Reverend’s Reviews: Show of Pride

Conservative prime minister Margaret Thatcher’s 1984 crackdown on miners and other members of British labor unions has already been documented to some degree in such films as Billy Elliot and The Iron Lady. CBS Films’ Pride, now playing in Los Angeles and New York before expanding nationally next month, reveals an inspiring, little-known aspect of this historical episode.

Moved by the plight of striking workers in a small Welsh town for whom mining provided the local economy, a group of gay and lesbian Londoners led by HIV+ activist Mark Ashton (Ben Schnetzer, last seen in The Book Thief) began to collect money as well as donations of food and clothing to send to the miners’ families. The recipients were initially perplexed if not outright offended by the notion of “fa—ots” coming to their aid, but over time the town’s residents and members of Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners (as they came to be called) learn to appreciate one another.

In addition to passionate turns by young, relative newcomers Schnetzer, George MacKay and Faye Marsay as the support group’s founding members, the movie boasts a top-drawer roster of British actors including Bill Nighy, Imelda Staunton, Dominic West and Paddy Considine. Irish-born Andrew Scott supplies what may be the film’s most affecting performance as a gay man who dreads returning to his homophobic home country of Wales, no matter how good the cause. Nighy and Staunton also have a nice scene together in which they bare their characters’ secrets while making finger sandwiches.

Pride marks the first produced screenplay by actor-writer Stephen Beresford as well as only the second film directed by Matthew Warchus, better known as the guiding force behind Broadway’s God of Carnage and the hit stage musical Matilda. Their shared inexperience with filmmaking results in a number of one-dimensional characters, especially where the women are concerned, and less-than-subtle directorial flourishes. Still, Pride won the Queer Palm award for best LGBT-themed entry at this year’s Cannes Film Festival and succeeds greatly on the strength of its cast and undeniably powerful true story. It’s a real crowd-pleaser, so show your pride by seeing Pride.

Reverend’s Rating: B+

Review by Rev. Chris Carpenter, resident film critic of Movie Dearest and Rage Monthly Magazine.

Reverend’s Review: The Twilight-of-Life Zone

Los Angeles’s esteemed Center Theatre Group (CTG) has a daunting task getting word out about their current, world premiere production of Marjorie Prime without giving away any of its considerable twists and turns. I’ll do my best not to reveal any major spoilers herein, but suffice to say Rod Serling would approve of this engrossing and ingeniously-plotted play by young Orange is the New Black scribe Jordan Harrison.

It starts out like a fairly standard-issue dramedy about an elderly woman in an assisted living facility, Marjorie, who is experiencing the onset of dementia with its attendant memory lapses and potential hallucinations. As the play begins, Marjorie (played by the great character actress Lois Smith) is engaged in conversation with a younger vision of her late husband, Walter (Jeff Ward, fresh from his Broadway debut in Orphans opposite Alec Baldwin). Their affection for one another as they recount past experiences, beloved pets and their two children is palpable. The audience gradually learns that it is also more tangible than initially suspected.

We also gradually discover via subtle bits of information distributed like tantalizing bread crumbs that the play is set in the future, approximately 50 years from now. I expect a fuller understanding and appreciation of Marjorie Prime in this regard, as well as its more philosophical musings, will result from additional viewings. Marjorie’s daughter Tess (Lisa Emery, recently seen on Broadway in Harvey Fierstein’s Casa Valentina) and son-in-law Jon (Frank Wood) visit and add more dimensions to playwright Harrison’s central exploration of mortality, past losses and memory.

Director Les Waters clearly has a handle on the play’s content, including its more Twilight Zone-esque aspects. Although Wood’s performance suffered a glitch or two (one of them possibly the result of or related to a technical/lighting issue) on opening night, the cast is on the whole exceptional. The amazing, 83-year old Smith’s career has spanned 60 years on stage, film (her first movie role was as the barmaid in the 1955, James Dean version of East of Eden) and TV. In the latter medium, she is recognizable to fans of HBO’s recently-concluded True Blood as Sookie’s grandmother, Adele. It is nothing less than a privilege to see her working live and in person on the Mark Taper stage.

Providing the actors fairly minimalist but essential support is Mimi Lien’s set design. Its broad, blank backdrop beckons like a page or canvas waiting to be recorded on while, in the foreground, comfortable furniture in muted color tones supply the requisite nursing home feel. During the play’s final scene, however, the action manages to rise above the play’s previous confines both literally and figuratively.

More than a few of my fellow theatergoers didn’t quite know what to make of Marjorie Prime at the conclusion of its opening night performance. An older gentleman across the aisle stated bluntly “I didn’t understand it,” but “that was interesting” was a more common reaction. I noticed many people discussing it animatedly as I left the theatre, while my companion and I dissected it appreciatively during our drive home.

Marjorie Prime is playing at the Taper in LA now through October 19th. Tickets are available by calling 213-628-2772 or visiting the Center Theatre Group website. Those hungry for more thought-provoking, provocative theatrical fare should not miss it.

Reverend’s Rating: B+

Review by Rev. Chris Carpenter, resident film critic of Movie Dearest and Rage Monthly Magazine.

