Emma Thompson wants us to like our bodies. She knows it's hard.

[IronLionZion]

In the Hulu movie “Good Luck to You, Leo Grande,” Thompson plays a middle-aged woman who finds self-fulfillment with the help of an enlightened sex worker.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/movies/2022/06/17/emma-thompson-interview-leo-grande/



“Everyone just looked angry,” says Emma Thompson, grimacing and gritting her teeth. She’s describing the movies featuring sex scenes that she watched as a teenager. “Everyone looked just sort of cross, and just sort of enraged by the whole thing,” she continued. “I just thought, ‘Is that what sex is supposed to be like? I don’t understand.’ Good grief, we have a long way to go.”

Thompson considers her new movie, “Good Luck to You, Leo Grande,” at least “a step in the [right] direction.” She plays Nancy Stokes, a widow and retired teacher who hires a sex worker named Leo Grande (newcomer Daryl McCormack) to help break her out of a lifetime of sexual repression. Over the course of four meetings in an anonymous-looking hotel room, the two embark on an unlikely ally-ship, with Nancy eventually discovering, like Dorothy in Oz, that when it comes to fulfillment — sexual or otherwise — there’s no place like home.

Screenwriter Katy Brand wrote “Good Luck to You, Leo Grande” at the beginning of the pandemic, inspired in part by “this notion of why we feel so guilty and ashamed of pursuing our own pleasure when it doesn’t hurt anyone.” Aware that as women age, they continue to put other people first, she continues, “Why do we temper [desire], why do we put it aside or put it last all the time, and feel bad if we put it up the priority list for even a minute?”

Brand, who lives in Germany, where sex work is legal, was also fascinated by people in the profession who approach it as a vocation. “Good Luck to You, Leo Grande,” she says, is the product of her curiosity about “what happens when you bring those two things together.”

I haven't seen it yet but it's streaming on Hulu. I thought it was interesting since DUers have been discussing sex work recently because of a current congressperson.

[cilla4progress]

1. I will be interested in reviews here.

Before diving in.

😳

[Croney]

2. I watched the trailer, and I have one unanswerable question.

In these fables about a grown person who's "never had an orgasm," why is the person always a woman?

[IronLionZion]

3. Biology

it's easier for a man to have an orgasm, even while asleep. But a woman could have better quality orgasms and lots of them. But it takes more effort to achieve. It's connected to mentality.

[Croney]

5. This is why I called it an unanswerable question.

Most women are knowledgeable about their bodies. The movies like to think we need help.

[TexasBushwhacker]

14. Male orgasm required for humans to reproduce

Female orgasm isn't. If female orgasm was required to be impregnated, any females that weren't orgasmic wouldn't pass their genes onto the next generation.

[highplainsdem]

4. Rave review in the Daily Beast:

https://www.thedailybeast.com/emma-thompson-made-the-best-sex-movie-of-the-year

[nolabear]

6. It's an absolutely lovely movie.

Watched this afternoon. It’s got so much to do with the pain of never having any adventures, sexual or otherwise, and the difficulty of self acceptance. It’s sweet, smart and funny. Highly recommended.

[Ocelot II]

12. I agree!

Emma Thompson is excellent, as always, as the repressed widow, simultaneously excited and ashamed, and Daryl McCormack, "Leo," is a lovely character - and he also has one of the hottest bodies I've ever seen.

[nolabear]

13. He is pretty darn hot. His acting is really great too.

[Skittles]

7. I know I could have an adventure with Leo

yes INDEED

[IronLionZion]

8. I like the contrast between the 2 of them

he's so calm and smooth, and she's so not.

I wonder how much demand for adventures like this will increase after people watch it.

[Skittles]

10. all I know is

whatever goes on between consenting adults is A-OK with me

[IronLionZion]

9. Emma Thompson Talks Filming Nude Scenes in Good Luck to You, Leo Grande

[Skittles]

11. love that she looks so natural

I detest the pulled and plumped and tucked look, which so often takes away much of the, er, "personality" of a face....