Blood of a Poet
Director: Jean Cocteau
Writer: Jean Cocteau
Cast: Enrique Rivero, Elizabeth Lee Miller, Pauline Carton, Odette Talazac, Jean Desbordes, Féral Benga, Barbette, Fernand Dichamps, Lucien Jager
Overview
A surreal trip into the mind of an unnamed poet, Cocteaus' non-narrative debut feature succeeds entirely on the strength of its' visuals.
Synopsis
A poet/artist (Enrique Rivero) creates a drawing that comes to life and starts to speak to him. He tries to silence it but ends up going on a strange journey, where he finds himself peering through key holes, witnessing a deadly snowball fight, and partaking in a card game where he must literally gamble with his own life.
The Queering
Generally speaking, I do not like surrealistic motion pictures that abandon a coherent narrative early on. Blood of a Poet was an exception. Personally, I was able to remain engaged and interested throughout the entire running time.
There are three reasons for this:
1) A relatively short running time (the entire film clocks in under 1 hour).
2) With no pretense of a narrative, the audience is free to focus on the images and therefore put the bulk of their efforts into interpreting the underlying meanings of that imagery.
3) The vivid imagery Cocteau has created is both memorable and symbolically meaningful.
Cocteau has created here the best example of cinema attempting to create filmed freestyle poetry. This is reflected not just in Cocteaus' stylistic choices and the short length, but in the lack of coherent narrative as well. Like many poems, this is not intended to be understood on a literal level, rather Cocteau is presenting the audience with a series of related images.
Blood of a Poet is known for its' homoerotic and gender bending scenes (Jean Cocteau was openly gay) but those images that struck me the most strongly were those with a strong feminist subtext. There is plenty of commentary going on here, with Cocteau offering up commentary on how hegemonic masculinity is dangerous for both men and woman.
Blood of a Poet is bookended with shots of an obviously phallic tower being demolished. We then move on to the artist himself, who gets upset when the female face that he's drawing starts to talk back to him. He tries to erase her mouth but the mouth ends up on his hand. Naturally, he has to make out with this creature. All I could think of during this were the lyrics by Pink, "It's just you and your hand tonight!" Art as masturbatory naval gazing indeed.
This is followed by a scene where the poet, after the hand is transferred to a nearby statue, follows the statues instructions and jumps into a mirror. Freud, with his "all human action is motivated by the desire to return to the womb" theory would have had fun interpreting this bit. Eventually of course, the poet is reborn in a memorable shot that is simply the scene of him entering the pool/mirror shown in reverse.
Then there is the shot of a female figure adorned with make up to make her look like a living sketch, a reflection presumably, of mans desire to draw women as he pleases.
Guns (another phallic symbol) of course feature prominently in several sections where a person is either shot or kills or attempts to kill themselves. These bits emphasize as well the destructive nature of unbridled machoism.
The climactic scene, where the poet/artist plays a card game in front of a royal audience where the stakes end up becoming quiet literally, a battle for his life. Here, the thematic subtexts are the broadest and include commentary on class, race, and the creative process itself.
Ernest Hemingway once wrote, "writing is easy, all you do is sit down in front of a typewriter and bleed." In the final scene of Blood of a Poet the sacrifices an artist must make are made perfectly clear when the poet/artist loses the card game and commits suicide. His death causes the bourgeois audience to clap politely. The image invokes the idea of the artist as a sacrificial offering to an audience that does not understand or care about what they are consuming. A fitting image indeed for this particular work.
Recommendation
For those who enjoy (or at least do not mind) surrealistic, non-narrative films, Blood of a Poet is worth seeking out. I would argue enduring bad poetry would be a reasonable price to pay, but this is not a film worth shedding any actual blood over.
The Rating
*** out of ****
Trailer
Want to find a review of a particular work? Check out the Title Index, the archive of all reviews posted listed alphabetically.
October 22, 2012
October 16, 2012
Paragraph 175 (2000)
Okay, while doing research for my novel Silver Demon, somehow overlooked (until now) this powerful documentary on the NAZI's persecution of gay men during the Holocaust.
Fortunately, it's available for free online, so no point in me giving a review.
I will say that for those who can stomach the material, I highly recommend it.
Paragraph 175
Fortunately, it's available for free online, so no point in me giving a review.
I will say that for those who can stomach the material, I highly recommend it.
Paragraph 175
October 12, 2012
Queer Review: The Color Purple (1985)
The Color Purple
Director: Steven Spielberg
Writers: Menno Meyjes. Based upon the novel by Alice Walker.
