"Assume the position."

2002

1h 51m

6.8(2014 votes)

Romance

Drama

Comedy

Overview

A young woman, recently released from a mental hospital, gets a job as a secretary to a demanding lawyer, where their employer-employee relationship turns into a sexual, sadomasochistic one.

Where to Watch

Stream

Rent

Links & Resources

IMDbView

Social & External

IMDb

Production Companies

The people behind it

Cast & crew

10 featured cast members

Starring

James Spader

Mr. Grey

Maggie Gyllenhaal

Lee Holloway

Jeremy Davies

Peter

Lesley Ann Warren

Joan Holloway

Stephen McHattie

Burt Holloway

Patrick Bauchau

Dr. Twardon

Jessica Tuck

Tricia O'Connor

Osgood Perkins

Jonathan

Amy Locane

Lee's Sister

Mary Joy

Sylvia

Creative team

Directed by: Steven Shainberg
Written by: Erin Cressida Wilson
Produced by: Amy Hobby
Steven Shainberg

Similar Movies

2025

Gunjou

An orphan girl on a solo journey met a fellow traveller abroad who took her on a life changing journey

Movie

6.1

2007

Youth Without Youth

Professor of language and philosophy Dominic Matei is struck by lightning and ages backwards from 70 to 40 in a week, attracting the world and the Nazis. While on the run, the professor meets a young woman who has her own experience with a lightning storm. Not only does Dominic find love again, but her new abilities hold the key to his research.

Movie

7.0

2008

Lemon Tree

Salma Zidane, a widow, lives simply from her grove of lemon trees in the West Bank's occupied territory. The Israeli defence minister and his wife move next door, forcing the Secret Service to order the trees' removal for security. The stoic Salma seeks assistance from the Palestinian Authority, Israeli army, and a young attorney, Ziad Daud, who takes the case. In this allegory, does David stand a chance against Goliath?

Movie

6.0

1989

Vampire's Kiss

A publishing executive is visited and bitten by a vampire and starts exhibiting erratic behavior. He pushes his secretary to extremes as he tries to come to terms with his affliction.

Movie

7.1

2007

Before the Devil Knows You're Dead

When two brothers organize the robbery of their parents' jewelry store, the job goes horribly wrong, triggering a series of events that send them and their family hurtling towards a shattering climax.

Movie

6.2

2008

Untraceable

Special Agent Jennifer Marsh works in an elite division of the FBI dedicated to fighting cybercrime. She thinks she has seen it all, until a particularly sadistic criminal arises on the Internet. This tech-savvy killer posts live feeds of his crimes on his website; the more hits the site gets, the faster the victim dies. Marsh and her team must find the elusive killer before time runs out.

Movie

6.7

1986

Matador

A conflicted youth confesses to crimes he didn't commit while a man and woman aroused by death become obsessed with each other.

Movie

6.6

2007

The Grocer's Son

Antoine Sforza, a thirty-year-old young man, left his village ten years before in order to start a new life in the big city, but now that his father, a traveling grocer, is in hospital after a stroke, he more or less reluctantly accepts to come back to replace him in his daily rounds.

Movie

7.0

2008

The Baader Meinhof Complex

When German police viciously quell a protest against the shah of Iran, popular journalist Ulrike Meinhof rebels against her dishonest marriage, walks away from her children and joins radical anarchist Andreas Baader. Together with Baader's girlfriend, Gudrun Ensslin, they form the violent Red Faction Army, and together perpetrate a slew of terrorist attacks as a way of disrupting the fabric of what they see as an increasingly fascist state.

Movie

7.7

2013

The Longest Distance

Two sides of the same country: a chaotic and violent city contrasting against a natural paradise where the oldest mountains on the planet can be found. Two main characters that find each other at a crucial moment. Two fearless journeys, one that begins as a childlike adventure and ends up on the other side of the country and a one-way journey, free and determined. The same destiny will inevitably bond a woman with her grandson. Without knowing it they are part of an unbreakable family circle that deeply unites them. Second opportunities will arise while individual freedom of choice will become imposing. Everything comes together to tell us: there is only one destiny, the one you choose for yourself.

