Wong Kar Wai's The Hand is easily the best of the three shorts, and probably the only one that could be classified as genuinely erotic. Chang Chen (the earthy rebel Dark Cloud in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) stars as a timid apprentice tailor in 1960's Hong Kong assigned to design the wardrobe for a well-to-do "kept woman" played by the radiant Gong Li. Upon their first meeting, a self-serving and cynical act of control on her part is nonetheless received as a moment of kindness that fosters a lifetime of devotion. As the years progress and the whore's fortunes decline, the tailor remains faithful to the muse who inspired his greatest work. At just over 40 minutes, Wong's film is a mini-masterpiece of repression and unrequited desire. Featuring almost no explicit nudity, the movie is incredibly sensual, almost tactile in its textures and moods. Wong seduces less with what he shows than with what he refuses to show. It's also a heartbreaking and emotional, multi-layered work about the complexities of love, art, dignity, and compassion.

Steven Soderbergh's Equilibrium (not to be confused with the cheesy sci-fi B-movie of the same title) is more of a lark, a silly riff on the futility of obsession. Robert Downey Jr. delivers one of those mumbly performances typical of his work since burning out on drugs. He stars as a 1955 Madison Avenue ad exec visiting his psychiatrist (Alan Arkin) to interpret a recurring dream he's been having about a mystery woman. The shrink only feigns interest, and while his patient is turned away keeps himself preoccupied with his own peculiar fixation. The movie begins gloriously, as Soderbergh's gently swaying camera teases us with glimpses of the dream woman, then segues into a long talky section focused on word play and the banter between actors, and finally features an enigmatic and confusing ending perhaps meant as a tongue-in-cheek homage to Antonioni. The piece is not a work of art and will at best serve as a footnote in its director's career, but is amusing and entertaining for its 25-minute length.

Then we have Antonioni's The Dangerous Thread of Things, a sad reminder that the once great auteur is well past his prime. Although the director attempts to weave in his signature themes of alienation and portentous symbolism, and still has a talent for choreographing long tracking shots in which the movements of the actors seem to flirt with the camera, the movie is a pale shadow of his earlier works and plays more like a Jess Franco softcore cheapie. The three lead actors whose names are not worth remembering deliver terrible performances and are forced to speak some atrocious dialogue. The plot involves a man and his frequently-topless wife having marital difficulties, until the man sleeps with a buxom girl from a neighboring villa, after which point the two women get naked and frolic on the beach. It's all directed with utter solemnity and is meant to be terribly serious and meaningful, but is deadly dull and laughably pretentious. Though one of the two women is quite a looker, the explicit nudity and sex are the least erotic element of any of the three films in this collection. Antonioni should be ashamed to let his career go out with such a whimper.

As a total package, Eros is a mixed bag, but two out of the three shorts are genuinely worth seeking out even if the third, the impetus behind the project, should best be forgotten. With some expansion, the Wong segment could have made its own wonderful feature film.

Final Thoughts: Even if not all of its parts work as well as intended, Eros is an interesting collection of short films worth owning for the Wong and Soderbergh entries alone...

The best short is Wong Kar Wai's The Hand, but only because of Doyle's trademark cinematography and Wong Kar Wai's adept use of older Chinese melodies. Other than that, it's too depressing, and yet too underdeveloped to be satisfying. It features Gong Li as a gold-digger who hits on a tailor. Li's character runs out of money, and resorts to prostituting herself, while her lover is forced to make excuses to his boss over why she hasn't paid up for the clothing. While the woman and her tailor have great chemistry, they can never fulfill their emotional needs with each other, and thus the two part on a negative note. I got exactly what I expected out of The Hand, but it just didn't add up to a great short, because there's no time to get to know or relate to the characters. Plus the sexual encounters are depicted in a melodramatic fashion which makes it a challenge to get turned on by them.

On the other hand, at least there are sexual encounters in The Hand, while Soderbergh's Equilibrium features a bland Robert Downey Jr. talking to his uninterested shrink about the discomfort he has over a dream in which a woman takes a bath nude(*gasp*) and then dresses when she's done. Note that I have not seen any of Sodenbergh's other "indie" flicks and even Ocean's 11, so I can't really comment about his work in general, but I don't really see the point of Equilibrium. Is it a commentary about isolation in a modern society? By connecting the dream to the lead's desire to sleep a little longer after the alarm,is it trying to equate repression of sexual urges with automation? Whatever it is, it's definitely not titilating or even riveting. And on a side note, the color sequences are garish and tacky, while the black and white sequences are bland and lifeless.

The only short which gets the scenery-but nothing else-right is Antonioni's The Dangerous Thread of Things. Shot on location in the Mediterranean, the film has wonderful views of the countryside.

The valleys where this film takes place are full of dreamlike beaches, fields and majestic mountains. Speaking of majestic mountains, 'Thread features a very attractive woman who encounters a bickering couple on the verge of splitting up. The man takes a liking to this new paramour, and has his way with her in a rebound encounter. Unfortunately, you only see her totally nude when she's not having sex. In the meantime, she's just plays around-partly with herself-to some hideous Europop music in the background. It's a cop-out, since the emphasis is placed on the relationship of the first couple, rather than the affair of the second couple. So instead of steamy sex, you get stuck with a bitter break-up. And why would I want to pay to see that, when I have enough of those in my personal life?

NINGEN21'S RATING: In conclusion, I give Wong Kar Wai's short a 6, Soderbergh's Short a 4, and Antonioni's short a 5, with an optional +2 for the nudity. The average for the film as a whole would be about 5.5/10

We'll start with Steven Soderbergh's Equilibrium, which features Robert Downey Jr. as a harried ad executive who comes to a psychiatrist (Alan Arkin) to help interpret his recurring dream about a mysterious woman. I'm not quite sure what Soderbergh was going for here. Even though there is a copious amount of nudity, I had a hard time understanding what this part of the anthology had to do with sex. It actually comes off more as a "head trip" movie, which makes it all the more aggravating when the film suddenly ends. Still, the short is shot quite nicely, and Downey give an interesting performance, which makes Equilibrium at least worth a viewing.

The same cannot be said for Michelangelo Antonioni's The Dangerous Side of Things. This softcore sex romp disguised as an "arthose" movie irritates, bores and angers the viewer as they are subjected to an inane script and wooden acting. The plot, about a couple having problems (which leads the husband having an affair) has been done dozens -- if not hundreds -- of times before. Even though this segment offers the most "erotic" content (i.e., the most nudity and sexual scenes), it's nothing all that sexy. Combined with the poor quality of the actual film-making, the only thing "dangerous" about Antonioni's contribution is how it will take a half-hour of your life that you will never get back.

Thankfully, Wong Kar-Wai's entry, The Hand, is much better. This could be seen as a companion piece to Wong's In the Mood for Love and 2046, as they all take place during the same time period and deal with some of the same issues like loneliness. Chang Chen plays a tailor who falls for a prositute (Gong Li) after she offers her "services" to inspire him to make gorgeous dresses for her. Through the years, their relationship never fully develops, and by the time both characters acknowledge their true feelings for each other, it is too late for the two to act on them. Like Equilibrium, The Hand feels a bit incomplete, especially since Wong uses a "slow burn" technique to develop his characters and the short running time simply does not allow him to do that here. Still, there are many classic Wong Kar-Wai elements on tap here (including stunning cinematography by Christopher Doyle) that are used effectively enough to make The Hand a solid short film, which redeems Eros as a whole.