Cast: Whoopi Goldberg, Danny Glover, Margaret Avery, Oprah Winfrey, Willard E. Pugh, Akosua Busia, Desreta Jackson, Adolph Caesar, Rae Dawn Chong, Dana Ivey, Susan Beaubian, Carl Anderson
Overview
Steven Spielbergs' first attempt at making a serious/adult film falls flat for a variety of reasons. While highlighting a handful of good to brilliant performances (Whoopi Goldberg, Margaret Avery, Oprah Winfrey) the screenplay unfortunately paints nearly every element, from characterization to tone, in the most melodramatic method imaginable. Worse the saphic relationship between Celia and Shug was drastically toned down from what was present in the book.
Synopsis
Celie Johnson (Whoopi Goldberg) is a poor black women in the deep south during the Jim Crow era. Her abusive husband, Albert (Danny Glover), causes her to be estranged from her sister Nettie Harris (Akosua Busia) and hides any letters Nettie sends to Celie. However, Celie finds some comfort in a relationship with Shug Avery (Margaret Avery) and the two form an intimate relationship.
The Queering
Steven Spielbergs' first major blockbuster (Jaws) succeeded mainly by not showing the monstrous shark early and often, but rather through glimpses and intimation. When dealing with a film about domestic violence, the technique of hide, don't show, is not so effective. We know that Celie is subjected to horrible abuses throughout her life. Her father rapes her and she has two children that she believes he killed. She is then later "given" (in a scene reminiscent of a slave being sold at auction) to her husband Albert, who treats her alternatively like a servant, a prostitute, and a punching bag.
However, we know this mostly thanks to the dialogue, we are only shown on screen glimpses and intimations of the horrors of Celies' life. Ultimately, I could not help but feel that rather than exposing the horrors of rape and domestic violence, Spielberg ends up romanticizing these things to a degree. I have no problems with a film showing a strong female character overcoming a horrific situation, but The Color Purple never really feels like it's doing this. Instead, I felt like I was watching an amateur boxer dancing clumsily around these issues but never really delivering the goods.
If one wishes to see a film that deals honestly with the issues of poverty, domestic violence, as well as ethnicity and race, I would highly recommend Once Were Warriors, as one example of a film that pulls no punches on these issues.
As for the lesbian relationship between Celie and Shug, it is made fairly explicit in one scene that these two are becoming intimate lovers. However, from what I understand (having never read the book by Alice Walker) that this relationship was much better developed and explored on the written page.
There is also a brief but rather strong subtext I noticed that developed between Albert and Shugs' husband. In the first scene where Shugs' husband shows up, the two men exchange meaningful glances. Soon they're having fun smashing smashing Easter eggs on each others foreheads. From what I understand, this is not typical of male bonding but in any case they're shown wandering off into a nearby field, arms around each others shoulders,presumably to have sex, er as a plot convenience to give Celie and Shug time to go through the house so that they could find the letters Nettie had sent to Celia that Albert had deliberately hidden (rather than say... burned).
Overall, The Color Purple suffers from an embarrassingly bad script, which paints using only strokes a mile wide and leaves no cliche unturned. Not only that but Spielberg, who is nominally one of the most technically accomplished directors in Hollywood, has created with The Color Purple his most technically incompetent film ever (at least of those I've seen). There are some nice transitions here and there, but overall, most of the early scenes are confusing, the cinematography is frequently uninspired, and family relationships between the minor characters are nearly impossible to figure out without a cheat sheet. Spielberg certainly is not helped though by the horribly schmaltzy and frequently inappropriate score by Quincy Jones.
Recommendation
The title of The Color Purple refers to the need of people (and things apparently) to be loved. While I did not hate Speilbergs' interpretation of Alice Walkers' novel, I can not say that I loved it either. This is yet another movie that is pretty much only for those with a strong interest in the history of queer cinema.
The Rating
** out of ****
Trailer
Want to find a review of a particular work? Check out the Title Index, the archive of all reviews posted listed alphabetically.
Director: Steven Spielberg
Writers: Menno Meyjes. Based upon the novel by Alice Walker.
