Stepping out of a taxi on a dark night in the middle of a vacant mall parking lot has all the makings of a bad situation. And though Gili is greeted with smiles and kisses by two cordial-looking boys, a few awkward glances reveal that she is there for one purpose, and one purpose only: to provide them with sexual favors. It is clear from the beginning that Gili has nowhere to go but downhill.

Israeli film duo director Jonathan Gurfinkel and writer Rona Segal team up for the second time in creating their provocative and painfully honest film S#x Acts (Shesh Peamin). Inspired by true events, S#x Acts — also correctly heard as sex acts — explores the sexual boundaries, or lack thereof, between new girl in school, Gili Shulman (Sivan Levy), and her horny teenage boy classmates. Though set in Tel-Aviv, this world of iPhones, swimming pools, house parties and daddy’s cars is universally recognizable to anyone who remembers their teenage years. Like any 17-year-old, Gili is at a vulnerable age and seeking love and acceptance, but by any means necessary. Intent on changing her image from “lame” to “cool girl” status, this brown-eyed, naïve and wholly pathetic flirt discovers her sexuality by hooking up with the popular guys, but at a cost to her own self-respect and dignity. The film is divided into six parts, and with each meeting the guys push their sexual encounters one step further and see what, and who, they can get her to do next.

S#x Acts isn’t particularly concerned with providing viewers with an extensive background of the characters or the political and religious climate of Israel. And Segal’s script doesn’t cloud the film with too much dialogue either (which the viewer may be thankful for, considering it means less subtitles to read). In this case, actions speak louder than words, and there is a lot of action to go around. Despite the acts of voyeurism and sexual rendezvous, Gurfinkel manages to film these scenes in an artistic manner and avoids a pornographic attitude by concealing reproductive body parts using strategic camera angles. The audience is left to draw their own conclusions about the heroine and the self-destructing world she creates for herself, which can be seen as refreshing. In such a controversial and obscure situation, it’s difficult to label characters as either a predator or a victim. There are many films that spell it out in such black and white terms, but, in Gurfinkel’s case, by having created a gray area and by letting the audience form their own opinion, it has added more intrigue.

Some may be unsure for a good chunk of the film whether or not this young girl is a prostitute — though she does not officially don the title, her borderline pornographic, sexually explicit actions suggest otherwise, noted at one point by Omri (Eviatar Mor) — and this ambiguity creates situations in which she’s treated as such. Omri, a seemingly polite and intelligent boy whom Gili likes, acts as her unofficial pimp by using her and passing her off to his friends as well as sending her on beer runs so that he can decisively ditch her afterward. Gili’s willingness to participate, followed by shameful, sad puppy-dog-like eyes makes the audience struggle in a sort of tug-of-war between feeling sorry for the girl or being blasé about it because she brought it upon herself.

Each act gets more racy and degrading, and Levy’s portrayal — for which she won the Ophir Prize for best actress at the Haifa International Film Festival — as this annoyingly passive teenager is so convincing that you want to hate her, but can’t help recognizing her insecurities as sad and all too familiar. All any adolescent wants is to fit in, and Levy’s character is the epitome of what someone will do to be popular when, particularly in high school, popularity seems like everything. By the end of the movie, the line of consent is so hazy, it’s hard to tell who’s in control, though Gili shrugs it off, insisting to her girlfriends that she is using them, and not the other way around. And it’s tough to see the easy girl in school as a victim. Albeit sad that she is cast off by her crush Tomer (Roy Nik) only to be handed down to his best friend Omri, she recovers quickly and is grateful for the attention. Not to mention that she cruelly rejects the only person who shows her any sort of chivalry or sympathy — although Shabat’s efforts aren’t entirely altruistic, and are a tad sickening and discomforting.

Gili uses the oldest trick in the book to get a guy’s attention — flirt with one of his friends to make him jealous, even if you don’t like him. And by flirt with, I mean have sex with. Her perception of gender roles is obviously flawed; unsurprising in a world where guys are patted on the back for sleeping around, while girls of the same nature are labeled as “sluts.” The blunt footage Gurfinkel uses is so believable that every parent will anxiously worry whether or not this is in fact going on behind their teenagers’ closed doors. The non-judgmental, un-melodramatic approach lets this character-driven plot take center stage. However, this six-year endeavor fails to surpass its genre clichés of social morality, despite its good, but predictable intentions.

But shedding a light on social immoralities is sometimes necessary to jar us back to reality and realize that rape (because that is in essence what is going on here) is serious and evidently taking place in high schools and elsewhere. This is no film for anyone expecting a happy ending where a knight in shining armor sweeps the damsel in distress off her feet and onto his white stallion. It tells it like it is, where no means yes and men objectify women.

Overall, Gurfinkel’s film, aside from moments of dullness and the lack of fresh insight, delivers a powerful dose of reality that’s sadly believable, and will maybe remind you of just how hard it is to be a teenager.

Rating: 3 out of 4 stars

“S#x Acts” had a limited release beginning December 6, 2013. It is currently available nationwide on cable VOD as well as digital platforms like iTunes, Amazon and Vudu.


Video Courtesy of: Tribeca Film.

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