Review of Brief Interviews with Hideous Men (2009) by Walter M — 16 Feb 2011

In "Brief Interviews with Hideous Men," Sara(Julianne Nicholson), a graduate student, interviews various men about their sex lives for her thesis, even secretly taping a couple of them(Christopher Meloni & Denis O'Hare) talking about sexually harassing a woman(Lorri Bagley) at an airport.

And that's kind of the level of discourse she has to listen to, day in and day out. Added to that, as a woman, she is expected to be in a relationship with a man, hopefully not like her subjects but maybe like the one(Will Arnett) who is locked out of his apartment.

(Or to take a more extreme example: In an early episode of "Homicide: Life on the Streets," Detective Kay Howard(Melissa Leo) confides to a therapist about her conflicting feelings about men, after, as a homicide detective, seeing the worst they have to offer.

) Newly single, people comment on Sara's wardrobe and her haircut and her professor(Timothy Hutton) suggests she should be more sociable. As intriguing as this might sound and despite incredibly and inventively realizing the cinematic potential in such material, the movie sadly never quite goes beyond the conceptual level.

And I think a lot of that has to do with never hearing Sara's questions to hear what she is so curious about, so she sadly remains little more than a cipher. Like "The Hitchhiker's Guide to The Galaxy" points out, sometimes the questions are just as important as the answers.