Monday, August 31, 2015
Seamier side
The underbelly of LA gay life is shown here in gritty black and white.
I'll Love You Forever...Tonight (1993)
A weekend in Palm Springs with a few people looking for love and not finding it.
Since these are gay people, the love they seek tends toward the sexual but that turns out to be as empty as the other kinds.
Alienation, degradation, resignation.
I can't think of any other words like that. A downer for sure.
If I had seen this before coming out I would have jumped off one of the bridges that keep showing up, the ones presumably going to the famous resort where I now live. I hardly recognize the place.
The film is rather well done. I might not like its message but it is arty and crafty and it is hard to look away or to say "to hell with it". It is a slow motion train wreck.
Handsome men look at other handsome men and want something but can't seem to find it so they look away.
There is no positive message in this picture. Unless in watching it one would say "well, I dodged that catastrophe".
The philosophy on offer here is not so attractive but that is more the point than not.
I am glad that this is the life I missed. Almost entirely. But I know some folks who got mowed down by it all. Perhaps this very last weekend out there in the inns and bars that prosper in spite of it all.
A 3 out of Netflix5 or maybe a 4. I have to think about it.