Movie

6.4

1981

Mommie Dearest

Renowned film star Joan Crawford's abuse towards Christina, her adopted daughter, intensifies as her professional and romantic relationships turn sour.

Movie

4.9

2017

Attack of the Adult Babies

A group of high-powered, middle-aged white men go to this place to take refuge from the stresses of their daily lives and spend time relaxing and regressing as “adult babies.” It’s set in a beautiful, secret location but this is not their only function. As adult babies, they are there to refuel the world’s economy by sinister and unusual means.

Movie

6.3

1990

The Death King

Seven episodes, each taking place on a different day of the week, on the theme of suicide and violent death.

Movie

6.0

2008

Dorothy Mills

When a gloomy, God-fearing island community is rocked by the assault of an infant, a psychiatrist is called in to examine Dorothy Mills, the teenager accused of the crime. Despite the villagers' hostility to her inquiry, she soon comes to suspect that Dorothy suffers from multiple personality disorder...

Movie

6.6

2006

Taxidermia

Three stories. Three ages. Three men. Grandfather, father, son. One is an orderly, one is a leading sportsman, and one is a master taxidermist. One desires love, the other success, and the third immortality.

Movie

6.3

1991

Class Action

A liberal activist lawyer alienated his daughter Maggie years ago when she discovered his many affairs. Now a conservative corporate lawyer, Maggie agrees to go up against her father in court. To gain promotion, she must defend an auto manufacturer against charges that their explosion-prone station wagons are unsafe. As her mother begs for peace, Maggie takes on her dad in a trial that turns increasingly personal and nasty.

Movie

3.8

2008

Crying for Love

Three girls meet by chance in a hospital. Struggling to come to terms with their fate, they all look back on a decisive moment in their life: Sara, a professional swimmer relentlessly urged on by her ambitious father, was deprived of her only real chance of happiness. Mette has left her deeply religious family, finding it too hard to bear that they have accepted her fate while she hasn't. And Stephanie has brutally rejected her boyfriend in fear of being rejected herself. Although their stories are very different, the three girls are brought together in their search for love and companionship. Based on the Oscar nominated short fiction »At Night«

Movie

6.7

2005

Accused

On the surface Henrik and Nina Christofferson are an ordinary family living happily. But they have a problem. Their daughter, Stine, a difficult 14 year old, has a habit of telling lies in class. When Stine accuses her father of sexual abuse, and is believed by seemingly eager social workers, their family is thrust into crisis. Could Henrik have done it? And when Stine prepares to return home, the ugly side of family life is exposed.

Movie

5.8

1976

The Shaggy D.A.

Wilby Daniels, a successful lawyer running for District Attorney, suddenly finds himself being transformed into an English sheepdog. Somehow he has to keep his change a secret and find just what is causing it, all the while eluding the local dog catcher.

Movie

6.0

1935

Calm Yourself

A recently-fired advertising executive starts his own company, Confidential Services, to help clients solve their unusual and problematic situations.

Movie

Recommended Movies

6.3

2015

The Duke of Burgundy

Day in and day out, lovers Cynthia and Evelyn enact an elaborate sadomasochistic fantasy as mistress and maid. But as their ritual of domination and submission begins to turn stale, Cynthia yearns for something more conventional, while Evelyn tries to push their taboos even further.

Movie

6.2

2007

Sex and Death 101

A guy's life is turned around by an email, which includes the names of everyone he's had sex with and ever will have sex with. His situation gets worse when he encounters a femme fatale who targets men guilty of sex crime.

Movie

6.7

1997

In the Company of Men

Two business executives--one an avowed misogynist, the other recently emotionally wounded by his love interest--set out to exact revenge on the female gender by seeking out the most innocent, uncorrupted girl they can find and ruining her life.

Movie

6.3

2022

How to Please a Woman

When her all-male house-cleaning business gets out of control, a mature woman must embrace her own sexuality, if she is to make a new life for herself.

