This HBO movie from Steven Soderbergh was released theatrically outside the US, and tells the story of the internecine romance between piano maestro Liberace (Michael Douglas) and Scott Thorson (Matt Damon), on whose book the film is based. Over a six year period the two men seduce each other with money, charm and high living, but when the older man starts to graft a new look onto his lover, the cracks in their relationship widen. Douglas makes a superb Liberace, with and without his toupe, and Matt Damon does just as well as Thorson, throwing himself into the character’s sexuality with surprising elan. Rob Lowe contributes a notable grotesque as a plastic-surgery addict; taking a look at the seedy world behind the glamour of Vegas, Soderbergh crafts one of his best studies of sexual politics to date.
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