A Night Out On Film
Clockwise from above: The Garden Left Behind; Sell By; and Gay Chorus Deep South. (Publicity photos)
While previewing this year’s Out on Film, I watched “Sell By” and “Straight Up” back to back. I felt the former was a too-in depth story about a group of friends that keeps the rest of us at arm’s length, while the latter resonated with me so deeply I wasn’t sure anyone else would get it (I’ve since talked to someone else who saw it and he enjoyed it as much as I did, so there are at least two of us, but a third didn’t like it at all).
So while I’ll be offering positive and negative views on several films in the next and online, the best advice I can give is to take a chance if something sounds interesting to you. It would be a dull world if we all had the same taste.
Of the 20-some features I’ve previewed so far, I’d pick “Straight Up” as the best narrative film and “For They Know Not What They Do” as the best documentary.
This year’s festival runs September 26-October 6, with all films through October 3 at the Landmark Midtown Art Cinemas and the closing weekend at the Out Front Theatre Company and Plaza Theatre (as noted in reviews in the next issue and online). It’s always wise to check the festival’s website, www.outonfilm.org, for last-minute changes.
The ratings for the festival features in the next issue and online are on a four-star scale, but I never give anything four stars.
More in depth reviews available at thegavoice.com.
SELL BY
(H H)
September 28, 9:15pm
The honeymoon is over for Adam (Scott Evans) and Marklin (Augustus Prew) after five years together. Marklin has struck it
rich with a fashion website, while Adam is a struggling painter, doing works in the style of a pretentious artist (Patricia Clarkson, appearing briefly) who sells them as her own. They’re part of a group of mostly thirtysomething New York yuppies, all of whom have their own stories. Writerdirector Mike Doyle seems to have made “Sell By” for the characters it’s about. If you don’t fit in with their clique, and I don’t, you can feel excluded; and I did.
THE GARDEN LEFT BEHIND
(H H H)
September 29, 5pm
Like a contemporary version of “Pose” without the ballroom aspect, Flavio Alves’ first feature follows 30-ish Tina (Carlie Guevara), who’s lived with her grandmother (Miriam Cruz) in New York since coming from
Mexico at five, as she begins transitioning to womanhood. A lot of information about the process transgenders face (it ain’t easy) is woven into the story, which focuses on Tina, her supportive, already transitioned friends, and a couple of men in her life, one of them a wild card. The script glosses over some financial questions but it covers a lot of bases, most of them very well.
GAY CHORUS DEEP SOUTH
(H H H)
September 29, 7:15pm
After the 2016 election the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus toured five Southern states (not Georgia) to start a conversation about discrimination against LGBT people while states were passing “religious freedom” laws. David Charles Rodrigues’ documentary includes several well-sung songs in rehearsals and performances, but it’s not a concert film. It’s more about the conversation, including personal stories of chorus members and others. A few have touching family reunions along the way. The film reminds us how much can be accomplished by leaving our bubble, getting to know the people we disagree with and letting them get to know us.
THE BLOND ONE
(H H
September 29, 9:30pm
Most foreign films require too much patience for American viewers. This one, by writerdirector Marco Berger, may set a record in that regard, but not unintentionally. In Buenos Aires Juan (Alfonso Barón) has rented his spare room to a co-worker, Gabriel (Gastón Re). Both men have girlfriends; divorced Gabo has a seven-year-old daughter who lives with his parents. The sexual tension between them mounts ever so slowly for more than half an hour before anything happens, and there are many uneventful stretches after that. It’s frustrating but effective, and I can’t deny being seriously turned on.
AN ALMOST ORDINARY SUMMER (H H
September 30, 7pm
This year’s Big Gay Italian Wedding isn’t as good as last year’s, but it’s not bad. Toni (Fabrizio Bentivoglio) has invited his own family and that of Carlo (Alessandro Gassmann) to his fabulous vacation home Clockwise from top: An Almost Ordinary Summer; Billie & Emma; Scream, Queen! My Nightmare on Elm Street; and Leonard Soloway’s Broadway. (Publicity photos)
so the men can announce their engagement. Carlo’s homophobic son Sandro plots with Toni’s daughter Penny to prevent the union. The dramedy runs out of laughs about halfway through and it’s a chore to keep track of all the characters, but the overall story of two older men finding themselves and each other makes it worth the effort.
LEONARD SOLOWAY’S BROADWAY
(H H H)
October 1, 5pm
Leonard Soloway was born a theater queen. If you were too, as I was, you’ll enjoy Jeff Wolk’s biographical film. Cleveland-born Soloway has been a fixture in New York theater for 70 years or so, and he’s been out most of that time. You don’t know him because he’s
played spotlight-averse roles like producer and general manager for more than a hundred shows. The film’s framework involves his efforts in 2014 to bring Maurice Hines to New York in “Tappin’ Thru Life”; but there are plenty of interviews with Soloway (at 90!) and his friends to provide backstage gossip.
SCREAM, QUEEN! MY NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET
(H H H)
October 1, 7pm
It wasn’t planned but “Freddy’s Revenge,” 1985’s sequel to “A Nightmare on Elm Street,” became a gay cult classic. Mark Patton, who played Jesse, thought it would make him a star; but the public thought he and it were “too gay.” In the year Rock Hudson was outed while dying from AIDS,
gay actors didn’t work. Patton vanished for almost 25 years, until another “Elm Street” documentary started him attending horror conventions, including a celebration of “Nightmare 2”’s 30th anniversary. Afterward we see Patton confronting writer David Chaskin, who’d thrown him under the bus initially. Will this be “Mark’s Revenge”?
