Steve McQueen's Shame

By Callum Brown

‘Shame’ tells a brave in-depth story of a subject we don’t see enough about, certainly not in the brutal and honest version McQueen shows us here. We see how Brandon has managed to keep his sex addiction a secret but it slowly takes a hold on his life, and when his self- harming sister comes to stay it all starts to spiral out of control, we see the addiction control his life in a way that is extraordinary, and how it has taken over his life so much so that he doesn’t realise what is important, McQueen tells a daring story in which we learn of a subject we knew very little about, and see how it effects peoples lives, superbly acted by everyone involved,  especially Michael Fassbender, with extremely little dialog he relies on the slightest twitch of his face to convey emotion in a subtle way, and displays the subject without making it look ‘cool’ in any way, showing us the dangers of sex addiction. McQueen shows the desperation Brandon suffers without so easily slipping into a whinny story about a man who has lots of sex, this film is so far the opposite of that, its character driven, emotional ride through one mans pain, and a film I’m sure many people relate to through addiction.

This triumph of film-making uses long, exhaustive editing techniques to show Brandon’s boredom, and lust for his hit. The film shows Brandon’s struggle as his careful control is untwined by his sister who comes to stay, this is were I was personally compromised by the film and perhaps my judgement is now biased, however I was already captivated and drawn by its realism so perhaps not, however his sister’s scars on the wrist tell a story without us having to be told simply with composition, however its not until the final, shocking suicide attempt that holds no barriers and is almost muted as Brandon finds his sister in his bathroom, wrists slit, sitting in blood in his white bathroom, the scene is simply sickening in the best way possible and genuinely made my eyes water, although I don’t think it was intended to be sad as much as shocking. No part of the film is done in a ‘cool’ or ‘emo’ like way in the slightest, it shows how not only teenagers suffer from the depression and self harm affliction (which people assume too much) but a lot of people from various ages. This hard-hitting film displays gore and nudity but doesn’t make it a focus in anyway, it only uses it realistically and in a way the film demands, as a sickness more than anything. Although it is why I personally think it was shun from the Oscars because to date I have never seen a better performance from an actor, although Mickey Rourke in ‘The Wrestler’ comes close. McQueen has proven himself an incredible director with an astonishing body of work with his only feature length films being ‘Hunger’ ‘Shame’ and the recent phenomenon ’12 years a slave’ which all also star Michael Fassbender creating one of the best Actor-Director partnerships I’ve witnessed.