Saturday, July 21, 2012
LOVE AFFAIR
Today's gay film was
I included this film in the gay film series because Tom Courtney is Albert Finney's bitch.
An effeminate man, kind of in love with his uncaring boss, plays a familiar, old fashioned, for sure, submissive role in a kind of soft SM relationship.
I know. This is a lot to swallow when ostensibly the film is all about the relationship between an old hack of a star in a British rep company, on tour, and his dresser. A role which not only includes dressing but caretaking in the most intimate and expansive way.
The relationship is not sexual per se but it is definitely homoerotic and, at least from the dresser's perspective, as deeply love involved as any physical one. We are in the realm of the psychological bond.
All that having been said, boringly as it sounds, the story involves a subtle transformation and power shift. We can sit back and enjoy a backstage film which was made out of a backstage play.
Finney is glorious as the crazed, alcoholic, aging star. Courtney flits about managing him, pulling his puppet strings in an effort to help the show go on even though its star is clearly incapable of performing. Actually, he pulls it off. A star turn. Lear.
It is a great show, a 5 out of Netflix5. Any film that has the talents of Finney and Courtney is going to be a tour de force. Courtney's turn as a campy servant is priceless and, when it is not tragic, very funny. The perfect queen.
