The Sessions - When Words Touch - DVD

Film: Since contracting polio as a boy, Mark O'Brien (John Hawkes) has had to spend much of his life in an iron lung. But at 38, the journalist and poet decides he no longer wants to let his disability define his life and that he finally wants to lose his virginity. With the blessing of his priest (William H. Macey), Mark hires sex therapist Cheryl Cohen-Greene (Helen Hunt) to guide him to the goal of his dreams in a set number of sessions. But over the course of these meetings, the conversations and physical closeness increasingly soften the professional boundaries between Mark and Cheryl, and it becomes clear that not only hands but words can touch in a very special way.

The Sessions - When Words Touch is based on the essay On Seeing a Sex Surrogate, published by Mark O'Brien in an American magazine in the 1980s. Based on the article, O'Brien's autobiography and through numerous conversations with his partner Susan Fernbach and with Cheryl Cohen-Greene, filmmaker Ben Lewin has created a very poignant film that strikes the perfect balance between life-affirming humor and emotional drama.

John Hawkes, who has made a name for himself as a character actor in such films as Winter's Bone and Martha Marcy May Marlene, delivers a performance as impressive as it is wonderful with his portrayal, limited almost entirely to his facial expressions, of a severely disabled man who has never lost his optimism and sense of humor despite his difficult life situation. His performance is not aimed at making us feel sorry for Mark, but at letting us be infected by his zest for life and his charm. And he succeeds more than believably.

What really makes the film special, however, is its completely uninhibited approach, especially for an American film, to the subject of sex and the needs of disabled people, which are often regarded as taboo. The conversations about sex as well as the nude scenes are staged in a completely natural way, without being obviously provocative or voyeuristic. In this, Helen Hunt in particular, at almost 50, sheds her clothes with exactly the natural unbending that is necessary to make her portrayal of the sex therapist believable. Lewin and his cast brilliantly circumnavigate any looming cliff that would have made the film awkward, cramped or even ridiculous in these very sensitively staged scenes.

The Sessions - When Words Touch is very sad at many moments. Especially since Hawkes makes it clear with his looks that Mark actually doesn't long for sex so much as simply for love and some kind of normal relationship that will never be possible for him, there is a certain heaviness over the whole film, which Lewin, however, manages to break up through the purposeful use of restrained but quite wonderful humor. In the end, the moving story of Mark O'Brien, who died in 1999, is not a depressing, unwieldy art film, but an enchanting feel-good film that not only touches the heart, but also the laughing muscles. And for that, it gets a more than deserved: worth seeing!!!

Picture + Sound: While the sound comes along rather restrained due to the genre and mainly takes place in the central area, the very clean picture pleases with a very atmospheric color scheme and a good overall sharpness, which can also convince in the representation of smaller details. Good.

Extras: Bonus features include the trailer as well as three short documentaries on John Hawkes (approx. 4:16 mins), Helen Hunt (approx. 4:05 mins) and The Woman Mark O'Brien Loved (approx. 4:15 mins). Not uninteresting, but overall too little to get a deeper insight into the shooting and about the real background.

Conclusion: The Sessions - When Words Touch is a sensitive drama whose well-measured humor and refreshing unpretentiousness, combined with the good actor performances, make for an enchanting feel-good film that touches but also amuses. For friends of the demanding American independent cinema this DVD is therefore also: absolutely recommendable!

An article by Frankfurt-Tipp