Cast: Whoopi Goldberg, Danny Glover, Margaret Avery, Oprah Winfrey, Willard E. Pugh, Akosua Busia, Desreta Jackson, Adolph Caesar, Rae Dawn Chong, Dana Ivey, Susan Beaubian, Carl Anderson
Overview
Steven Spielbergs' first attempt at making a serious/adult film falls flat for a variety of reasons. While highlighting a handful of good to brilliant performances (Whoopi Goldberg, Margaret Avery, Oprah Winfrey) the screenplay unfortunately paints nearly every element, from characterization to tone, in the most melodramatic method imaginable. Worse the saphic relationship between Celia and Shug was drastically toned down from what was present in the book.
Synopsis
Celie Johnson (Whoopi Goldberg) is a poor black women in the deep south during the Jim Crow era. Her abusive husband, Albert (Danny Glover), causes her to be estranged from her sister Nettie Harris (Akosua Busia) and hides any letters Nettie sends to Celie. However, Celie finds some comfort in a relationship with Shug Avery (Margaret Avery) and the two form an intimate relationship.
The Queering
Steven Spielbergs' first major blockbuster (Jaws) succeeded mainly by not showing the monstrous shark early and often, but rather through glimpses and intimation. When dealing with a film about domestic violence, the technique of hide, don't show, is not so effective. We know that Celie is subjected to horrible abuses throughout her life. Her father rapes her and she has two children that she believes he killed. She is then later "given" (in a scene reminiscent of a slave being sold at auction) to her husband Albert, who treats her alternatively like a servant, a prostitute, and a punching bag.
However, we know this mostly thanks to the dialogue, we are only shown on screen glimpses and intimations of the horrors of Celies' life. Ultimately, I could not help but feel that rather than exposing the horrors of rape and domestic violence, Spielberg ends up romanticizing these things to a degree. I have no problems with a film showing a strong female character overcoming a horrific situation, but The Color Purple never really feels like it's doing this. Instead, I felt like I was watching an amateur boxer dancing clumsily around these issues but never really delivering the goods.
If one wishes to see a film that deals honestly with the issues of poverty, domestic violence, as well as ethnicity and race, I would highly recommend Once Were Warriors, as one example of a film that pulls no punches on these issues.
As for the lesbian relationship between Celie and Shug, it is made fairly explicit in one scene that these two are becoming intimate lovers. However, from what I understand (having never read the book by Alice Walker) that this relationship was much better developed and explored on the written page.
There is also a brief but rather strong subtext I noticed that developed between Albert and Shugs' husband. In the first scene where Shugs' husband shows up, the two men exchange meaningful glances. Soon they're having fun smashing smashing Easter eggs on each others foreheads. From what I understand, this is not typical of male bonding but in any case they're shown wandering off into a nearby field, arms around each others shoulders,
Overall, The Color Purple suffers from an embarrassingly bad script, which paints using only strokes a mile wide and leaves no cliche unturned. Not only that but Spielberg, who is nominally one of the most technically accomplished directors in Hollywood, has created with The Color Purple his most technically incompetent film ever (at least of those I've seen). There are some nice transitions here and there, but overall, most of the early scenes are confusing, the cinematography is frequently uninspired, and family relationships between the minor characters are nearly impossible to figure out without a cheat sheet. Spielberg certainly is not helped though by the horribly schmaltzy and frequently inappropriate score by Quincy Jones.
Recommendation
The title of The Color Purple refers to the need of people (and things apparently) to be loved. While I did not hate Speilbergs' interpretation of Alice Walkers' novel, I can not say that I loved it either. This is yet another movie that is pretty much only for those with a strong interest in the history of queer cinema.
The Rating
** out of ****
Trailer
Want to find a review of a particular work? Check out the Title Index, the archive of all reviews posted listed alphabetically.
October 9, 2012
Setting the Record Queer: The Isophyls of History
While doing research for my novel Silver Demon, I was going through Keith Stern's Queers in History and came across the entry for Gerald Heard, which mentioned his idea of isophyls. The term itself comes from the greek words "iso" and "phil" meaning "same" and "love" and is roughly the Greek equivalent of the Latin term "homosexual".
According to Heard, the isophyls are a secret society that has been the primary influence throughout history. He stated in a series of lectures to the ONE Institute that "in advanced societies, the isophyllic type, relieved of breeding is produced and so specialized as to run the elaborate organizations."
I must admit Heards' idea fascinates me, but is there any truth to this? Have LGBTQ individuals been the primary movers and shakers throughout civilization?
I don't intend to answer Heards' question directly, but a surface examination of the biggest names in history might make it appear so. Alexander the Great, Plato, Isaac Newton, Shakespeare, Abraham Lincoln, and Julius Caesar, all have historical evidence which points to them being likely isophyls.