Movie

6.6

1988

Working Girl

When a secretary's idea is stolen by her boss, she takes a risky chance to reclaim it by impersonating him and running the project from his position.

Movie

6.3

2019

Dirty Sexy Saint

Clay Kincaid hates the nickname 'Saint', he got for being too kind to stray animals and desperate people. Especially when it comes to women. With a rough and damaged past that has left him jaded, he doesn't do committed relationships. This is before he meets Samantha Jamieson, an heiress turned runaway in need of help. When she starts to work as a waitress at his bar, he discovers that she is someone truly special and amazing… someone that could warm his damaged heart.

Movie

6.7

2014

The Little Death

A comedy film that looks into the loosely connected lives of people with strange sexual fantasies.

Movie

6.4

2026

Office Romance

Jackie, President and CEO of Air Cruz, runs a tight ship in her business, including a rigid anti-fraternization policy for all her employees. When a new sexy lawyer begins working for her, that policy becomes very tested.

Movie

6.7

2012

My Awkward Sexual Adventure

A hyper-repressed and schlubby accountant (Jonas Chernick) strikes a deal with a worldly but disorganized stripper (Emily Hampshire): he'll help her with her crushing debt if she helps him become a better lover.

Movie

6.2

2002

The Good Girl

A discount store clerk strikes up an affair with a stock boy who considers himself the incarnation of Holden Caulfield.

Movie

6.3

2009

(Untitled)

A fashionable contemporary art gallerist in Chelsea, New York falls for a brooding new music composer in this comic satire of the state of contemporary art.

Movie

6.1

2009

Chéri

The son of a courtesan retreats into a fantasy world after being forced to end his relationship with the older woman who educated him in the ways of love.

Movie

6.0

2002

XX/XY

Three friends begin a dangerous three-way relationship that spirals out of control, leading to dire consequences that haunt them ten years later.

Movie

6.4

2015

Just Before I Go

Ted Morgan has been treading water for most of his life. After his wife leaves him, Ted realizes he has nothing left to live for. Summoning the courage for one last act, Ted decides to go home and face the people he feels are responsible for creating the shell of a person he has become. But life is tricky. The more determined Ted is to confront his demons, to get closure, and to withdraw from his family, the more Ted is yanked into the chaos of their lives. So, when Ted Morgan decides to kill himself, he finds a reason to live.

Movie

5.8

2007

Young People Fucking

On a Tuesday night, five couples have separate sexual adventures. Matt and Kris, friends for years, want to have an only-once, no-strings good time. Abby and Andrew, married, celebrate his birthday, but it's marred by angst and miscommunication. Mia and Eric are exes, making sure they are over each other. Jaime and Ken work together and this is a first date. Inez and Gord invite his roommate, Dave, to join them. By the time each couple has gone through a prelude, foreplay, sex, an interlude, orgasm, and afterglow, they've answered basic questions: can sex be anonymous, are we bored, is our marriage really finished, does anyone tell the truth, and how do we make someone happy?

Movie

6.2

2003

The Shape of Things

Quiet, unassuming Adam is changing in a major way, thanks to his new girlfriend, art student Evelyn. Adam's friends are a little freaked by the transformation.

Movie

8.4

2023

¿Quieres ser mi hijo?

Lu, a conformist woman in her forties, learns that her 15-year partner has been having extramarital affairs. Starting from scratch, she gets involved in an unexpected relationship with a young womanizer.

Movie

6.9

2015

Focus

Nicky, an accomplished con artist, gets romantically involved with his disciple Jess but later ends their relationship. Years later, she returns as a femme fatale to spoil his plans.

Movie

6.1

1986

Nine 1/2 Weeks

An erotic story about a woman, the assistant of an art gallery, who gets involved in an impersonal affair with a man. She barely knows about his life, only about the sex games they play, so the relationship begins to get complicated.

Movie

6.1

2008

Strictly Sexual

Two successful women, sick and tired of dating and relationships, decide to keep two young men in their pool house for strictly sexual purposes.

Movie