Exotica

Characteristically stylish, intriguing film from Atom Egoyan, heavy on the eroticism and mystification as it delves into the lives of a number of characters connected by their relationship to the strip joint of the title: the owner and MC; a table-dancer; a taxman obsessed with the dancer; and a pet-shop proprietor, whose business the taxman is auditing. It's another excursion into projected fantasies, anxiety, exploitation and secret needs; the elegant camerawork and intense performances sustain interest, although the fragmentation of the plot sometimes seems unnecessarily obscurantist - finally, the mystery is not so very startling or significant. Fascinating, though, and without the pretensions that have marred some of Egoyan's earlier work.