Then there are lesser known individuals who have greatly influenced history in indirect ways.
It was Bayard Rustin who persuaded Martin Luther King to adopt non-violence and organised the infamous 1963 March on Washington during the African American civil rights movement. Rustin was openly gay.
George Joachim Rehticus was banned from Leipzig for 101 years after being accused of seducing a 17 year old boy. This did not stop him from promoting Copernicus' heliocentric model and thus helping to give birth to modern science.
Alan Turing is credited as being the father of modern computer science and his code breaking skills, specifically his creation of the Enigma code breaking machine, was instrumental in the defeat of the Axis powers. He was prosecuted for being in a same sex relationship and his punishment (chemical castration) most likely resulted in his suicide.
Furthermore, since Turing, many trans woman, such as Mary Ann Horton, Lynn Conway, Sophia Wilson, Audrey Tang, and Kate Craig Wood, have made significant contributions to the development of the world of computing.
Susan B. Anthony can be considered the founder of the Woman's Suffrage Movement and had passionate affairs with her co-activists.
Eleanore Roosevelt helped found the United Nations and chaired the committee that drafted the Universal Decleration of Human Rights. She also lived with journalist Lorena Hickok and the letters between the two have revealed that they were lovers.
In spite of all this, and the above examples are really just the tip of an iceberg, it feels a bit arrogant to suggest that one's own community is somehow responsible for every major civilized advancement ever. But there is a possible explanation that I would like to discuss here.
While we members of the gender and sexuality minority community have not always been prosecuted for our deviations form the norm, there are few times in history when such persecution did not take place. This means that many members of our community have been forced to endure the additional difficulties of navigating a world where we become outsiders in our own countries and homes.
No pain, no gain, or so the saying goes. Has the persecution we have faced as a community helped to strengthen some of our members or to inspire them to new heights of thinking?
It is no difficult task to find LGBTQ artists whose status as an outsider informed their creative output. But what of other fields, such as science, history, politics, or engineering? Could simply being queer actually provide an advantage in these areas as well?
I can recall reading as a youth in one of the novels in the Star Wars Expanded Universe, the story of Qwi Xux a gifted scientist who had been part of a group who had been recruited (technically enslaved and brainwashed) by the Grand Moff Tarkin into designing the Death Star and other weapons for the Empire. The relevant part for this article is her background, while she and her peers were enslaved, they were forced to study and work under extreme circumstances - if any of them failed, they were forced to watch their home village be destroyed before being executed. Qwi Xux was the only one of her peers to survive the training.
I bring this up because of the parallels to what might be the reason why a disproportionate number of gay, lesbian, bi, transgender/transsexual, intersex, and so on, individuals who have significantly changed history. Like Qwi Xux's fellow peers, too many have us have ended up dead, either by our own hands, by being subjected to direct violence, or allowed to die through lack of proper medical care as occurred during the AIDS crisis.
However, it does appear that there are those of us who have also managed to go on to become extraordinaire, to take their suffering and allow it to transform themselves into greater individuals. Perhaps it is time we adopted a new motto: "We're here! We're queer! And we built this world."
According to Heard, the isophyls are a secret society that has been the primary influence throughout history. He stated in a series of lectures to the ONE Institute that "in advanced societies, the isophyllic type, relieved of breeding is produced and so specialized as to run the elaborate organizations."
I must admit Heards' idea fascinates me, but is there any truth to this? Have LGBTQ individuals been the primary movers and shakers throughout civilization?
I don't intend to answer Heards' question directly, but a surface examination of the biggest names in history might make it appear so. Alexander the Great, Plato, Isaac Newton, Shakespeare, Abraham Lincoln, and Julius Caesar, all have historical evidence which points to them being likely isophyls.
Then there are lesser known individuals who have greatly influenced history in indirect ways.
It was Bayard Rustin who persuaded Martin Luther King to adopt non-violence and organised the infamous 1963 March on Washington during the African American civil rights movement. Rustin was openly gay.
George Joachim Rehticus was banned from Leipzig for 101 years after being accused of seducing a 17 year old boy. This did not stop him from promoting Copernicus' heliocentric model and thus helping to give birth to modern science.
Alan Turing is credited as being the father of modern computer science and his code breaking skills, specifically his creation of the Enigma code breaking machine, was instrumental in the defeat of the Axis powers. He was prosecuted for being in a same sex relationship and his punishment (chemical castration) most likely resulted in his suicide.
