Sunday, July 20, 2008

Reverend's Report from Outfest: Another Gay Sequel

There are only three movies during the course of my lifetime that I've deemed so wretched I walked out of the theater before they ended. The first was Message from Space, a Japanese Star Wars rip-off from 1978. I was only ten years old, but I knew it was crap. The next was The New Adventures of Pippi Longstocking in 1988, which I labeled celluloid child abuse.

I just saw the third movie, as much of it as I could bear anyway, last night at Outfest. It is Another Gay Sequel: Gays Gone Wild. I made it through most of the movie but had enough when it reached the climactic "Gays Gone Wild" competition orgy, which is no more than an excuse to show people having sex. My partner had bailed from the screening ten minutes earlier, and a number of other attendees departed prematurely with us.

The film is written and directed by the not-untalented Todd Stephens, who made the very good Edge of Seventeen and Gypsy 83 as well as this disaster's predecessor, Another Gay Movie. While I enjoyed the original, a clever GLBT riff on straight teen comedies like Porky's and American Pie, it hardly demanded a sequel.

It was such a hit, though, that every gay business currently in existence seemingly funded the sequel. An additional orgy of product placement runs throughout the movie, with video companies, lubes, condoms, websites, underwear and travel agencies all prominently displayed.

Stephens was on hand to introduce the Outfest screening. To be fair, he told the packed house up front that the film wasn't yet finished, and the need for additional editing and color-correction was evident while watching it. However, the only way Another Gay Sequel could yet end up a good movie would be to destroy the negative/digital master, re-think and re-write the script, re-cast the movie (Stephens should especially reduce blogger Perez Hilton's supporting role into a one-scene cameo, if he is to participate at all), and create something that doesn't offend the same audience it is pandering to.

It isn't just that the film is outrageously graphic in its depiction of sex, bodily functions and even violence. It's that it isn't really a spoof or good-natured satire like Another Gay Movie was, and instead becomes a derogatory depiction of the GLBT community. The sequel features distorted and either heavy-handed or not-very-funny-to-begin-with takes on reality TV competitions, venereal disease, fetishes, Catholicism, penis size, sexual positions and incest. It also claims to endorse monogamous GLBT relationships while simultaneously indulging in three-ways, bathhouse sex and anonymous encounters.

The funniest moment in the film is actually its smartest: a brief, barbed comment that RuPaul (who looks good and manages to emerge from the wreckage around him unscathed) makes about gay people taking over historically black neighborhoods. Oh, how I wish the script had more such moments tinged with truth rather than dominated by caricature.

I don't offend easily but I was offended, obviously, by Another Gay Sequel: Gays Gone Wild. If this represents the current high point of GLBT cinema in terms of artistic response to a predecessor's success, the number of companies endorsing it and the wide theatrical release (relatively speaking, for an GLBT film) it will receive later this summer, then it is a definite setback.

UPDATE: Another Gay Sequel: Gays Gone Wild is now available on DVDfrom Amazon.com.

Review by Rev. Chris Carpenter, resident film critic of Movie Dearest and the Orange County and Long Beach Blade.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow Reverend, I really don't think you got this movie. I LOVED this brave, bold comedy - and respect the filmmaker and all the cast for being so courageous. It is crude, you may not have the stomach for it...but what a ride!

Anonymous said...

Oh, I "got" it all right...just like a bad case of crabs! AAARGH! : ) Seriously, though, I'd love to hear more about why you think it is "brave and bold."

Anonymous said...

Alright, so I caught this film at the Philadelphia International Gay and Lesbian film fest. I was not offended at all because I knew it would be nothing but toilet humor and gay stereotypes the whole time. I have sent the first film for pete's sake. I am not sure how you could be offended because it was so over the top and silly. What did you expect? The first film was exactly the same. Except this time they pushed the envelope in terms of how far they could take a joke. Maybe that is what anonymous means when he said "brave and bold."

Overall the film was your standard sequel. The character Nico played by Jonah Blechman stole every scene he was in. My only fault with the film was that it felt like a remake of the first film but in a different setting. If you are a fan of the first, I do not see why you should not see this when it hits video (DVD) shelves.

Anonymous said...

This movie was horrible. I watched the first movie many times over, but this one just seemed to take everything that was funny in the first, and over do it until it just wasn't funny anymore. I can handle potty humor, but this one made the jokes annoying and tedious (not to mention predictable, who didn't figure out who the man in the dog suit was right from the beginning of that scene?).

Anonymous said...

Thank you, Anonymous, for your support/agreement. I just last week named this my pick for worst movie of 2008.