliantly analyzes situations and sometimes conflicts with his inner emotions, giving Neeson a chance to show a reserved man's inner turmoil.
Despite the serious subject matter, the film is humorous. The 1940s-era misconceptions about sex as well as some of the nontraditional answers to Kinsey's sex survey all provoke laughs from the audience. This doesn't translate to the film in general, however, as "Kinsey" sometimes becomes a dramatic piece. A fault of the film is that it doesn't blend humor and drama so much as simply place them next to each other.
Beyond its plot and acting, "Kinsey" is a reminder about how far we have (or haven't) come as a society when it comes to sex. The subject is a simple one that all college students know, at the very least on an informational level.
The fact that some of what Kinsey says today is still shocking, or that a graphic slide of sexual activity can elicit a gasp from the audience in a world saturated with hyper-violence is an indication that there is progress to be made. Kinsey pioneered open discussion about sex and his legacy has carried over into our time, but he may be disappointed to know we still have a few hang-ups.
Unfortunately, the critical reception of "Kinsey" will focus on the movie's subject and controversy rather than the somewhat disappointing filmmaking. The word "Oscar" will undoubtedly be mentioned, but it won't be earned. "Kinsey's" whole adds up to less than the sum of its parts.
