I saw
Praise two days back on
HBO. I didn't want to watch any
movies. I had returned late from the
office and was not in a very good mood - so I switched my TV on and started searching for some
Adult movie on my
Digital Cable.
Praise, Directed by John Curran, was TVMA. 'Good' - I thought.
Turns out it was not soft porn. It was a fantastic movie (well - agreed - some soft porn are great movies as well - but well - I was out of luck so...). It was strange and beautiful. PRAISE is a powerful, tragicomic love story of obsession, addiction, and codependency.
It's a simple enough story actually: two mismatched lovers.
Gordon is a chain-smoker and has asthma with a rather rapid insipid libido. Cynthia is a slightly pudgy nymphomaniac with a bad case of eczema. This girl is crazy about sex.
After quitting his job at a Brisbane liquor store, Gordon makes a mistake that changes his life big time: he becomes involved in Cynthia's manic parlor of games of chemical and sexual excess.
Cynthia lights Gordon's Cigs and Gordon scratches Cynthia's eczema. Cynthia wants constant sex, Gordon can't yield all the time. There's a lot of abuse, drinking, smoking and sadness in the movie. Sex is not that great. It fits the movie and stops there.
Incidentally my roommate didn't like the movie at all. He thought the characters were rather undeveloped and story was absent. I opine totally opposite. I think the character study in the movie is great and story line is interesting.
This movie was winner of the prestigious FIRPRESCI prize at the 1998 Toronto International Film Festival, in case you care.