The Lifestyle (NR)

synopsis

Some middle-class, middle-aged couples like to get together on Saturday night and play bridge or go bowling. Others like to have group sex. By turns funny, touching, shocking and surreal, THE LIFESTYLE, is an intensely personal two-year journey through a dozen swingers' homes, workplaces, conventions and parties. Known to outsiders as "swinging," the Lifestyle-as swingers call it-has quietly grown in the nineties. Every state except North Dakota now has at least one swing club. The swingers themselves estimate that three million Americans are involved in organized group sex. THE LIFESTYLE is the first in-depth account of this undiscovered subculture that exists amidst our suburbs and small towns. No extensive investigation of swinging has appeared in America in any medium in over twenty-five years, but now those who participate are ready to talk about the 'how and why' of swinging. Director David Schisgall spent over three years getting to know members and leaders of the Lifestyle and documenting their dreams, hopes, and beliefs. Like most Americans, they want family, marriage, and limitless sexual indulgence, except unlike most Americans, members of the Lifestyle feel they have attained all three. Right now swingers-conservative and suburban as they are-are the vanguard of our ongoing American revolution to encourage the pursuit of happiness and permit more personal freedom. Perhaps, in a hundred years, swinging will become the accepted norm-traversing the route of, say, oral sex, from taboo to normal practice. On the other hand, the rise of swinging may represent the decline of a decadent, materialist society. Your trip through this new, unexplored lifestyle will take you past drawn shades and behind closed doors. Then decide for yourself.