Wednesday, October 02, 2013
Serious business
Today's film is a gay theme with serious issues at hand and none of the usual fluff.
The issue is spousal abuse and the dance that two people go through, the abuser, the victim, somehow jointly culpable together.
Fight, make up, fight again with escalation and way too much appeasement and forgiveness.
A gay man moves from rural Virginia to San Francisco to be with his boyfriend/lover. Living together for the first time it becomes clear that the SFO one wants a boy at home that he can order around and kick around when the boy rebels.
But the boy is in love and gets not one bit of reinforcement for his dependency in the San Francisco gay scene.
Finally, a hustler, with whom he forms a serious but non-sexual relationship helps him detach and stay detached.
Along the way we all find out that the "gay heaven" of the gayest city in the world can be pretty unhappy, unfriendly and unsupportive.
This is not your usual gay film. Not a lot of sweetness and light here. The other people that are dated are grim. A delicate matter as stereotypes could be a problem here. This film avoids those pitfalls.
The relationships that do work are the human ones. The hustler, a straight woman with a great drag look, a woman who looks like a drag queen. I have met some of these. Special.
There are the conventional gentlemen who are so boring and conventional. The quick trick artists. A cavalcade of experience. I have met one of every one of them.
The time warp is used here back and forth. The through line shows the boy getting on a bus and riding and remembering. I assumed he was leaving the city and going back to where he came from.
Surprise endings here (we are supplied with two) help show that the boy has grown into a man and is happy with himself and the world around him.
I do not think this is a spoiler because without the feeling that he was OK while all this happened to him and better at the end helps us endure the pain that he has to go through.
There are no punches pulled here. People get, well, punched.
I really really liked this film. It has heart and what is more, a main character who has the stuff.
A 5 out of Netflix5. I ordered it for our small collection of great DVDs.
