Movie Review: Behind the Candelabra

Behind the Candelabra is a biopic about Liberace, a diva who spent his life lingering in the glass closet, at a time when that term did not exist yet. He was a piano-playing showman, into kitsch and glittery things to an almost pathological degree. Despite being flamingly gay to the point where satellites orbiting Earth would nudge each other and go 'You think he's…?' 'Well, DUH.' he somehow managed to slip under the radar of grandmothers everywhere. His public image was that of the ideal son-in-law.

Liberace had flings with various younger, twinky guys over the course of his life and this HBO movie tells the story of perhaps the most significant one: his six-year relationship with Scott Thorson. (It is based on an autobiographical novel written by Thorson.) For a television production, Behind the Candelabra is heavy on stars: Michael Douglas plays Liberace, Matt Damon plays Thorson and if you look behind various forms of dubious facial hair and/or make-up, you may recognize Scott Bakula, Dan Akroyd, Paul Reiser and Rob Lowe. In a production that features a lot of creepy-looking characters, Lowe edges out the competition as a cosmetic surgeon whose skin is pulled back so tight that his eyes have turned into cat-like slits. Gay-fave Debbie Reynolds puts in an appearance as Liberace's mother. The director also comes with a pedigree: Steven Soderbergh. He has made a fair amount of great movies like Ocean's Eleven and Traffic and has had a few misfires, like Ocean's Twelve and Thirteen.

Michael Douglas. In some shots (though not this one) his
head is superimposed over that of an actual piano-player.
Almost seamlessly - but not quite.

Given the star-power behind and in front of the camera, Behind the Candelabra is unexpectedly subdued. When Liberace is on stage, there is spectacle. When he is off it, there are strange-looking and not all that sympathetic people having mundane conversations in gaudy surroundings. Matt Damon's face looks oddly shiny in the beginning - presumably an attempt make him look young - and looks just odd after he gets cosmetic surgery later in the story. His stomach also draws the attention: it goes from flat to belly and back again, not very convincingly, by Damon temporarily wearing something pillow-like under his shirt. Michael Douglas is bravely unattractive as Liberace. On stage he looks like a doll and off it - especially when the wig comes off - he just looks fragile and old.

The real Liberace with Scott Thorson.

Interestingly, this HBO movie doesn't castrate Liberace, as popular culture tends to do with gay men, especially the more effeminate and older ones. He is a horndog and we do get to see Michael Douglas en Matt Damon kiss, simulate anal sex and have a discussion about who gets to top and who gets to bottom. All of this is refreshing to see, but it also left me feeling a bit queasy. This isn't a sweet, romantic story. Liberace and Thorson were definitely using each other, even if there was some real affection. The movie is non-committal about the amount of love versus cold self-interest, but as romances and relationships go, it was a bit of a car-crash, with a fair amount of sex, drugs and piano-music.

Behind the Candelabra is an interesting oddity, definitely worth checking out. But in the end it feels a bit flat. Like Liberace's stage persona, it's about the surface and it does not really engage emotionally.

Mee-ow!

Movie Review: The Parade

The Parade is a Serbian tragicomedy about a homophobic gangster who, through a series of unlikely events, ends up having to protect the first attempt at a Gay Pride parade in Belgrado. It won Best Feature during the Roze Filmdagen (a gay film festival) in Amsterdam in 2013 and deservedly so. It is both a farcical buddy movie and a call to arms and it manages to balance these two elements skillfully. There are stereotypes all around, from boorish straight blokes to screechy queens, but as everyone operates on the same level of comical exaggeration, it works. The characters are sympathetic and there is genuine heart in the way the little group that will be in the parade bonds with their reluctant bodyguards.

It's sad that the movie had to end with a turn for the dramatic, as so many gay-themed movies do, but the intent here is clear: the makers mean to make you angry. Generally speaking, Eastern Europe is still a shitty place to live for lesbians and gays. The scenes in the movie depicting ruthless homophobic violence and blind hatred are chilling. Watch The Parade; you'll laugh, you'll cry and then - hopefully - you'll realize there's much more work to be done for gay rights and contribute to the fight in whatever way you can.

