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	Kinsey
	Bill Condon Liam Neeson, Laura Linney, Chris O'Donnell, Peter Sarsgaard, Timothy Hutton, John Lithgow, Tim Curry, Oliver Platt, Dylan Baker, Julianne Nicholson 2004		The movie biography of a tweedy scientific researcher sounds like it would be a snore, but not if the academic in question is Alfred Kinsey, the 20th-century zoologist who oversaw and published the first in-depth surveys of the sexual habits of the American populace. In writer/director Bill Condon's thoughtful, sincere, humorous, even scintillating "Kinsey," Liam Neeson plays the Professor of Prurience with honesty and believability. Sequences from Kinsey's grim childhood under the sway of his strict father, a Bible-thumping minister taken beyond caricature by John Lithgow, establish a major theme of the film: the struggle against repression and one's personal demons. It's suggested that Kinsey's studies were his means of converting a wellspring of pain into something noble, as if through a hydroelectric plant of the heart. It's a sheer epiphany after Kinsey and soulmate Clara McMillen (a superb Laura Linney) have boudoir problems on their honeymoon, and he confronts the issue of sexual dysfunction. From there, he blazes professional and private trails with the help of his loyal research assistants (Chris O'Donnell, Peter Sarsgaard, Timothy Hutton), the president at the university where he teaches, and a reluctant Rockefeller Foundation officer. Condon, whose "Gods & Monsters" was a savvy, sensitive biopic about closeted director James Whale, has made a fitting tribute to Kinsey and his work.


	Sunday, November 17, 2024





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