Furthermore, since Turing, many trans woman, such as Mary Ann Horton, Lynn Conway, Sophia Wilson, Audrey Tang, and Kate Craig Wood, have made significant contributions to the development of the world of computing.
Susan B. Anthony can be considered the founder of the Woman's Suffrage Movement and had passionate affairs with her co-activists.
Eleanore Roosevelt helped found the United Nations and chaired the committee that drafted the Universal Decleration of Human Rights. She also lived with journalist Lorena Hickok and the letters between the two have revealed that they were lovers.
In spite of all this, and the above examples are really just the tip of an iceberg, it feels a bit arrogant to suggest that one's own community is somehow responsible for every major civilized advancement ever. But there is a possible explanation that I would like to discuss here.
While we members of the gender and sexuality minority community have not always been prosecuted for our deviations form the norm, there are few times in history when such persecution did not take place. This means that many members of our community have been forced to endure the additional difficulties of navigating a world where we become outsiders in our own countries and homes.
No pain, no gain, or so the saying goes. Has the persecution we have faced as a community helped to strengthen some of our members or to inspire them to new heights of thinking?
It is no difficult task to find LGBTQ artists whose status as an outsider informed their creative output. But what of other fields, such as science, history, politics, or engineering? Could simply being queer actually provide an advantage in these areas as well?
I can recall reading as a youth in one of the novels in the Star Wars Expanded Universe, the story of Qwi Xux a gifted scientist who had been part of a group who had been recruited (technically enslaved and brainwashed) by the Grand Moff Tarkin into designing the Death Star and other weapons for the Empire. The relevant part for this article is her background, while she and her peers were enslaved, they were forced to study and work under extreme circumstances - if any of them failed, they were forced to watch their home village be destroyed before being executed. Qwi Xux was the only one of her peers to survive the training.
I bring this up because of the parallels to what might be the reason why a disproportionate number of gay, lesbian, bi, transgender/transsexual, intersex, and so on, individuals who have significantly changed history. Like Qwi Xux's fellow peers, too many have us have ended up dead, either by our own hands, by being subjected to direct violence, or allowed to die through lack of proper medical care as occurred during the AIDS crisis.
However, it does appear that there are those of us who have also managed to go on to become extraordinaire, to take their suffering and allow it to transform themselves into greater individuals. Perhaps it is time we adopted a new motto: "We're here! We're queer! And we built this world."
October 7, 2012
Queer Review: Personal Best (1982)
Personal Best
Director: Robert Towne
Writer: Robert Towne
Cast: Mariel Hemingway, Scott Glenn, Patrice Donnelly, Kenny Moore
Overview
A mediocre effort, Personal Best does little to distinguish itself from many other sports film outside of the fact that happens to focus on queer female athletes and a tendency to shun most of the cliches that accompany the sports film genre.
Synopsis
When Chris (Mariel Hemingway) comes in last at a track event, she attracts the attention of Tory (Patrice Donnelly) an older lesbian. The two eventually becomes lovers and after Tory persuades Coach Terry (Scott Glenn) to allow Chris on the team, Chris manages to convince Terry of her talent. However, while the track team is preparing to qualify for the Olympic games, Terry ends up favoring Chris over Terry and attempts to pit the two females against each other.
The Queering
There are many things I would like to applaud about Personal Best. For one, it deals openly and honestly with a lesbian relationship, even though it came out in the early 80's. Another is that the training/sports sequences are effectively presented and usually manage to generate some suspense. Furthermore, the focus on female athletes is also a welcome change for a genre that almost exclusively focuses on men.
I also felt there was a rather deliberate effort on the part of the filmmakers to avoid many of the more annoying cliches associated with sports films. Terry never gives a grand speech about how winning is everything and TEH GLORY FOREVERZ! The plot does not conclude with the "big game" - this is actually all about qualifying for an Olympics, that thanks to the possibility of a U.S. boycott, the athletes might not even be able to attend.
However, after the writers removed all of the melodrama, speeches, and underdogs who come from behind that usually accompany sports flicks, what you have left is, well, something too bland to even be called "vanilla". Personal Best is more appropriately likened to watered down, low fat vanilla.
After what I considered a promising start, Personal Best spends most of the middle section meandering through tepid melodrama, before redeeming itself with an ending that is at least more involving than most of the material proceeding it.
