Berlinale 2022: Emma Thomson's Good luck to you, Leo Grande is a searing, emphatic nod to sexual freedom

Language: English

A retired religious studies teacher hires a sex worker after her husband’s death not only to forge deeper connections with the man but also her body in Sophie Hyde’s Good luck to you, Leo Grande that had its European premiere at Berlinale’s Special Gala section. Themes of sexual exploration, empowerment, and fulfilment of an older woman abound in Hyde’s movie that’s suffused with searing wit, sparkling dialogue, and skillfully crafted educational moments of sex and sexuality in a movie in which Dame Emma Thomson shines so bright it’s almost blinding.

The movie is in four acts segmented into meetings using which Hyde cleverly fashions the narrative arc to demonstrate progress of Thomson’s character Nancy. Nancy is a no-nonsense retired teacher whose husband died a few years ago and with whom she has never had an orgasm but always faked it. Nancy has followed all the rules in the book, was always the designated driver at parties, raised her children who still seem to love her even though her feelings to them have become increasingly ambivalent.

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The only sex Nancy ever had was with her husband and she wants to explore her sexual side, so she hires a sex worker, an arrestingly good looking, Leo Grande, played by the arrestingly good-looking Daryl McCormack. “I made a decision to not fake orgasm after my husband died,” she warns him before adding that she doesn’t expect him to give her one. That’s one pressure off the table, you can almost hear her murmur under her breath.

Leo Grande himself is a picture of ease at their first meeting, but Nancy is too cynical, prepared to be disappointed and has problems understanding why someone as good looking as him would have sex with her while being morally conflicted whether she’s forcing to do this with him. But the conversation flows like a clear stream between them. “What is your fantasy? He asks. “To have sex with you tonight,” she replies.

But it’s not that easy. Nancy is a mother of two and her curiosity is killing her as to why this man, who is perhaps even younger than her son, is involved in sex work. What is his mother’s opinion about all this? She wants to know. “Will you drop it if I told you? He asks.” “I promise,” she says, cocking her head.

Happening in a hotel room in its entirety, Good luck to you, Leo Grande is a therapy session, adult sex education class and an emphatic exploration of sex-work-as-social-work argument, all rolled into one gorgeously knitted carpet that unfurls every second revealing pattern after beautiful pattern. Nancy and Leo Grande ease into an awkward but free-flowing friendship shared between two people whose professional boundaries are wobbly at best because of the sheer nature of business they’re involved with.

Emma Thomson and Daryl McCormack share an unusually crackling chemistry that makes the experience of watching Leo Grande feel like eavesdropping in on two neighbours talking. As a result, even the steamy sex scenes have therapeutic quality and they never approach the boundaries of wanton titillation, rather one feels heartened witnessing the progress Nancy makes across the meetings.

The nature of boundaries, even the presence of it, can be befuddling when one shares sexual intimacy with someone in the absence of love.

As the sessions progress and Nancy starts exploring her sexual side more and more, her itch to get to know Leo Grande better becomes greater. Frustrated by this wall he built around himself and his stringent codes of professional boundaries, Nancy confronts him. “Is Leo Grande even your real name,” she asks him.

Good luck to you, Leo Grande thus embodies the vulnerability of human relations and their ephemerality in the face of intransigence. Nancy used to be a religious studies teacher but she’s never insufferable, rather only resigned to life’s disillusions that makes her cynical.
As much as it’s a nod to sexual freedom even as it is designed as a consumeristic enterprise, the film digs deeper to unearth hidden biases in its character’s psyche. “You make it sound like it should be made available at local councils,” Nancy tells Leo Grande in response to his spirited monologue about the importance of sex-work for people with no access to human contact.

Eventually, Nancy understands what she built with Leo Grande is purely transactional but coming to terms with it means expensive sessions and a dent in her finances. “I’m not a rich woman,” she tells him.

In the process of telling the relationship between an older woman in need of sexual contact – it’s a need like any other, the film convinces the viewer – and the intelligent sex worker who doesn’t need redemption or absolution, Good luck to you, Leo Grande achieves a lot. And every single thing it achieves needs to be treasured.

Rating: * * * *

Prathap Nair is an independent culture features writer based in Germany.