Movie Review: Cloudburst

If you angle the candelabra that is affixed to my ancient oak bookcase just so, and tip-toe down the winding stairs that this action reveals, then cross the bridge over the alligator pool, pass the Bieber dartboard, pass my geeky game room and my naughty gay room and then open the door just to the west of the giant Vin Diesel pin-up, you will find a shrine dedicated to Olympia Dukakis. In other words: I am a fan.

I am not quite sure what it is that generally makes gay men admire strong women. We don’t want to be them (speaking for myself, in any case) and we definitely don’t want to sleep with them, but we would love to knock back some beers with them (or maybe appletini’s, if that’s more your thing) and bitch and laugh about men in general and straight men in particular. Olympia Dukakis has this quality and in the role of Anna Madrigal in the Tales of the City tv-series, also has shown a maternal warmth. She seems like someone you could tell all your sordid secrets to and who would give you a reassuring hug afterwards, without judgment.

Playing a butch dyke, she is the best thing about Cloudburst, a road movie about an elderly lesbian couple. Her character Stella is crass and blunt, aware of this but unable to help herself, and she is softened and redeemed by the clear love for her partner, who is near-blind and dependent on her. When a scheming family member in denial about their relationship tries to place Stella’s partner in a care home against her will, the couple decide on a trip to Canada. Getting married there would give their relationship more validity and better legal standing, they think. Along the way, they meet an attractive young hitchhiker with a troubled past who is on his way to visit his ailing mother.

The ancient cliché applies to Cloudburst: it is not so much about the destination, it is about the ride. The mood is more important than the script, which is a bit lightweight. The movie meanders, the scenes loosely sketching out the characters and their relationships. We learn more about the history of the couple, their travelling companion and watch the beginnings of a friendship. There are shots of landscapes, scenes with mild suspense and there are some farcical scenes, notably one in which stuntman Randy Bolivar is plastered across the windshield of a car while full-frontal nude. (Going by the mostly lesbian audience I saw this with, male genitalia do very well as comic relief.) Both this scene and the insertion of an attractive guy as the third lead, seem intended to capture the interest of gay men, widening the potential audience.

I imagine the ideal viewers for this movie are lesbian couples, curled up together on the couch, imagining themselves growing old together. It is about equal parts sad, sweet and comforting. I would have preferred a slightly more upbeat ending, as it seems all too many gay and lesbian films end on a maudlin note, rather than leave you smiling. But it’s a trip worth taking. And now I am off to take a trip of my own, to light a new candle at my shrine dedicated to Olympia Dukakis. Because the lady still kicks ass.

Movie Review: Tensión Sexual, Volumen 1: Volátil

Tensión Sexual, Volumen 1: Volátil is a collection of vignettes, mostly about bulges in underwear that travel dangerously close to someone who might be interested in the contents of said underwear. The viewer is made complicit, as the bulges often get close to the camera and linger there. There is even some full-frontal nudity on the part of some sexy Argentinian men, which doesn’t displease. There is no release to the tension, at least not on screen, as these charged, short encounters between men fizzle by design, apart from one or two pieces where a well-timed fade-out leaves you wondering.

At its best, Tensión Sexual is playful and manages to be erotic, but it does fall flat on occasion. For instance, there is a wordless story about a male nurse who replaces a sexy man’s usual nurse. The nurse proceeds to soap and shower his patient in an extended sequence that had me checking my watch. It doesn’t help that the nurse has something creepy about him, and that his sexy patient mostly looks bored. Chemistry can be hard to bring across on screen, especially if you can’t fall back on kissing and sex, because the general theme here is ‘missed opportunities’. There may be as many lingering stares here as there were in the infamous Twilight. Not surprisingly, the couple of stories that forego dialogue are the worst offenders in this respect.