However, I think it is worth comparing Personal Best to it's male equivalents, either in terms of the sports genre or it's presentation of same sex love.
As far as sports dramas go, when most sports films with male characters would be going for 11, Personal Best goes for 1. There are times when I had to remind myself that these characters were Olympic class athletes, as they almost never seem all that interested in winning, or glory, or even in doing particularly well on a given day. Maybe the lack of motivational speeches is to blame, but neither the actors or the script really do much to sell the idea that these are professional athletes locked in non-contact combat.
I've been around enough athletes to know the kinds of pressures many of them face. There are rigid diets that must be adhered to. Strict training schedules that cannot be abandoned, even when one is not on the track. One does not simply lift a few weights, perform a couple of stretches, and then wash down an ice cream Sunday with a bit of Gatorade before showing up for practice or a big game. Compare the level of pressure these characters appear to be up against and compare that to what was on display in Black Swan which was about ballet, not training for the Olympics.
There are two possible explanations for this and the truth probably lies somewhere in between them. One is that the filmmakers believe female athletes are not as competitive as male athletes. This is not true as far as I know.
The second explanation is that the filmmakers decided that the content (LESBIAN ATHLETES WOO!) was juicy enough, and that trying to spice things up further would be like adding chili powder to jalapeno peppers. The blandness of the final product shows just how wrong that thinking was. Personal Best does however manage to avoid sinking to the level of Making Love, a film that was also released in 1982 and another example of where the filmmakers appear to come down with a case of, "well we got queer content, no need to do anything else to make this interesting, like actually bother writing a decent script".
Now as far as queer content itself goes, there is another element that differentiates Personal Best from it's male equivalents. Namely that there are way more shots of the nude female form then would ever be of male characters in a mainstream film - at least for the foreseeable future. Not that this is interesting in of itself, it just goes to further highlight the double standards that continue to exist in modern cinema.
Recommendation
While managing to avoid being a personal worst for anybody involved, Personal Best is anything but. Not to be avoided, but only worth seeking out for those with a strong interest in seeing lesbian characters on film, sports flicks about female athletes, or someone studying the history of queer cinema.
The Rating
**1/2 out of ****
TV Spot
Want to find a review of a particular work? Check out the Title Index, the archive of all reviews posted listed alphabetically.
Director: Robert Towne
Writer: Robert Towne
Cast: Mariel Hemingway, Scott Glenn, Patrice Donnelly, Kenny Moore
Overview
A mediocre effort, Personal Best does little to distinguish itself from many other sports film outside of the fact that happens to focus on queer female athletes and a tendency to shun most of the cliches that accompany the sports film genre.
Synopsis
When Chris (Mariel Hemingway) comes in last at a track event, she attracts the attention of Tory (Patrice Donnelly) an older lesbian. The two eventually becomes lovers and after Tory persuades Coach Terry (Scott Glenn) to allow Chris on the team, Chris manages to convince Terry of her talent. However, while the track team is preparing to qualify for the Olympic games, Terry ends up favoring Chris over Terry and attempts to pit the two females against each other.
The Queering
There are many things I would like to applaud about Personal Best. For one, it deals openly and honestly with a lesbian relationship, even though it came out in the early 80's. Another is that the training/sports sequences are effectively presented and usually manage to generate some suspense. Furthermore, the focus on female athletes is also a welcome change for a genre that almost exclusively focuses on men.
I also felt there was a rather deliberate effort on the part of the filmmakers to avoid many of the more annoying cliches associated with sports films. Terry never gives a grand speech about how winning is everything and TEH GLORY FOREVERZ! The plot does not conclude with the "big game" - this is actually all about qualifying for an Olympics, that thanks to the possibility of a U.S. boycott, the athletes might not even be able to attend.
However, after the writers removed all of the melodrama, speeches, and underdogs who come from behind that usually accompany sports flicks, what you have left is, well, something too bland to even be called "vanilla". Personal Best is more appropriately likened to watered down, low fat vanilla.
After what I considered a promising start, Personal Best spends most of the middle section meandering through tepid melodrama, before redeeming itself with an ending that is at least more involving than most of the material proceeding it.
However, I think it is worth comparing Personal Best to it's male equivalents, either in terms of the sports genre or it's presentation of same sex love.
As far as sports dramas go, when most sports films with male characters would be going for 11, Personal Best goes for 1. There are times when I had to remind myself that these characters were Olympic class athletes, as they almost never seem all that interested in winning, or glory, or even in doing particularly well on a given day. Maybe the lack of motivational speeches is to blame, but neither the actors or the script really do much to sell the idea that these are professional athletes locked in non-contact combat.
