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Hey there hordes upon hordes of loyal fans,

As you might have noticed, I have not been very active on this Blog. Generally, I now post reviews to Blogcritics.org and I also post those entries on my other Blog: Pop Culture Junkie. Please head over there to keep up with my wildly subjective reviews. Thank you.

- The Management

Movie Review: Friends & Family

Rarely do I find gay-themed movies in second-hand dvd stores. I think we people of the pink treasure our gay flicks even if they are flawed and we don't really feel the need to see them again. Ever. So I should have been forewarned when I found Friends & Family for the price of less than a cup of coffee. It is a deeply weird movie in that some parts that work pretty well are joined with a few parts that don't work in any way, shape or form. As the good parts aren't good enough to make up for the seriously bad ones, the whole production ends up going under.
Stephen and Danny are heavies for an Italian mob boss and are a gay couple. Their parents know about the latter and are dandy with it, but are oblivious about the former. Therefore, when all four of the parents come into town, many shenanigans ensue to cover up the shady profession. Though, because the couple is supposed to be our main interest and therefore sympathetic, we aren't really shown them doing anything all that shady. But everybody is deeply afraid of them because they have a reputation and as heavies for a mob boss I doubt it would be based on how they press wild flowers. They must have done some really bad and violent things in service for the mob - and these are the good guys...
What we also don't get to see is any physical activity going on between them. Because that would be - you know - gross, to the general audience that this movie seems to be aiming for. At the grand finale, the couple realises they took this job as tough, bad-ass mobsters to overcompensate for being gay. But it's not just the couple suffering from internalised homophobia; this whole movie has one foot in the closet. To kick up the gay-level in a sexless way, two flamers are presented as the best friends of our leads. How this group met and bonded is a scenario I can't quite fathom, but at least they are more interesting than the GQ duo. The 'leads' also have their thunder stolen by most of the slightly caricatured cast and their subplots. In the end, it feels like the headliners were the supporting cast in their own movie.
On the plus side, the production values are good, some jokes land and the actors - for the most part - manage to win you over. But then there is that one subplot that torpedoes the movie, sinks it, dives down for the remaining pieces and stomps on them.
One of the two pairs of parents are anti-government survivalists and plan to overthrow the people in charge now that they are visiting the big city by... well I didn't quite grasp the grander scheme, assuming there was one, but it ends in a hostage situation. The survivalist scenes leading up to this break tone completely with the rest of the movie and are entirely, cringe-inducingly unfunny. The actors and their characters are way over the top and the footage seems shot by amateurs without a script. They serve to force the movie to come to a climax, but a better solution could easily have been found to bring that about, using the other characters. The movie makes you feel like a good cook and a bad cook came together and only managed to come up with a half-way edible soufflé. It looks pretty, but falls flat.

Takei THAT!

George Takei (aka Sulu from Star Trek) came out as gay in 2005, but he unofficially came out - to me anyway - when I saw The Search for Spock (1984). I had been wondering even during the series, but in this movie there is one shot where he swishes across the screen so gaily, while throwing a cape over his shoulders, that all doubt was obliterated from my mind. Since 2005 he has been active fighting for gay causes (as well as appearing in Heroes) and I wanted to share an already somewhat older but very funny clip of him. When NBA sportsman Tim Hardaway made a homophobic comment, Takei responded hilariously and fittingly. Since arguments don't have an impact, maybe sly humour can help homophobes realise how irrational they are. Or maybe not.

Can You Bear It?

The expression 'camper than a row of tents' comes to mind when watching the video of the Dutch Bearband Bearforce 1. I have had the pleasure of talking a couple of times with the yellow-shirted band member (just talk, unfortunately) and can say that he is actually a sweet guy. And he and his body are well-known in Amsterdam, especially now that he is on the poster for Furball (a hairy men dance party) this month. I like the idea of this anti-boy band and even the silly dance moves are entertaining. It's just unfortunate that the music itself, a sort of collision of classic gay pophits re-sung, doesn't really do anything for me. I doubted it would go anywhere but apparently Perez Hilton picked up on it and the link from that renouned gossip site got the video 200.000 views in one day, so who knows... they might find their way to furry fame.

Movie Review: But I'm a Cheerleader

This movie sets up a situation with amazing potential for silliness, ramps up and then backs away as if startled by the monster it has created. The story goes thusly: an unsuspecting cheerleader is sent off to a rehab camp after an intervention in which she is told by parents and friends that she is a lesbian. That comes as a bit of a shock to her, as she thought all girls were mesmerised by bouncing breasts.
The boys and gals in the camp are sleeping in reassuringly color coded bedrooms (blue for boys, pink for ladies) and are trained to act in accordance with their gender. It should come as no surprise that the treatment is not only un-effective, but that romances start to develop, most notably between the cheerleader and a surly girl from rich parents who are threatening to disown her. Much theoretical tension ensues from the question whether or not the girls will end up together. No really, take a guess!
There are some nicely bizarre elements to the movie, most notably the colourful set design and outfits. The head of the house makes for a good, despicable villainess, who turns a blind eye to the fact that her own boy is a big flamer. And speaking of those: RuPaul - out of drag, as the trainer for the boys - makes a remarkably manly guy. The kids at the camp are amusing stereotypes that - apart from the romantic leads - struggle to be more than one-dimensional. For a movie with so many underdeveloped characters that could have used more scenes, it oddly struggles to fill its running time. It is also strange that the villains of the piece are not really dealt with at the end. There are a couple of scenes you expect are coming up by way of pay-off, but the movie can't be bothered, only interested by then in getting the main couple together. A bit more depth and sharper dialogue could have made this a movie worth re-watching. As it stands, once will be enough.

Movie Review: Head On

Over the last decade, there have been less depressing gay movies. Well, there are plenty that depress because they are bad, but not many that have the guts to be negative about the gay experience. In the olden days, as exposed in the great documentary The Celluloid Closet, gay people in movies were pathetic, ridiculous and asexual or evil. Since then they generally have been accepting of themselves, though often victimised by their surroundings. If they were in mainstream movies though, they often still got killed.
Ari is something else in Head On. He is a Greek guy in Australia who struggles with his heritage, in combination with his sexuality. He hates his orthodox father, partly because he is at an age when a lot of men do and also because he knows his father would disown him if he ever found out his son was gay. He is caught in a typically Greek close-knit family that is anything but homo-friendly and knows he will lose everything if he comes out. He has one flamboyantly gay nephew that is spat upon by the rest of the family - including his own father - that is his link with his gay side.
Now if you are expecting a cheerful morality tale with a happy ending you will be disappointed. Ari does not handle his internal conflict well: he goes on a self-destructive bender. He is rude to people who reach out to help him, does too many drugs and has unsafe sex with strangers. We follow him a whole night and by the end of it, there is a certain feeling of resolution, though there isn't the sense that he is beyond hope. It's a moody, dark and depressing ride, but it feels raw and real, which is a nice change from the upbeat fluff that a lot of gay-themed movies offer.
On a shallow note: Alex Dimitriades looks as hot in shadows and neon as he does in daylight and carries the movie easily, making us root for Ari even as he is being an asshole. That he appears full frontal is simply a bonus.