A Viennese treat or just empty calories?

Austrians apparently love their sausage. If the testimonial of one plump clothed woman and the sight of many generously padded unclothed bodies in the oddball distraction “Dog Days” are to be believed, they also enjoy topless sunbathing, group sex, amateur striptease and tearily boozing into the wee hours of the night. There is, it seems, a lot of Sturm und Drang and no small amount of sexual adventuring, sordid and otherwise, behind all those locked Viennese doors and immaculately groomed lawns.

Co-written and directed by Ulrich Seidl, initially released in 2001 and a fixture on the film festival circuit since, “Dog Days” unfolds during a fictionalized heat wave across several summer days. The place is an undifferentiated stretch of anonymous modern housing, industrial parks, fast-food joints and supermarkets where, presumably, a lot of sausage is sold. (Barstow and its surrounding environs instantly come to mind.)

The characters are many and nearly as blurred as the landscape. They’re definitely as isolated and in need of some tender loving care, from the creaky widower (played by nonprofessional Erich Finsches) who scrupulously picks every leaf off his yard to the young flirt (Franziska Weiss) who dances on a bar table, dreamily oblivious to the men peeking up her skirt.

In his previous films (none of which I’ve seen), Seidl apparently fuses fiction with nonfiction, a tactic that, writes critic Stefan Grissemann, can make it difficult to locate the “precise boundaries” in his work. “Dog Days” is Seidl’s first feature, but he hasn’t abandoned the world’s uglier truths. The most obviously uncomfortable truths are inscribed on all those naked bodies, often pictured grinding and groping with balefully little feeling. The lack of emotion during these encounters, as well as their almost mathematical choreography, comes off as seriously bleak -- when not laughing or blushing, you duck for cover. There’s a sociological undercurrent to this free-flowing sex-angst, I imagine, but like many filmmakers who indulge in gonzo high jinks Seidl seems to enjoy the more degrading aspects of the human condition a little too much.

That can make “Dog Days” somewhat hard going; a scene with a candle and a naked man has to be seen to be believed (or not), but it doesn’t make it any less watchable or strangely entertaining. The restless editing ensures that we never stay with anyone too long and instead flit from lonely woman to angry man and back again. The film’s bright look (you could watch the daytime scenes with sunglasses) alternates between carefully framed tableaux and the sort of hand-held camerawork associated with documentary cinema and reality TV. In the end, it’s unclear what precisely Seidl means to say about contemporary Austria, a country that at least here seems adrift with lost souls, save that summer in Vienna may be a must to avoid.

*

‘Dog Days’

MPAA rating: Unrated

Times guidelines: Adult language, nudity, explicit sex, violence

Maria Hofstatter...Hitchhiker

Christine Jirku...Teacher

Victor Hennemann...Teacher’s lover

Georg Friedrich...Lucky

Alfred Mrva...Alarm salesman

Erich Finsches...Old man

Franziska Weiss...Klaudia

Released by Leisure Time Features. Director Ulrich Seidl. Writers Ulrich Seidl, Veronika Franz. In German with English subtitles. Running time: 2 hours.

Exclusively at Landmark’s Nuart, 11272 Santa Monica Blvd., West Los Angeles, (310) 281-8223.