I've been around enough athletes to know the kinds of pressures many of them face. There are rigid diets that must be adhered to. Strict training schedules that cannot be abandoned, even when one is not on the track. One does not simply lift a few weights, perform a couple of stretches, and then wash down an ice cream Sunday with a bit of Gatorade before showing up for practice or a big game. Compare the level of pressure these characters appear to be up against and compare that to what was on display in Black Swan which was about ballet, not training for the Olympics.
There are two possible explanations for this and the truth probably lies somewhere in between them. One is that the filmmakers believe female athletes are not as competitive as male athletes. This is not true as far as I know.
The second explanation is that the filmmakers decided that the content (LESBIAN ATHLETES WOO!) was juicy enough, and that trying to spice things up further would be like adding chili powder to jalapeno peppers. The blandness of the final product shows just how wrong that thinking was. Personal Best does however manage to avoid sinking to the level of Making Love, a film that was also released in 1982 and another example of where the filmmakers appear to come down with a case of, "well we got queer content, no need to do anything else to make this interesting, like actually bother writing a decent script".
Now as far as queer content itself goes, there is another element that differentiates Personal Best from it's male equivalents. Namely that there are way more shots of the nude female form then would ever be of male characters in a mainstream film - at least for the foreseeable future. Not that this is interesting in of itself, it just goes to further highlight the double standards that continue to exist in modern cinema.
Recommendation
While managing to avoid being a personal worst for anybody involved, Personal Best is anything but. Not to be avoided, but only worth seeking out for those with a strong interest in seeing lesbian characters on film, sports flicks about female athletes, or someone studying the history of queer cinema.
The Rating
**1/2 out of ****
TV Spot
Want to find a review of a particular work? Check out the Title Index, the archive of all reviews posted listed alphabetically.
September 19, 2012
Silver Demon: The No Handed Bandit
This is the latest post regarding my LGBTQ superhero novel, Silver Demon, where I talk about stuff that either inspired me or interesting tidbits that I have come across while doing research.
In any case, during the course of the novel, one of the characters ends up losing both of their hands. While doing research on what that would be like, I came across the youtube videos of the the No Handed Bandit and they were interesting enough that I thought I might share them.
User Page for the No Handed Bandit
The No-Handed Bandit shows how he puts his arms on:
In any case, during the course of the novel, one of the characters ends up losing both of their hands. While doing research on what that would be like, I came across the youtube videos of the the No Handed Bandit and they were interesting enough that I thought I might share them.
User Page for the No Handed Bandit
The No-Handed Bandit shows how he puts his arms on:
September 2, 2012
Queer Review: ParaNorman (2012)
ParaNorman
Directors: Chris Butler and Sam Fell
Writer: Chris Butler
Cast: Kodi Smit-McPhee, Tucker Albrizzi, Anna Kendrick, Casey Affleck, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Leslie Mann, Jeff Garlin, Elaine Stritch, Bernard Hill, Jodelle Ferland, John Goodman
Overview
A groundbreaking children's film about the dangers of persecuting people simply for being different, ParaNorman also manages to be a fun and entertaining adventure for the whole family, whether they be young, old, or recently dead.
Synopsis
Norman (Kodi-Smit-McPhee) is blessed with the unusual ability to see dead people. Except everyone around him sees this ability not as a blessing but as a curse. Bullied at school, he becomes friends with Neil (Tucker Albrizzi) an overweight lug who appreciates, rather than fears Norman's ability to see dead people. When Norman is approached by his Uncle, Mr. Prenderghast (John Goodman) who also shares his ability, he is told by his uncle that the birthday of the accursed town witch who was executed 200 years ago is approaching. It turns out that Norman must prevent the witch from raising an army of the dead. But when things go wrong, Norman and his friends find themselves being pursued by an army of zombies. In order to save their town they must find a way to end the witches curse permanently.
The Queering
In 1933 Franklin D. Roosevelt argued that "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself." This could be summed up to be the main theme of ParaNorman which lacks a traditional villain. There are several plot twists that reveal, bit by bit, that the different groups of "villains" that appear to pose the greatest threat at the beginning, are not what they initially appear to be. In the end, the greatest danger presented in the film comes from those characters who give into fear and hatred. There is also a rather brief but interesting moment where a car radio has the news media trying to fan the flames of fear during the height of a crisis, so one character changes the channel to easy listening.
