‘That Kind of Summer’ Review: A Shockingly Banal Look at Sexual Obsession

variety.com:

Peter Debruge Chief Film Critic“You are not here for a cure,” the founder of a 26-day sexual therapy retreat tells the small group of women enrolled in her program at the outset of “That Kind of Summer.” Laying out the ground rules for the sensitive self-awareness exercise that follows — a loosely structured hiatus from unhealthy temptations, designed for those whose out-of-control impulses have made their lives unmanageable — she reassures, “You are not forbidden any sexual thoughts or behavior here.

You are not sick.”Shot on grainy Super 16 with the kind of unsteady handheld aesthetic that suggests the cameraperson really ought to get their inner ear checked, Denis Côté’s radically nonjudgmental “let’s talk about sex” drama looks and feels like a documentary — at least, it could pass as one until a giant CG tarantula crawls up the wall while one of the women is masturbating late in the game.

By then, it’s safe to say, the film has shifted from loosely simulated vérité to something more impressionistic, and the distinction doesn’t matter so much anyway: A clinic in which the patients “are not sick” may be well-intentioned, but it’s inherently anti-dramatic: Then why are they there?

How does one identify progress? And what exactly is the goal of the frustratingly slow 137 minutes that follow? Defiantly unconventional Canadian director Côté’s latest wants to bring sexy back to Quebecois cinema, but his languid portrait of three so-called hypersexuals is so hyper-respectful, it borders on boring.