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Better than most people think

One of the film's great tricks is that, for a time, you think it will go down a rabbit hole of unrealistic glorification.

Blistering performances.

I liked this movie so much, it should be a continuing show on Showtime with these characters evolving. I especially like how the story subtly opened the characters' "truths" with sparing dialogue. The movie's pace was excellent, I avidly anticipated the succeeding scenes. The material was fresh and handled well. Acting and writing, cinematography and directing were all excellent. The depiction of sex so realistically without anything crossing into exposed flesh was less than seen on Californication, one of the great Showtime series. I was happy to find this gem on Showtime, albeit 3 or 4 years after it was made. The only change I can think of is to give Lorna the nickname: "Cookie" and she can figure out equally annoying nicknames for those who call her that (ha ha).

Writer/Director Ken Kwapis ('About a Boy', 'Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants', episodes on TV series 'ER', 'The Office', 'Malcolm in the Middle', etc) knows his ways around the ups and downs of contemporary relationships, weighing the importance of the physical aspect of the union against the para-physical benefits and makes no prescription for which is of more importance. SEXUAL LIFE explores several couples whose married or about to be married status receives the testing of infidelity.A wedding photographer is frustrated with his executive girlfriend's lack of intimacy and seeks physical satisfaction through an upscale prostitute who has her own rather solid ground views of her business. The photographer's girlfriend is finding physical satisfaction with her married architect boss who in turn is trying to hide his infidelity from his wife who in turn feels she must seek outside satisfaction with an old college flame who happens to be gay and she turns to a hotel clerk at the point of a fantasy liaison for gratification. The hotel clerk happens to be having an affair with an engaged African American girl and is frustrated about her impending marriage to a frustratedly 'correct' African American male who feels he is following a proscribed duty and seeks attention from the prostitute who opens the whole story. How these intersecting couples work out their dilemmas and resolve their individual needs for expanded physical needs in the presence of the safety of relationships is the clever puzzle Kwapis presents - with the conclusions primarily left up to us, the viewers.The cast is homogeneously fine and attractive - Eion Bailey, Elizabeth Banks, Fionnula Flanagan, Anne Heche, Dule Hill, Sam Jaeger, Kerry Washington, Steven Weber, Steven Williams, Shirley Knight, James LeGros, Tom Everett Scott, and Azura Skye along with the minor characters. Kwapis keeps the flow integrated so that the story does indeed seem like a series of coincidences. The sexual scenes are more suggested than graphic and should not offend even the most skeptical viewer. This was, after all, a movie made for Showtime TV, but it stands very well as a tightly conceived and acted lesson about relationships. Well worth watching. Grady Harp

"Sexual Life" takes a superficial look at the romantic inclinations or disinclinations of several disparate but loosely interconnected Los Angeles couples as it flows serially from one couple to the next, eventually coming full circle in the end. The common denominator is sex and other relationship salients though the film is quite tame and has a kind of mellow and understated feel to it. The couples range from a call girl and her client to a married couple to a betrothed couple, etc. all obviously carefully planned to provide a range of possibilities for both auteur and audience. Though there's little new to be found between the credits, this is a pleasant little dramedy which handles the subject matter delicately in deference to more edgy and sexually explicit genre motifs. "Sexual Life", built from B listers and a step down for Heche, is a winsome little indie for those who want to glean it from broadcast. (B-)

This is an excellent, non-linear film of intimate social mores. The dialog is very well written, with completely believable characters. It is at times funny, heartbreaking, and on some levels disturbing. The acting is world-class, with a wonderful cast. It deals with the complexity of one's sexual life, which can take directions that are against one's overall health and integrity. Each scene was tight and spare, leading beautifully into the next. Human sexuality is probably one of the great mysteries, and it has been given a brilliant and unyielding observation here. The score was at times breathtakingly beautiful. I hope to see more from this writer, director and composer.