The pieces I enjoyed the most were the ones that showed a sense of humor. There is the fairly unbelievable story of one supposedly straight guy teaching another supposedly straight guy how to make love to a lady, by getting near-naked and acting things out with him. And there is a story where it becomes clear that one of two muscled training buddies is sneakily seducing the other. The fun here is that it takes the audience a while to figure out that one of them is doing it, and that his friend doesn’t catch on even after we do.

You do have to be a somewhat shy and patient person to identify with most of the characters in this movie. Once or twice I rolled my eyes wondering why someone was playing coy and didn’t just make a move already. By the end of it all, despite some lulls that lead to mild boredom, Tensión Sexual mostly delivers on its title. It is extended foreplay without the release of sex. It leaves you titillated, a bit frustrated and in need of a good shag.

Movie Review: We Were Here

Imagine finding a vague and disturbing piece of paper stuck to the window of your local pharmacy, showing pictures of mysterious dark splotches on a man’s skin, warning you that something bad is doing the rounds. Imagine more and more people around you – friends, colleagues, partners, family, the guy serving you coffee at your local diner - starting to get these markings and dying soon thereafter. It’s unclear what is causing this sickness or how you get it, just that it seems to be mostly hitting the gay community you are part of. There is no cure, no treatment. If it turns out you are infected, you will inevitably end up in a medical facility, where a brave but desperate group of nurses and volunteer caretakers will try to ease your pain as you lie dying, wasting away to nothing. Paranoia reigns about any kind of intimate physical contact and you start to dread getting calls from friends, fearing to hear that yet another one of them is headed towards an early death, leaving you even more alone and reminding you that you may be next. This isn’t the plot to a horror movie, this is suddenly your life. It’s San Francisco during the eighties and something called AIDS – initially called GRID (gay-related immune deficiency) - is turning into an epidemic.

The documentary We Were Here? tells the story of this traumatic period through interviews with people who each experienced it from their own unique perspective. There’s Daniel Goldstein, for instance, a man who lost countless friends and two lovers, got HIV himself but survived through luck and determination. There’s Ed Wolf, who by chance managed to dodge the disease and volunteered as a buddy for the dying. There’s Guy Clark, who owned a flower shop and ended up doing way too many funerals. The interviews are intercut with old film footage and pictures of men initially smiling and care-free, with no idea what is about to hit them.

Rather than getting too deeply into the medical details or the political aspects, the documentary is primarily a portrait of the San Francisco gay community as it got battered by the catastrophic epidemic, lost many of its members, pulled together stronger than ever before and ultimately managed to overcome. It puts a face on something that those who did not go through are tempted to repress, because AIDS and HIV put a damper on the still relatively new-found sexual liberation of gay men. Now that HIV is more a chronic disease rather than a quick killer, we want to forget how much this disease cost our community and get on with our lives. But it’s good that this documentary exists as a tribute to the generation of gay men who were hit the hardest, those who didn’t survive until the first retro-virals started to appear.

I saw this movie in a theater as part of a gay and lesbian movie festival and the audience and me were completely absorbed by it. There was deep silence as people listened intently, there were relieved bursts of laughter at the occasional sassy turn of phrase and there were a whole lot of barely contained sobs as the tale was told. We Were Here draws you in and puts you through the wringer, but you feel better for the experience. By the end you’ll want to hug the people who made themselves vulnerable and poured their heart out to you in the interviews. It’s a great documentary and should not be missed.

Movie Review: Skoonheid / Beauty

Skoonheid (Beauty)is a movie about South-African ‘Boer’ Francois van Heerden who forms an unhealthy obsession with his attractive, twenty-something nephew. The viewer follows Francois as he lives his frustrating life: saddled with a woman and a daughter he does not seem to particularly care for, working at the wood mill he owns, occasionally hooking up with other closeted gay men in the area for what is depicted as very mundane and depressing group sex. We see that he feels disconnected: both from his family life and from gay men who are open about their sexuality. The viewer gets a knot in his stomach watching his awkward attempts to get closer to his nephew, knowing that this is going to end badly for one or both of them.