Norman's condition functions as an obvious metaphor for being gay. He is referred to as having been "born that way" and bullied at school for it. His father and other family members go out of their way to try to encourage Norman to stop seeing dead people and just try to be "normal".
In addition to this subtext, ParaNorman also contains a groundbreaking gay character, Neil's older brother Mitch is explicitly revealed to have a boyfriend. This is groundbreaking in two ways. One is due to the almost complete absence of queer identified youth in cinema in general. The second is due to the total absence of LGBTQ characters in mainstream films aimed at kids. As it is, Mitch is the first (that I am aware of) gay identified youth in a mainstream film aimed at kids.
On the technical side of things, the stop motion animation for ParaNorman is first rate. It was be filmed in 3D, but I saw the 2D version and did not feel that I was missing out on anything. The voice work is also well done and there are no recognizable celebrity voices to distract the audience from the story. The humor is fairly overt for the macabre subject matter, with some truly clever moments such as the use of the theme from Halloween that turns out to be Norman's cell phone ringer or the way the filmmakers reveal that Norman's grandmother is actually dead.
Overall, an enjoyable flick with some well done animation and interesting subtexts to go along with a nicely told story.
Recommendation
Anyone normal or para-normal should see this film.
The Rating
*** out of ****
Trailer
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Directors: Chris Butler and Sam Fell
Writer: Chris Butler
Cast: Kodi Smit-McPhee, Tucker Albrizzi, Anna Kendrick, Casey Affleck, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Leslie Mann, Jeff Garlin, Elaine Stritch, Bernard Hill, Jodelle Ferland, John Goodman
Overview
A groundbreaking children's film about the dangers of persecuting people simply for being different, ParaNorman also manages to be a fun and entertaining adventure for the whole family, whether they be young, old, or recently dead.
Synopsis
Norman (Kodi-Smit-McPhee) is blessed with the unusual ability to see dead people. Except everyone around him sees this ability not as a blessing but as a curse. Bullied at school, he becomes friends with Neil (Tucker Albrizzi) an overweight lug who appreciates, rather than fears Norman's ability to see dead people. When Norman is approached by his Uncle, Mr. Prenderghast (John Goodman) who also shares his ability, he is told by his uncle that the birthday of the accursed town witch who was executed 200 years ago is approaching. It turns out that Norman must prevent the witch from raising an army of the dead. But when things go wrong, Norman and his friends find themselves being pursued by an army of zombies. In order to save their town they must find a way to end the witches curse permanently.
The Queering
In 1933 Franklin D. Roosevelt argued that "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself." This could be summed up to be the main theme of ParaNorman which lacks a traditional villain. There are several plot twists that reveal, bit by bit, that the different groups of "villains" that appear to pose the greatest threat at the beginning, are not what they initially appear to be. In the end, the greatest danger presented in the film comes from those characters who give into fear and hatred. There is also a rather brief but interesting moment where a car radio has the news media trying to fan the flames of fear during the height of a crisis, so one character changes the channel to easy listening.
Norman's condition functions as an obvious metaphor for being gay. He is referred to as having been "born that way" and bullied at school for it. His father and other family members go out of their way to try to encourage Norman to stop seeing dead people and just try to be "normal".
In addition to this subtext, ParaNorman also contains a groundbreaking gay character, Neil's older brother Mitch is explicitly revealed to have a boyfriend. This is groundbreaking in two ways. One is due to the almost complete absence of queer identified youth in cinema in general. The second is due to the total absence of LGBTQ characters in mainstream films aimed at kids. As it is, Mitch is the first (that I am aware of) gay identified youth in a mainstream film aimed at kids.
On the technical side of things, the stop motion animation for ParaNorman is first rate. It was be filmed in 3D, but I saw the 2D version and did not feel that I was missing out on anything. The voice work is also well done and there are no recognizable celebrity voices to distract the audience from the story. The humor is fairly overt for the macabre subject matter, with some truly clever moments such as the use of the theme from Halloween that turns out to be Norman's cell phone ringer or the way the filmmakers reveal that Norman's grandmother is actually dead.
Overall, an enjoyable flick with some well done animation and interesting subtexts to go along with a nicely told story.
Recommendation
Anyone normal or para-normal should see this film.
The Rating
*** out of ****
Trailer
Want to find a review of a particular work? Check out the Title Index, the archive of all reviews posted listed alphabetically.
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