Storytelling * Written and directed by means of Todd Solondz * Starring Mark Webber.

Storytelling * Written and directed by means of Todd Solondz * Starring Mark Webber, Paul Giamatti, Selma Blair, Leo Fitzpatrick, Robert Wisdom, and Mike Schank * Fine Line Features

Is it fair to discuss a white corporation student who is sexually assaulted from her black writing professor in the same breath as a high indoctrinate student who receives oral sex from his hang-out buddy? They are as well-as; not only-but also; not only-but; not alone-but key events in Todd Solondz's latest act of provocation, Storytelling, on the contrary the manner in which they are related (or not) provides an interesting investigation in contrasts.

In "Fiction," the first and shorter film in Solondz's two-part thumb-noser, raped learner Vi (Selma Blair) trumpets her experience to her match classmates in the form of a graphically detailed short story in which little has been done to disguise characters and consequences In "Nonfiction," the bedroom fellatio performed in succession Scooby (Mark Webber) is inadvertently missed by dint of a documentary filmmaker (Paul Giamatti) who purports to be doing a no-holds-barred analysis of this alienated suburban teenager.

by what mode real events become filtered and corrupted by the agency of artists is at the heart of this ballsy gesticulation from the maker of Welcome to the Dollhouse and Happiness. In the pair "Fiction" and "Nonfiction," the exploitation of united person's suffering for another person's entertainment ensues in serious credibility issues. None of her classmates purchase into Vi's fictionalization, even as it cherishs close to the truth, while none of the audience who procure to see Giamatti's completed film are privy to an essential constituent of its subject's makeup: his sexuality. All of Scooby's family and schoolmates assume he's gay; he may or may not be and doesn't appear to care. But the gap between public perception and concealed reality descrys the lie of omission in Giamatti's incompetent stab at truth-telling.

Solondz makes a certain number of pointedly self-referential cast choices: "Fiction" features Leo Fitzpatrick of Larry Clark's controversial piece of cinema verite fiction Kids, while "Nonfiction" includes Neanderthal slacker Mike Schank from Chris Smith's derisive true-life studious mood American Movie. Both of those films commit transgressions of storytelling, the director showily implies. Solondz's own impulse to underscore his message at each other turn is the chief storytelling sin of an otherwise ribald and welcome work of social commentary.

Stuart is film critic and senior film writer at Newsday.

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