BILLIE & EMMA
(H H H)
October 1, 9:15pm
Has there ever been another Filipino lesbian high school romance? Back in the ‘90s, Billie (Zar Donato), the new girl in the Catholic school where her aunt teaches, begins a romance with Emma (Gabby Padilla), one
of the smartest, most popular girls. Then Emma finds out she’s pregnant. She’s hoping for a scholarship, but Catholic schools aren’t big on pregnancy or abortion (not to mention homosexuality). Writer-directorLGBT activist Samantha Lee takes on a lot of responsibility here and it’s remarkable how smoothly she makes it all work together at a good pace without seeming rushed.
5B
(H H H)
(October 2, 7pm)
In the early 1980s, many doctors and nurses, let alone friends and relatives, were afraid to go near AIDS patients before anything was known about the disease but its high fatality rate. San Francisco General became the first U.S. hospital to have a separate AIDS ward, Ward 5B, where patients could receive compassionate care from health care professionals and volunteers who were willing to take calculated risks to be humane. Several of them survived to take part in this documentary by Paul Haggis and Dan Krauss about the first decade of HIV/AIDS, which is a well-deserved tribute to them.
CUBBY
(H H H)
(October 2, 7:15pm)
That Mark Blane wrote, co-directed and stars as Mark, who also hails from Indiana, could lead you to expect an element of autobiography in his impressive debut, a comedy about a 30-ish gay misfit on his own for the first time in New York. He finds a group apartment to share and gets part-time work babysitting a six-year-old. Mark, who draws gay sex he hasn’t experienced, has an imaginary friend, Leather-Man, who he discovered in a hidden magazine when he was six years old. Mark can be lovable or scary but he’s always fun to watch – from a safe distance.
THE SHINY SHRIMPS
(H H H)
(October 3, 7:15pm)
We’ve seen many movies about a reluctant coach turning a bunch of losers into champions, but the gay water polo team in this French comedy is based on a real team. Forced to train the Shiny Shrimps for the Gay Games is Matthias (Nicolas Gob), who has to Clockwise from top: Bit; All Male, All Nude: Johnson’s; Cubby; and Changing the Game (Publicity photos)
redeem himself for using a homophobic word on television. The seven gay men and one trans woman on the team each have stories, some rather dramatic or melodramatic. After a funny start the movie becomes overly serious as their stories play out, but it retains a positive energy that saves the day.
ALL MALE, ALL NUDE: JOHNSON’S
(H H
October 3, 9:15pm
Gerald McCullouch’s follow-up to “All Male, All Nude,” about Atlanta’s Swinging Richards, is less nude but still, er, visually stimulating, and provides some insight into the club business. It’s about Johnsons, a similar bar in Fort Lauderdale-adjacent
Wilton Manors, that was opened by former SR d.j. Matt Colunga. To qualify as a “go-go bar” they make dancers keep certain things covered, even if customers don’t keep their hands or money to themselves. Colunga may overstate what a clean business he runs and how well he treats his employees, but testimonials of customers, dancers and staff lend credence to his claims.
BIT
(H H)
October 4, 7pm
“Bit,” an ambitious attempt to reinvent the teen vampire genre, bites off more than it can chew. The character of Laurel and Nicole Maines, who plays her, are both trans, but that’s neither obvious nor relevant. Laurel
graduates high school in Oregon and heads to L.A. for a gap summer. She’s soon sucked into a group of vampires, led by Duke (Diana Hopper), who are lesbian but more importantly feminist. A lot of exposition is devoted to their history and special rules, but one gets the idea that their cure for toxic masculinity is worse than the disease.
CHANGING THE GAME
(H H H)
October 5, 2pm
Out Front Theatre
Should there be a “T” in Team? Michael Barnett’s documentary about three transgender high school athletes in
different states (Texas, New Hampshire and Connecticut) with different rules, studies legitimate questions. It may require the wisdom of Solomon to come up with a solution that’s fair to everybody, because none fully resolves the issue of testosterone, natural or injected, giving one an unfair advantage over cisgender female competitors. The film’s not “fair and balanced,” but it can save lives. That and getting to know three likable young folks – Mack, Sarah and Andraya – make “Changing the Game” supremely worthwhile.
MOM + MOM
(H H H)
October 5, 9pm
Out Front Theatre
Lesbians are forbidden to co-parent in Italy, so Karole (Linda Caridi) and Ali (Maria Roveran) travel to Barcelona to get Ali inseminated, and they’re not immediately successful. I enjoyed being plunged into their wacky world, based on the experiences of director and co-writer Karole Di Tommaso. Her overabundant imagination leaves the impression that everyone in Italy (except our heroines, of course) is eccentric. I wondered why Karole’s brother doesn’t inseminate Ali, but the film’s odd wavelength is too irresistible to be spoiled by logic.
STRAIGHT UP
(H H H
October 5, 9:30pm
Plaza Theatre
I think I’m in love with writer-director James Sweeney, who also stars as OCD-afflicted Todd in this odd romcom. I know I’m in love with his movie. Todd can’t stand bodily fluids, so he doesn’t want to have sex – with anyone, even though he’s obviously gayer than Pride. Rory (Katie Findlay) is a wannabe actress who blows every audition. Individually they’re a mess, but together they’re a perfect match; but is a lack of sex a dealbreaker for a young couple? “Straight Up” isn’t for everyone, but it sure is for me! MAKING SWEET TEA
( H H H)
October 6, 4:15pm
Out Front Theatre
Despite its haphazard organization there’s a lot to like about “Making Sweet Tea,” in which Dr. E. Patrick Johnson (call him Patrick) visits or revisits, some in Atlanta and Decatur, six of the men he profiled in his book “Sweet Tea: Black Gay Men of the South.” The film is partly about adapting the book into a stage play, apparently a solo show with Patrick playing all the characters. He tells their stories well in their voices, but the film is at its best when it just lets the men spill their own tea.