She’s Lost Control Reveals the Psyche of A Woman Trying Desperately To Suppress It All

Rare professions are hard to come by these days. Especially in a country dominated by startups and other nebulous office work. But, at last, Berlin born writer-director Anja Marquardt has found an untapped profession to explore in She’s Lost Control: that of the sexual surrogate.

Promo poster for She's Lost Control
Promo poster for She’s Lost Control

What exactly is a sexual surrogate, you might wonder? A woman named Ronah (Brooke Bloom) studying to complete her master’s in behavioral psychology, part of which includes her very physical research of sleeping with emotionally stunted men to help them overcome their quibbles with intimacy.

Trying to get one of her clients to take his shirt off
Trying to get one of her clients to take his shirt off

Her supervisor, Dr. Cassidy (Dennis Boutsikaris), assigns her a new client, Johnny (Marc Menchaca), who is far more volatile and unpredictable than her other two patients of the moment. It is his elusiveness and impenetrability that makes Ronah even more determined to crack through his emotions and get him to open up to her–especially sexually.

Grappling with her own psychology
Grappling with her own psychology

In the meantime, an issue with a leak in her shower that has trickled down to her neighbor’s, Claire (Roxanne Day), leads her to forge a friendship with her and invite her over to dinner. It is over this meal that Claire notices Ronah’s washing machine, an appliance that will later come back to haunt Ronah with regard to the leak.

In spite of the issues her patients have, Ronah herself slowly reveals aspects of her life that show her fragile mental state. For one, she injects herself with hormones to freeze her eggs and, for another, she brushes off communication with her brother, Andro (Ryan Homchick), back in Canada even though he informs her that their senile mother has disappeared from his house.

Johnny, her most volatile client
Johnny, her most volatile client

To put herself in the potentially dangerous situation of allowing her clients to become too attached or to misconstrue her feelings is telling of Ronah’s subconscious self-worth. As she tells Johnny, “All relationships end. People break up or die.” The idea she has in mind for her patients is to transfer the emotions gleaned from their sessions with her to another woman they actually care about.

Troubled
Troubled

The semi-tragic fate that befalls Ronah is indicative of the therapist’s plight: so often they can see everything that’s wrong with others, but possess an inconceivable blind spot when it comes to their own foibles.

To check out the book of the same name that is in no way affiliated with this movie, go here. To listen to the song, go here.

Genna Rivieccio http://culledculture.com

Genna Rivieccio writes for myriad blogs, mainly this one, The Burning Bush, Missing A Dick, The Airship and Meditations on Misery.

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