Naked as We Came

Richard LeMay's low-budget melodrama serves up many scintillating plot twists, but fails to muster up much in the way of compelling storytelling. Two bickering adult siblings—moody Laura (Karmine Alers) and insecure gay brother Elliot (Ryan Vigilant)—have been unhappily running their family business, comprised of New York City launderettes, following their father's death. When the pair travel to the country to visit their dying mother, Lilly (Lué McWilliams), they are surprised to find her living with a handsome young writer named Ted (Benjamin Weaver), who serves as a combination valet/gardener/houseboy. Conveniently for Elliot, Ted—who has a habit of taking off his shirt to display his muscular torso—is gay. This doesn't sit well with Laura, who has her own domestic headaches and is unhappy to find her family's life careening towards further tumult. But Lilly, whose lifetime highlight was a scandalous affair with a senator (a story told in great depth), wants to die peacefully with all of the loose family threads neatly brought together. While the film's steamy title and convoluted plot might have led to a jolly parody of a Douglas Sirk-style soap opera, this turgid drama is absent of even the slightest whiff of camp. Not a necessary purchase. (P. Hall)