Gregg Araki’s “I Want Your Sex” Opens on 700 U.S. Screens

Gregg Araki’s latest feature, I Want Your Sex, opened this week on 700 screens in the United States—wide for an independent film. The comedy-drama follows Elliot (Cooper Hoffman), a 23-year-old recent graduate who becomes an assistant to flamboyant artist Erika (Olivia Wilde). Their relationship spirals into “polymorphous” sexual encounters that blend kink, humor, and satire of the commercial art world. The ensemble also includes Charli XCX as Elliot’s academically inclined girlfriend, Mason Gooding as the blunt “Zap,” and Johnny Knoxville and Margaret Cho as detectives investigating a body found in a swimming pool.

The Guardian

The project began after Araki’s 2014 drama *White Bird in a Blizzard* and was first imagined as a “comic 50 Shades of Grey” with a female intern seduced by a male boss. Funding fell through, and the script was shelved until Araki revisited it after his 2019 series *Now Apocalypse*. In the wake of #MeToo, he rewrote the story to feature a male submissive and female dominant dynamic, saying he wanted to avoid “kink-shaming” and present a feminist perspective.

The Guardian

• 700 U.S. screens for the opening weekend, surpassing recent indie releases by Refn and Jarmusch.

The Guardian

• A GLAAD report notes that LGBTQ+ inclusion in films from the ten largest distributors is at a three-year low, underscoring the rarity of a mainstream-level queer-themed comedy.

The Guardian

Araki describes the film as “a very queer story” that moves across the straight-queer spectrum. He said the shift to a male-sub/female-dom structure stemmed from his discomfort with earlier depictions of female victimhood.

The Guardian

He warned that “in America, things are worse than they’ve ever been,” citing a “puritanical tyranny” that represses trans people and fuels broader societal aggression. He framed the film’s ending—set to Jessie Ware’s “Free Yourself”—as a counter-narrative to what he sees as a “culture of oppression and fascism” under the current administration.

The Guardian

Araki expressed optimism about younger audiences, noting that New York screenings attract “Letterboxd kids” who are “very sophisticated cinephiles,” and he praised the recent surge of queer cinema at Cannes as evidence that the “queer new wave” remains vibrant.

The Guardian

• “I based Cooper’s character on myself when I was in my early 20s and trying to figure out what my sexual identity was.” — Gregg Araki

The Guardian

Araki will continue touring the film, with upcoming New York screenings aimed at the “Letterboxd kids” audience. He hopes the unapologetic portrayal of sexuality will encourage broader acceptance of queer voices in mainstream cinema.

The Guardian