Just got home from seeing Kinsey. It mostly follows some of the standard formula of a biopic, though its subject matter makes it startlingly different in places. I thought Peter Sarsgaard gave the best performance of the film. I really liked both Laura Linney and Liam Neeson (but then one usually does).

Of course, with a movie like this, one is more drawn to discussing the subject matter than the film qua film. One is reminded of how repressed our society still is. I have teenagers asking the "stupid" questions that folk are asking Kinsey at the beginning of the film. And this year Texas adopted health textbooks that have no real sex education whatsoever.

Some folk would look at our society and say that it quite sexually liberated, even pornographic. But I think they are wrong. Yes, it is more liberated than in Kinsey's day (and he played an important role in that). But I think (and something similar is stated at one point in the film) that a sexually repressive society is a pornographic society. Because that which is taboo is something that one can become obsessed with. And because then when a figure wants to breakout of or flaunt the taboo, they exploit sexuality (Brittany Spears, for instance).

What is needed is a positive, healthy view of sexuality that celebrates it so that people need be neither repressed nor go to the other extreme. I debate this often within the circles of youth ministry, where I have very good friends and colleagues who disagree. They think my views are more likely to lead to inappropriate behaviour and I think theres are.

Of course, I may be wrong. But I also know that the church has a long history of sexual repression. Many people are messed up about sex, and it is the church who messed them up.

Back in June I posted a sermon that I had preached on this topic.

As for the film:
3 film reels
3 1/2 popcorn kernels