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 The cast of Shortbus certainly arrived in style for their UK premiere at the London Film Festival on Tuesday - in a pink double decker bus... Suchandrika Chakrabarti reports.
The film has been attracting controversy from the very start, as it was to show the actors actually engaging in sexual activities. Some of the cast have faced very harsh reactions; Sook-Yin Lee, in the lead role of Sofia, was threatened with losing her job as a radio host for CBC in her native Canada for taking the part. Only after celebrities such as Francis Ford Coppola, Michael Stipe and Yoko Ono rallied behind her, did CBC back down.
However, at their London premiere, the cast and writer/ director John Cameron Mitchell, who was behind Hedwig and the Angry Inch, were all smiles.
Sook-Yin Lee plays the lead role, Sofia, a couples counsellor who, ironically, has intimacy issues of her own. In a bid to remedy this, she ends up visiting a dominatrix, Severin.
Sook-Yin said of the premiere: "We're really glad to bringing the film to London, we worked so hard on it. Now it’s like we’re sharing it with people. It’s kind of like releasing an SOS in a bottle."
When asked about reactions to the film, she was hopeful that Shortbus had found its ideal audience in Leicester Square: "I don’t know what the reaction will be! It’s naughty and yet it’s not naughty at all. I think that British audiences have a real history of finding humour in awkward situations. I think you might be able to get this."
PJ DeBoy (L) and Paul Dawson (R) play a couple who come to Sofia for guidance, and persuade her to become more adventurous.
PJ said: "Are people going to be offended by the film? Well, there was a rabbi in Tel Aviv who was a little miffed. He wanted to shut the cinema down. Well, you want somebody to be a little shocked don't you? I've been in trouble all my life, so this is nothing new!"
Paul said of the film's reception: "You feel like you do something, and you do want everyone to like it. You want everyone to get something from it."
PJ added: "This movie is only going to happen once for us, so we're going to enjoy it... we're just going to ride this bus."
Paul replied: "You had to get the 'bus' in there... we're going to ride it till the wheels fall off!"
Director/ writer John Cameron Mitchell was battling a sore throat, possibly from the raucous singing on the bus to the premiere. However, he had plenty to say on what he aimed to do when making Shortbus: " We use sex the way a lot of people might use music. Both Shortbus and Hedwig are about what it is to be alone and not alone... about finding someone. Hedwig was more about coming of age, this is more, 'you've already come of age, what's the next crisis?'."
On his working methods, John said: "I usually work from my own scripts. There haven't been many that have caught my eye, Hollywood doesn't tend to appeal. Neither do scripts that mire themselves in irony and distance themselves from the characters. I go for something that has heart, is really smart and has a sense of humour."
When spealing of future projects, John admitted: "A big-budget film with an A-list cast wouldn't do it for me... spending three years working like that... I'm too old for it!"
In fact, his next film is going to be aimed at a completely different audience. He said: "I'm working on a children's film right now."
Shortbus will be released in UK cinemas on 1st December.
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there are some hilarious moments, and great little one liners; at times the whole cinema would be laughing out loud, and there are wry little observations and shrewd remarks littering the dialogue. (and a whimsical visual gag with a jackson pollock was appreciated by all!) having said that, it's not just sex and humour, it ranged far & wide; great low-key music, interstitials of a colourfully painted/rendered new york city bringing an exaggerated vibrancy, times when the cinema was deathly still, some tremendously sad undercurrents in certain characters' lives... but finally, after all the sadness, there came elements of hope, togetherness, and the beautiful sizzling of the city's fuses being blown as Sofia finally finds what she's been looking for -- something we all had our fingers crossed for!
leaving the last words to the director...
"Shortbus. Its everything you need to get through two more years of George Bush." ~John Cameron Mitchell