‘Passages’ Review: Doubting Tomas
The smart and sexy "Passages" captures a disaster in motion as a gay man risks his marriage for a torrid affair with a woman.
Meet Tomas Freiburg, a gay German filmmaker living and working, quite successfully, in Paris, just the right romantic backdrop for his extramarital adventures, and for writer-director Ira Sachs’ tempestuous love triangle drama Passages (★★★★★).
Superbly portrayed by Great Freedom star Franz Rogowski as a vexing paradox of wide-open, curious, and insanely self-centered, Tomas is the sort of fascinating character it might be fun to hang out with, and all kinds of exciting to take home. He cuts an alluring figure gallivanting around la ville de l’amour in an array of chic, skin-baring vests and sweaters.
But evidenced by a viciously funny scene of him ripping his extras to shreds on the set of his latest film, he’s a terror as a boss. And, as becomes clear in Sachs’ exquisitely sensitive exploration of a very modern marriage — co-written with Love Is Strange collaborator Mauricio Zacharias — Tomas is an absolute pain as a husband.
His husband, graphic designer Martin (an excellent Ben Whishaw), is prepared to just let it go when Tomas comes home from a party declaring that he spent the night making love with a woman, foxy French schoolteacher Agathe (Blue Is the Warmest Colour‘s Adèle Exarchopoulos).
Led by Rogowski and Whishaw’s dynamic rapport, the film effortlessly establishes the rules and rhythms of Tomas and Martin’s relationship in Tomas’ eagerness to share his new infatuation with Martin, and Martin’s corresponding willingness to hear about it, but only within limits. Of course, Tomas persistently, often painfully, tests those limits.
As exacting as he is on set, and decisive in his directorial choices, he is, by contrast, a confused mess in his personal life. Though, he does admit, once he finds himself, Martin, and Agathe all tossed in a storm of his own making, that maybe he’s not so much confused as merely self-involved.
Passages deeply understands Tomas and those who function like him, wreaking havoc on the lives and feelings of those who love them. Rogowski clearly gets him, too, investing the character with a passion that is magnetic, even while his actions can seem deliberately destructive.
He and Whishaw convey the story powerfully even during one fraught confession where we barely see them, with Tomas facing away from camera, and Martin only partially visible in frame. Yet, Sachs and cinematographer Josée Deshaies so thoughtfully measure the couple’s physical closeness and tension that we can hear every unspoken word of Tomas and Martin’s body language.
Body language also speaks volumes in the film’s rightfully much-talked-about love scenes between Tomas and Agathe, and Tomas and Martin, which have earned the movie an NC-17 rating. Some have suggested there may be an element of homophobia attached to the rating, arguing that films littered with gory violence and straight sexual situations routinely get away with PG-13 or R ratings, as opposed to the controversial NC-17.
That argument certainly might apply to Amazon’s upcoming gay fairy-tale romance Red, White & Royal Blue, which the MPA branded with an R-rating for some relatively cable-TV-level depictions of its two handsome leads fucking. But Passages goes a lot harder — although not full-frontal hard.
More importantly, the sex isn’t gratuitous, but vital to portraying the reality of one man’s clumsy foray into bisexuality. Given the similarities to Mike Bartlett’s acclaimed 2009 play Cock, also about a gay man stepping out on his partner with a woman, the casting of Whishaw, who originated the onstage role of Cock‘s bisexual John, seems not just pointed but a clever way to tap into the actor’s history uncovering this particular minefield of emotions.
For her part, Exarchopoulos uncovers Agathe’s intense journey through this mess by playing her cards close to the vest. She earns style points for the way Agathe has to dump her poor ex twice before the guy gets the picture, and for the fierce backbone she shows in how she tries to handle Tomas.
But, as Martin’s potential new lover Amad (Erwan Kepoa Falé) sagely opines, “You cannot change someone like him, what they think, what they want to do.” You can’t do anything about it, but hold on for dear life, or choose to let go.
Passages opens August 11 in select theaters, including Landmark’s E Street Cinemas in Washington, D.C. Visit www.landmarktheatres.com or www.fandango.com.
Director Ira Sachs will do an in-person Q&A following the Saturday, Aug. 12, 7:45 p.m. showing of the movie.
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