The Gay Film That Changed Your Life

[FindingNamo]

Oh Wayne Kostenbaum, I love you. You too, Colman Domingo.

Lotsa theatrical quee-yuhs talkin' about lots of movies on the Times Arts Blog:


Your Life

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

I like that someone chose "Deathtrap"!

Mine would probably be "The Rocky Horror Picture Show."

[Kad]

I don't think there was a gay film that really had a life-changing effect on me. I feel like I'm missing out.

Though, growing up, I was obsessed with both Star Wars and Beauty and the Beast. Which basically sums me up as person today.

[JerseyGirl2]

Lea Delaria mentioned Go Fish. I absolutely hated that movie. I kept thinking that if that's what lesbians looked and acted like, then I should just keep playing straight. I don't think I have ever seen a specifically "lesbian" movie that I felt represented me and my life. I loved Bar Girls and Everything Relative. I loved Foxfire because it wasn't about being GAY! It was about falling in love with this interesting, different, strong person and the gender was secondary.

[Marianne2]

The Hunger being mentioned makes me laugh. It was really bad. I saw it in a college class. No, it was not about the gay storyline. My professor chose it because he was giving us examples of formulaic and non-traditional things in certain genres of movies. This was one of the vampire movies.

[DayDreamer]

Surprised no one mentioned Another Country, probably the first gay-themed movie that hit my radar when I was growing up in Latin America. Maurice is up there too for me.

[themysteriousgrowl]

I don't know that it changed my life, but seeing "My Beautiful Laundrette" when I was very young was pretty bracing.

[AC126748]

For me, it would have to be PARTING GLANCES when I was about 13.

[PalJoey]

I love that Andrew Holleran mentions La Dolce Vita.

[FindingNamo]

Me too.

And Kostenbaum got me thinking about Bernd Broderup all night long.

[TheatreDiva90016]

Power Tool.

[FindingNamo]

Ha!

[Mister Matt]

Mine would be Deathtrap as well. It was the first time I saw two men kiss and THAT'S when I knew. Suddenly, it all made sense. Then it was Making Love and My Beautiful Laundrette. I sought them out because of the gay themes.

[TheatreDiva90016]

Deathtrap was HUGE for me. I even directed it my senior year in High School.

And that was back in the mid 80's.

[EricMontreal22]

Wild Reeds, I think.

[JustAGuy]

BOYS IN THE BAND - I was barely 19 living in the heart of the Midwest and SLOWLY coming out, when that movie was released. At the time I had aspirations of moving to NYC as quickly as possible and it was upsetting and depressing to see what I presumed was the life waiting for me there. I can't really say it changed my life... but I'm pretty sure it slowed down my move to NYC, I wasn't anywhere close to being prepared for what that movie portrayed.

[EricMontreal22]

Ha, I love that it caused a sort of reverse reaction for you. If you haven't seen it yet, I really recommend the documentary about Band--Making the Boys.

[PalJoey]

Eight minutes and 28 seconds of the best of the Boys in the Band:

http://youtu.be/zOakue0MiZs

[JohnBoy2]

Of course, "best" is extremely relative when it comes to the tedious and dreary THE BOYS IN THE BAND.

[FindingNamo]

At least you're not bragging about never having heard of it, which is your usual métier, johnboy.

[singtopher]

For me, it would be THE BIRDCAGE. I had seen that movie a million times, but one time while watching it with BFF from High School I suddenly just had the urge to tell someone (her) I was gay. It just seemed so natural.

[FindingNamo]

PJ, I had never noticed how much Emory influenced Ellen Greene in Little Shop.

[PalJoey]

Not to mention empowering a generation of Westchester decorators and New Jersey hairstylists to "let their freak flags fly."

[FindingNamo]

Here's a nifty little documentary for anybody who has moved beyond JohnBoy-doing-Arthur-Bell-Circa-1976 in the Complaints about Boys in the Band Department. Demonstrates clearly why it's a piece of theatrical and cinematic history. Everybody interviewed shows how it changed their lives.


All About the Boys in the Band

[Jordan Catalano]

I have two. First would be ROCKY HORROR. My parents took me to see it when I was 10 in 1988 and I fell in love with it and I think that's when I realized I was "different". The second was 7 years later in 1995 when I saw HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS and Robert Downey Jr. made me realize that I was going to be ok. So I think the latter would be the most "important" gay film I have ever seen, even though it wasn't necessarily a "gay" film.

[Scripps2]

A TV movie from the 1980s about a Scottish mother raising two sons on her own. Much of the film focused on the older son getting into trouble, whilst a sub-plot had the younger son coming to terms with being gay.

I can't remember the film's title but I can definitely remember the scenes of the younger son, who played for the local rugby team, and his team-mates in the changing room and the communal rugby bath. It was the first time I experienced lightning-in-the-loins lust, and that long before rugby acquired the homoerotic reputation it has now.