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Shortbus

Play trailer 2:25 Poster for Shortbus 2006,  1h 42m,  Comedy/ Drama Play Trailer Watchlist
Shortbus: Trailer 1 Shortbus: Trailer 1 Now Playing View more videos
Watchlist 69% 126 Reviews Tomatometer 77% 50,000+ Ratings Popcornmeter
69% Tomatometer 126 Reviews 77% Popcornmeter 50,000+ Ratings
John Cameron Mitchell's SHORTBUS explores the lives of several emotionally challenged characters as they navigate the comic and tragic intersections between love and sex in and around a modern-day underground salon. A sex therapist who has never had an orgasm, a dominatrix who is unable to connect, a gay couple who are deciding whether to open up their relationship, and the people who weave in and out of their lives, all converge on a weekly gathering called Shortbus: a mad nexus of art, music, politics, and polysexual carnality. Set in a post-9/11, Bush-exhausted New York City, SHORTBUS tells its story with sexual frankness, suggesting new ways to reconcile questions of the mind, pleasures of the flesh, and imperatives of the heart.
Shortbus

What to Know

Critics Consensus

The sex may be explicit, but Mitchell integrates it into the characters' lives and serves the whole story up with a generous dose of sweetness and wit.

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Critics Reviews

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Mark Bourne Film.com Mar 4, 2008
Shortbus is not, above all, 'dirty.' What it is, in fact, is a nice movie, one of the nicest to come down the pike since March of the Penguins. Go to Full Review
Stella Papamichael BBC.com Nov 30, 2006
2/5
Everything comes to a head in a touchy-feely climax (if you catch our drift) where, ironically, it isn't the strong sex but all the singing and handholding that's the real turn-off. Go to Full Review
Anna Smith Empire Magazine Nov 29, 2006
3/5
A gleefully subversive but over-simplistic rude little indie that's starting to gain cult status. Go to Full Review
Matt Brunson Film Frenzy Feb 15, 2023
3.5/4
What makes Shortbus unusual for an American movie is that it isn't frightened of sex, it doesn't reduce the act to insensitive frat boy gyrations, and it doesn't employ it as a bludgeoning weapon. Go to Full Review
Dennis Harvey 48 Hills Feb 11, 2022
It’s a disarmingly sweet movie about dysfunctionality and connection. Go to Full Review
Frank J. Avella Edge Media Network Feb 7, 2022
A
the film is just as bold and startling as when it first came out maybe more so, because we have become more puritanical when it comes to depicting sexual situations onscreen, even in indie films. Go to Full Review
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Audience Reviews

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Rey M Mar 2, 2019 Interesting script and overall outline does not measure up to the amateurish acting and direction
Dec 3, 2017 No artistic value except explicit sex.
Theodore S Feb 2, 2017 its really awkward at parts but it comes down to just pure awful acting that induces shear paralyzing bordum
Anakin G Jan 15, 2017 Another attempt at creating an art out of a gay porno movie, introducing their problems and emotions to the foreground. But it's too much of a homosexual activity in this movie for it to be objective. See more
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Shortbus

My Rating

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Cast & Crew

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John Cameron Mitchell

Director

Sook-Yin Lee

Sofia

Paul Dawson

James

Lindsay Beamish

Severin

PJ DeBoy

Jamie

Raphael Barker

Rob

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Shortbus

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Shortbus

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Movie Info

Synopsis John Cameron Mitchell's SHORTBUS explores the lives of several emotionally challenged characters as they navigate the comic and tragic intersections between love and sex in and around a modern-day underground salon. A sex therapist who has never had an orgasm, a dominatrix who is unable to connect, a gay couple who are deciding whether to open up their relationship, and the people who weave in and out of their lives, all converge on a weekly gathering called Shortbus: a mad nexus of art, music, politics, and polysexual carnality. Set in a post-9/11, Bush-exhausted New York City, SHORTBUS tells its story with sexual frankness, suggesting new ways to reconcile questions of the mind, pleasures of the flesh, and imperatives of the heart.
Director
John Cameron Mitchell
Producer
Howard Gertler, John Cameron Mitchell, Tim Perell
Screenwriter
John Cameron Mitchell, John Cameron Mitchell
Production Co
Q Television, Process Film, THINKFilm, Fortissimo Films
Genre
Comedy, Drama
Original Language
English
Release Date (Theaters)
Oct 6, 2006, Limited
Rerelease Date (Theaters)
Jan 26, 2022
Release Date (DVD)
Mar 13, 2007
Runtime
1h 42m
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