The Little Death: Josh Lawson explores sex and the taboo, but this jarring feature doesn’t work

REVIEW: Josh Lawson’s jarring comedy The Little Death is erratic and insensitive, despite his attempt at making light of sex, love and the taboo.

The Little Death (MA15+)

Director: Josh Lawson (feature debut)

Starring: Josh Lawson, Bojana Novakovic, Damon Herriman, Lisa McCune, Kim Gyngell.

Rating: *1/2

Don’t stare too deeply into demise

Josh Lawson has been pushing The Little Death from all kinds of angles in the run-up to its release around the country today.

This one in The Brisbane Times, however — variations upon which have appeared elsewhere — not only takes the cake, but then sits on it too:

“If you are an Australian who doesn’t like Australian films,” proclaimed Lawson, “this is the film you should watch. Because neither do I.”

Mmmmm. You certainly can’t accuse Mr Lawson of not being capable of talking the talk. (As one disagreeable Tweeter found out the hard way last Monday, when Lawson asked him “how many films have you made, champ?”)

Thwack! ... Josh Lawson hits out at a disagreeing type on Twitter.

But how does The Little Death — Lawson’s first feature as writer and director — fare when it comes to walking the walk?

Let’s just say it ain’t got the legs.

As Lawson has pointed out, it is clear there are millions of movie misanthropes in our midst who’d rather stay home and wash their hair than go out and watch an Australian production.

However, The Little Death isn’t going to be the one that stops many of them reaching for the nearest shampoo bottle.

Over here, Officer ... Kate Mulvany dresses up for some role play in The Little Death.

That is unless there really is an audience out there who have been waiting patiently to plonk their money down on an erratic episodic comedy about just how funny a fetish can be.

Among the saucy-seedy japes presented for the nation’s collective amusement are such thigh-slappers as mock sexual assault (Lawson himself plays a bloke whose partner keeps hassling him to rape her) and a husband who may or may not be interfering with his nagging wife after he drugs her asleep each evening.

Some sketchy interludes in The Little Death do have their moments.

One member of a couple using role-play scenarios to spice up their love life starts thinking he is the greatest method actor since De Niro.

Messy ... Paul (Josh Lawson) and Maeve (Bojana Novakovic) in The Little Death.

Then there’s the woman who’s come down with a pronounced case of dacryphilia. She cannot achieve sexual pleasure unless her husband breaks down and cries.

However, the film as a whole generally follows a line of humour where dysfunction, discomfort and sometimes, even distress, lead only to laughter-free dead ends.

In particular, the rape-fantasy section of The Little Death — which punchlines out to an icky encounter involving forcible restraint in an abandoned underground car park — embodies just how easily Lawson’s material can switch from marginally ill-conceived to majorly insensitive in the blink of an eye.

Awkward ... Evie (Kate Mulvany) and Dan (Damon Herriman) in The Little Death.

A stand-alone sequence which closes The Little Death almost silences the echo of the many clangers the film has dropped earlier on in proceedings (such as the running gag about the friendly registered sex offender who bakes golliwog biscuits for a warn-the-neighbours doorknock campaign.)

It is a beautifully written and performed three-hander about a call-centre operator acting as interpreter between a dirty-minded deaf man and a distracted phone-sex practitioner.

The undeniable excellence of this one scene deserves better than to be filed away under “too little, too late”.

If Lawson can somehow match it at a later date, he’ll have the perfect rebuttal should anyone on Twitter ever ask him “how many films have you made, champ?” :

“More than one.”

Only Joshing ... Lawson gives his Twitter adversary another biff before sending him on his way.

Originally published as The Little Death: Josh Lawson explores sex and the taboo, but this jarring feature doesn’t work