Film Review: I WANT YOUR SEX (2026): Gregg Araki’s Latest is a Wild and Fun Movie With a Few Minor Flaws

I Want Your Sex Review

I Want Your Sex (2026) Film Review, a movie directed by Gregg Araki written by Karley Sciortino and Gregg Araki and starring Olivia Wilde, Cooper Hoffman, Chase Sui Wonders, Mason Gooding, Daveed Diggs, Charli XCX, Johnny Knoxville, Margaret Cho, James Duval, Nathan Bexton, Michael Hitchcock, Roxane Mesquida, Christian Wilde, Miki, Coda Li Marcus and Kent Navarrette.

Gregg Araki is an expert at creating sexual tension on-screen and has made exceptional films in the past such as 1995’s The Doom Generation. In the new film, I Want Your Sex, Araki has made his most mainstream movie to date. Focusing on risqué topics like BDSM and sexual harassment in the workplace helps the director tap into themes that will hit modern viewers over the head with a comic sledgehammer. There’s nothing subtle about how Araki tackles these themes, but that’s never been his style anyway.

Olivia Wilde is featured as a kinky woman in Araki’s new film. She plays a quirky lady in her late 30’s working in the art world named Erika Tracy. When she hires a 23-year-old guy named Elliot (Cooper Hoffman in a juicy role) to work for her, things start to get a little too uncomfortable for Erika’s new employee who has a girlfriend, Minerva (Charli XCX, underutilized here), and a best friend/roommate, Apple (Chase Sui Wonders), who desperately needs Elliot to pay his share of the rent.

Things happen very quickly at the start of the film in terms of Elliot getting hired and beginning to participate in dominant/submissive sexual behavior with Erika outside of the office. Elliot gets rammed in the butt with sex toys and soon finds himself immersed in Erika’s twistedly offbeat world. If this plot development didn’t occur so quickly, there may have been time to develop all the characters just a tad bit more.

Charli XCX plays Minerva straightforwardly as a graduate student who doesn’t care about Elliot too much, judging from her attitude towards him. Since Erika pays Elliot a lot of attention, he thinks he should leave Minerva to be in a relationship with Erika. However, Erika has other things in mind and a big upcoming professional event which she needs to focus on in-between steamy bouts of sexual interaction with the average Elliot who discovers in Erika a reason to change his life until she asks him to bring Apple on board their sexual conquests which further complicates an already weird situation.

This story line would make a great dramatic film, but too often Araki goes for the comic jugular rather than carrying through on the promises the movie sets out in its framing device in which Elliot is interviewed by a couple of detectives (Margaret Cho and Johnny Knoxville). That takes the viewer out of the picture at times rather than sympathizing with Elliot who can be an unlikable character at times.

I Want Your Sex can get bogged down with unbelievable situations that would play better as dramatic material. The outtakes at the end credits of the film that are meant to be funny wouldn’t work in a serious film, but that doesn’t matter because Araki takes the comic route almost always in terms of the way the material is presented on-screen.

Wilde is very authentic as the sex-obsessed woman who has words of wisdom that make sense, especially in terms of her reasoning why people should stay with someone who cares rather than going off and being single or in a bad relationship just for the sex.

The supporting cast is headed by a terrific turn by Chase Sui Wonders whose character gets herself caught up in an unsettling situation when things could have taken a different path had Elliot been more normal. A normal person probably would have walked away from Erika and the job at some point early in these proceedings. This film makes the desire for financial stability the driving force for Elliot staying at the new job, but then the plot pulls the rug out of that notion when Elliot acts up at Erika’s big event later in the picture.

Wonders brings quite a bit of complexity to a part that could have been a throwaway in a lesser actress’s hands. Mason Gooding is pretty funny in support as a gay character named Zap who often parties and dishes out unsolicited stories about his personal life.

Still, the lead performances are nothing to sneeze at either. Wilde was born to play this part and has a great time on-screen creating her character with a lot of memorable zest. Sadly, she plays her role in a way that makes her more likable than Hoffman’s Elliot. It’s debatable whether or not that was the point.

It may not sound like I Want Your Sex is a very good film, overall, but it is, actually, quite entertaining. Araki’s fine pacing helps drive the plot in a clever way and the performers are really dedicated to the material from beginning to end. In the final analysis, I Want Your Sex bites off a lot in just a brief 90-minute running time and chews it all pretty well even though with Araki at the center of it, it should have and could have been even more thought-provoking than it is. Olivia Wilde is a national treasure, and Hoffman is on the rise as an actor to watch. Wonders can do no wrong either which makes Araki’s new film worth a look.

Rating: 7/10

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