The opening scene of 30 Days of Lust makes it extremely clear that Freddy (Linda Blümchen) and Zeno (Simon Steinhorst) have absolutely no problems keeping each other satisfied in the bedroom. They should enjoy themselves while they can: they don’t know it yet, but their sex life – along with everything else in their relationship – is about to become a whole lot more complicated.
Freddy and Zeno are high school sweethearts who’ve been together since they were teenagers. Now they’re coming up to 30, and Freddy is starting to wonder what she’s been missing.
Freddy (Linda Blümchen) and Zeno (Simon Steinhorst) in '30 Days of Lust'. Credit: Trimafilm / SWR / Beta Film
“I do think it’s weird that neither of us has ever had sex with anyone else,” she says in a moment of fading post-coital bliss.
Because they’ve both been cocooned in a loving relationship their entire adult lives, this idle statement does not immediately set alarm bells ringing. For the two of them, being this happy and secure is all they’ve ever known: when she suggests that maybe he might like butts bigger than hers, or that she might have a secret fetish, it’s just a game of “what if”.
Meanwhile, all around them people are driving home the idea that they need to somehow improve things. At work, Zeno’s father boasts that sex with his new lover is far more satisfying than with his mother, mostly because he didn’t (yet) know what he wanted in bed. Zeno, unsurprisingly, does not take this news well.
Later at a party Freddy and Zeno are confronted with one of Freddy’s old friends who’s gone into couples counselling as part of her “bucket list” (also on it: visiting Australia and New Zealand). Feeling defensive over her own stalled life goals, Freddy blurts out that they’re also checking off an item on their bucket list. “For 30 days we can do whatever we want with other partners… I mean sexually”. Zeno’s expression at this news is not to be missed.
30 Days of Lust is a series about a couple who don’t realise that physical and emotional connection go hand in hand. They assume that without exploration, their life will be full of regret. Because they’ve only ever had each other, the idea that exploration itself could also lead to regret, and that piling up a series of separate intimate experiences could drive a wedge between them, doesn’t cross their minds. At least, not at first.
Freddy (Linda Blümchen) and Zeno (Simon Steinhorst). Credit: Trimafilm / SWR / Beta Film / Sabine Panossian
Right from the start the chemistry between Blümchen and Steinhorst is utterly convincing; the duo are completely believable as a deeply loving and physically comfortable long-term couple. It’s also clear that Zeno is the slightly reserved and settled one of the pair, while Freddy is starting to feel that maybe she needs to shake up things before it’s too late. So, while Zeno isn’t fully on board, he agrees to Freddy’s proposal. For the next 30 days, they can sleep with whoever they like.
As he’s the nice quiet one, everyone – well, Freddy and the friend she’ll be staying with for the month, Charu (Samia Muriel Chancrin) – expects Zeno to struggle. Instead, by the end of the first night he’s stumbled into a threesome with his neighbours. Which leads him to propose a new rule: no sleeping with the same person twice.
Freddy and Zeno are gambling that their love is stronger than 30 days of one-night stands.
Meanwhile Freddy has thrown herself at an old university lecturer, only things don’t go quite to plan. But she’s made her (single) bed and now she must lie in it; fans of scenes where people write heartfelt text messages then delete them unsent will find much to enjoy here.
It’s clear how Freddy thought things would go. She’d have a month of effortlessly enjoying herself with all the people who were clearly hitting on her and then go back to Zeno with her desires sated. The idea that things might not work out that way, and that she might be jealous of Zeno for once, never occurred to her.
While this is a series with a lot of sex (and a few good jokes as well), the light-hearted tone of the early scenes is soon replaced with a more thoughtful look at relationships. Freddy and Zeno had no idea they had it so good: what’s next might be full of carnal delights, but it’s the ever-growing risk that one or the other might develop feelings for one of their casual encounters (or realise that their feelings for their partner aren’t strong enough) that’s the real worry.
Freddy and Zeno are gambling that their love is stronger than 30 days of one-night stands. That’s not a bet too many couples would want to make.
30 Days of Lust is streaming at SBS On Demand.
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30 Days of Lust
