Why Gaspar Noé’s ‘Love’ Fails To Break The Curse Of Sex On Screen

One of the most hotly anticipated films of Cannes this year was Gaspar Noé's "Love," It’s only the fourth feature in seventeen years from the enfant terrible behind “Irreversible” and “Enter The Void,” and insofar as it's a 3D drama revolving around unsimulated sex, the film had the potential to be his most controversial picture yet at its midnight bow on the Croisette. And yet, as with so many instances of "serious" filmmakers tackling matters below the belt, the effort proved to be less of a mind-blowing, all-night marathon, and more of an underwhelming, unsatisfying quickie behind some garbage bins. 

The new film by the director (who’s no stranger to for-real on-screen fucking, having featured such in various forms in both “Enter The Void” and his short in art-porn anthology “Destricted”) is in many ways a conventional romantic Bildungsroman, as American-in-Paris Murphy (Karl Glusman) gets a phone call telling him that one-time love...