Skoonheid is interesting and has a complex central character who holds you attention even as he ultimately repulses, but the movie is agonizingly slow. I checked my watch twice to see how close Skoonheid was getting to the end of its advertised 105 minutes runtime, which is not a good sign. When painting a mood picture, rather than putting together a heavily plotted piece, it’s not always clear when you’re ‘done’, because structure doesn’t provide much in the way of guidance. In this case, less would have been more: there are scenes that seem to hit the same notes a few too many times. Despite this, the movie manages to stay narratively vague: even though we are observing Francois up close and personal, what is going through his mind remains a mystery at some crucial points. And it’s not just what’s happening in his mind that is sometimes unclear. There are a few ambiguous scenes at the end of the movie, that leave you guessing as to what is actually going on because you are deliberately not being given complete information.

Art-house movies sometimes get a bad rep for being boring and pretentious and up to a certain point, Skoonheid is guilty of these sins. But it offers up an interesting character study and gives more food for thought than your average generic blockbuster. Its open-to-interpretation later scenes may frustrate, but it’s worth seeing once. And then likely never again.

Movie Review: The Butch Factor

The Butch Factor does what a good documentary is supposed to do: it makes you think. It does so by asking a complex question, presenting a variety of different, interesting viewpoints and leaving you to form your own opinion. It asks the question: what is masculinity and how do gay men perceive it? Especially for this group it is a loaded question. There is social pressure for a man to be manly, and this can be extra tough on gay guys, as they are not seen as ‘real’ men to begin with. After all, sleeping with another guy is seen as intrinsically girly, especially the ‘bottom’ role if there’s anal sex involved - even though ironically no girls are participating. It makes gays more self-conscious about feminine traits they may have and can lead them to shun their more effeminate brethren for fear of being associated with them and losing the respect of their straight peers. The documentary crew talks to musclemen, sportsmen, regular joes, ‘sissies’ and to a female-to-male transman about what makes a man.

Does a ‘real’ man have to have muscles and physical strength and is that all there is to it? We’ve all seen pumped up guys who look butch right up to the point when they open their mouth and then a purse falls out. There are gay guys who look masculine at first glance but show feminine traits when it comes to body language. Is a real man just a regular guy, doing things a stereotypical straight guy does? Does it necessarily mean getting excited about beer, sports, being hairy and possibly growing a gut? Does it mean not following your own interest, going out of your way to conform to the manly standard, turning away all things labeled as gay or unmanly by others? Isn’t someone who is preoccupied by appearing masculine actually showing he isn’t confident about his masculinity to begin with? And doesn’t that insecurity in itself hurt his ‘butch factor’?

Is it about strength of character? The outwardly most feminine gay men, have no choice but to grow a pair as they can’t pass for straight and have to fend off the aggression that brings out in people. Being regarded as a ‘real’ man is never an option for them, though they have all the required parts and likely have more of a fighter mentality than most men who pump iron. Is your level of masculinity set at birth, something you just are or aren’t and can’t influence all that much? But then: is a transman who has been through hormone therapy and starts acting and thinking like a man not as masculine as the next guy, apart from the genitalia?

There is a lot of shame about femininity within the gay scene; not only do some seem to think that interacting with a feminine guy would suck the masculinity right out of them by association, but a lot of gay men - including the feminine ones - are attracted to stereotypical masculine markers and behavior, passing over the queenier of their kind. Possibly it’s because they are seeking masculinity in others that they fear they are lacking themselves. Then again, there may be something more biological going on, hormones being set to respond to masculinity on a primal level: no perceived masculinity, no arousal. However, that ‘perceived’ caveat is an important one. Is masculinity something you intrinsically are, because of how you look, move, talk, smell… or is it subjective, something you are judged to be by others on the basis of culture? And is it ultimately something anyone should worry about or should we just get on with our lives and be ourselves, regardless of how people perceive us? Watch this very interesting documentary and discuss.

