Don Jon - Energetic, confident, assured, charismatic, ambitious, witty and funny

Energetic, confident, assured, charismatic, ambitious, witty, funny. All qualities that Joseph Gordon-Levitt exhibited on stage when introducing his new film Don Jon as part of the Laugh gala in association with Empire on Wednesday evening. Clearly immensely proud to be presenting his debut film as writer-director to the Odeon West End audience, he exuded enthusiasm and charm in his brief but winning introduction.

They are also qualities that can be applied to the film, in which Gordon-Levitt also plays the title role. In his intro he revealed that having graduated from successful child star, he’s always been fascinated by the film-making process and had been considering how he was going to make his debut film for a number of years. Heavily influenced by the films of Hal Ashby (Harold And Maude, The Last Detail) and the legendary Libertine Don Juan, Gordon-Levitt has extended his reputation with a flashy, if imperfect, debut about a New Jersey lothario who has a hidden and unhealthy relationship with pornography.

Obsessed with partying with his boys, preening his manicured looks, toning his sculpted body in the gym, as well as attempting to bed any girl that fits his crude standards, nothing quite compares though to Jon’s obsession – or addiction – to online pornography. Despite enjoying his many sexual escapades, Jon is convinced that pornography offers a higher plane of fulfillment and brazenly analyses how exactly he came to such a conclusion.

Things begin to change, however, when he encounters the stunning and equally media consumed Barbara, played by a vivacious Scarlett Johansson. Stiff-arming his persistent advances, in order for Jon to get any further with Barbara he must adhere to a ‘conventional’ relationship. But for how long will he be able to conceal his favourite seedy past time?

The superb cast includes Tony Danza, Brie Larson, Glenne Headly and Julianne Moore as a fellow night class student who identifies Jon’s inability to have a truly intimate relationship as a consequence of his misjudged preference for pornography. Beginning a (moral) maturation process as a consequence of his relationships with two very different women forms the more saccharine, and ultimately more conventional, part of this romantic comedy. When Don Jon is at its most profane, it is also at its most edgy.

After the 2012 release of Steve McQueen’s Shame, a far more naked and sombre portrayal of a related subject matter, Don Jon appears in a manner more played for laughs. This is not to accuse the film of having noting to say. Gordon-Levitt is keen to highlight the issue of current media consumption – not just pornography - and the effect it has on an individual’s ability to interact on a human level. Despite the film’s sharp wit and caricature portrayal of this particular world, Gordon-Levitt always retains his focus on the subject at hand.

Even when Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch’s ‘Good Vibrations’ rings out on Jon’s car radio there’s a gleeful sense that Gordon-Levitt knows exactly what he’s up to.