Book Review: Gay Travels in the Muslim World

Gay identity is denied in most Muslim countries. That there are men and women within those areas who primarily love people of their own gender is a biological certainty. But most of them would not label themselves 'gay' or 'lesbian', they would see the attraction as just one small aspect of themselves that they try to fit into their lives while adhering to what is expected of them by friends and - especially - family. Family is very important, both caring for the current generation as well as raising the next one. Getting married before you are thirty and having children is the only accepted way to live in many places. Not doing so could lead to loss of honour for you and your family. This means that most gay love and lust takes place behind closed doors and isn't acknowledged even while everybody around knows it happens. As long as there are no witnesses and it isn't talked about, everybody can pretend that no social mores are being broken.

Considering that gay sex is officially frowned upon and even punishable by death in many Muslim countries, the casual intimacy between men is one that will surprise many tourists. Much more than in Western countries, men are likely to be seen touching each other in a physically intimate way or even walking around the city hand in hand. The 'Western' gay identity threatens this way of interacting with each other by making it look suspect and threatens the entire family-oriented society. It introduces new options and choices that could upset the basis on which the society is built. Gay Muslims may start to question things and realise that the way their heart is pulling them does not have to point towards certain doom, but could lead them to a happy, if alternative, family life.

Gay Travels in the Muslim World is a series of autobiographical short stories, edited by Michael Luongo. It gives an impression of the Muslim world as described above. The majority of them deal with contrasts and conflicts between Western culture and Muslim culture, from varied perspectives. Most of the stories were written by Western visitors, one or two by people within the culture. The style, tone and attitudes of the writers vary, and while some of the tales are likely to annoy you, you will find a couple that are touching and interesting. I liked the story of an American who starts a long-distance romance with a Turk, only to find out he is married and has children. Rather than break up with his long-term lover, the Turkish man integrates him as an 'uncle' into his family, where he is lovingly accepted.

Not all stories are sweet though; in several of them, local men desperate for money and tourists desperate for sex with locals meet each other on a sharp and uncomfortable knife's edge between two cultures, using each other for selfish purposes.

All in all it is an interesting collection, well worth a read for anybody interested in this different perspective on gay identity. And if you want to take a more academic look at the topic, you may want to pick up Unspeakable Love - Gay and Lesbian Life in the Middle East.

Book Review: Secrets of a Gay Marine Porn Star

Secrets of a Gay Marine Porn Star sounds like the kind of book you would read with one hand in your lap. But this is not the case - for better or worse, depending on your expectations. It is the autobiography of Rich Merritt, better known in xxx-rated circles as Danny Orlis. Rich initially ended up in the news as the anonymous source for a New York Times cover article that made big waves when it was published in 1998. It illustrated the difficulties of being a gay marine with the American navy, forced to live a double life due to their 'don't ask, don't tell' policy.
His real identity wasn't too hard to figure out for people who knew him personally and when The Advocate discovered that Rich had starred in a couple of porn movies while in the service, they did not hesitate in making it public knowledge, causing another scandal.
The book starts at this point in time and then regresses to Rich's childhood, suffering under a highly religious regime at the Bob Jones University. Rich has plenty of material to pick from: a masturbation virgin until his twenties, in denial about being gay until his mid-twenties, his double life with the marines, ill-advised outings into the worlds of stripping and porn, clinical depression, suicide attempts and an addiction to pills and booze.
While there are too many uninteresting details in the book, and a fair amount of pages should have been culled, his story is fascinating even if the style in which it is written won't blow you away. Rich shows himself to be impulsive and eager to please, sometimes arrogant but at other times charmingly open, like when he admits to having had a premature ejaculation problem. By the end of the book he seems to think he now has his life well and truly back on the rails, but as a reader you are left wondering if he could not go off-track again in the future. For the moment things are going well, however: in January he published his first novel: Code of Conduct. Making use of his insider knowledge, he tells the love story of two marines circa 1993, when Clinton was promising to abolish the army's 'shush' policy on gays. It looks to be an interesting and historically accurate read.