Reverend’s Reviews: The Naked Truth

As we learn watching I’m a Porn Star, the new movie from actor turned documentarian Charlie David, pornography in its various forms generates $13 billion in sales each year. This makes the porn industry more successful than the music industry and nearly as successful as the mainstream film industry. I’m a Porn Star (available now on DVDand streaming from Canteen Outlaws) exposes — pun intended — several of the popular names behind current gay porn.

David kicks things off with a brief but masterfully edited (by Diego Gomez) history of gay porn, which actually began in the 1920’s with a bold French film that depicted men having sex with other men as well as with women. This doc within the doc also notes the contributions of Bob Mizer, Kenneth Anger, Andy Warhol and Wakefield Poole, as well as the challenges presented to the industry by the AIDS pandemic and the more recent rise of pornographic websites, of which there are currently more than 300 million.

Viewers are then introduced (well, at least those not previously aware of their, ahem, talents) to Colby Jansen, Johnny Rapid, Rocco Reed and Brent Everett. Graphic highlights of their work including “money shots” are featured, but it is their personal backgrounds and stories that I found most revelatory. Jansen was a college undergraduate in physics, served in the Marine Corps (and admits to having killed people on behalf of the US) and worked at the Pentagon before starting to work in porn. He considers himself straight and is married to post-op transsexual porn actress Gia Darling. When not filming, Jansen is currently studying for his MBA.

Rapid is also straight and has a committed girlfriend. However, he defines himself as respectful and open-minded and has burned up many TV and computer screens as bottom to his frequent co-star, top Rafael Alencar (whom we learn is a dentist by day). Reed, meanwhile, defines himself as bisexual after first appearing in straight porn but eventually finding stardom as a gay porn bottom. Unlike most performers in the industry, Reed studied acting after discovering theatre while in high school although he first wanted to be a professional basketball player. Jansen, Rapid and Reed all comment on the “overwhelming number” of heterosexual men who do gay porn, though the obvious draw is that their producers typically pay more than straight porn producers. Plus, as Reed says with a chuckle, “Everyone’s a little bit gay.” A psychiatrist also weighs in on what draws men and women to do porn. (Editor's Note: both Jansen and Rapid have said they are bisexual in other interviews, while Reed infamously stated "I am not or never have been gay" upon his retirement from the porn industry last year.)

The film’s fourth subject, Brent Everett, deserves kudos for not only being the one self-proclaimed gay man featured but for also being the only performer who told his parents he was doing porn without them first accidentally discovering it for themselves. As a younger performer, his openness largely reflects his generation. Everett also reveals that his parents are swingers and more open-minded themselves. Impressively and amusingly, his are the only parents to date who have accompanied a performer to the annual gay video awards, of which Everett is a recipient.

I’m a Porn Star paints a generally rosy picture and avoids going into the more unpleasant aspects of the industry like the risk of HIV transmission, drug abuse and performer suicides. I have no doubt though that this documentary will find an eager audience.

Palm Springs’ Cinema Diverse Film Festival, taking place this weekend, marks the end each year of California’s LGBT fest circuit. As such, it largely screens movies that have already premiered at other festivals but it will have a few unique offerings. Among these are the world premiere of Matthew Ladensack’s Saugatuck Cures, which is presumably set in Saugatuck, Michigan, one of my fave gay getaways.

Also being screened is the dark thriller Violence of the Mind, which I was able to view in advance. It follows the exploits of attractive thrill killer Max (Jon Fleming) and his cute young protégé, Sebastian (Ryan Kibby, who rather hilariously but probably unintentionally goes cross-eyed whenever he “dies” during the film’s numerous fantasy sequences). After a few tentative efforts, the pair regularly begins to recruit hustlers online to have sex with and murder, not necessarily in that order. “I think it’s so hot that we’re exploring this together,” Sebastian excitedly confesses to Max, as if their actions were merely some light kink between the two of them.

The body count piles up, the script (by Daniel Rhyder) gets monotonous and the whole, very bloody film (directed by Alex Pucci) is pretty pointless in the end. It is set in LA/Hollywood but cuts awkwardly, for those of us in the know, to numerous Palm Springs locations like (the highly-recommended) Trio restaurant. What makes Violence of the Mind slightly worth recommending is its cast, which includes some familiar gay indie faces, and the unusually high quality of the acting for the gay horror genre. True, Kristian Steel, seemingly emulating Bronson Pinchot’s Serge from the Beverly Hills Cop movies, is an embarrassment as Max’s nosy, gay Latino neighbor but Shoniqua Shandai is refreshingly acerbic as a sassy co-worker of Sebastian. The film becomes truly and winningly engaging whenever she is onscreen, however briefly.

Speaking of sassy but moving from movies to music, we encounter singer-actress Isabel Rose. Her new album Trouble in Paradise, just released on CDand iTunes, is a cocktail party-ready treat. Working with an impressive array of Grammy winners like Chris Lord-Alge and Al Schmitt as well as popular remixers Frankie Knuckles and Eric Kupper, Rose channels 1960’s Las Vegas via opening track “Lot of Livin’ to Do” (from the musical Bye Bye Birdie), “Never Satisfied” and the Peter Gunn theme (who knew it had lyrics?). She covers more recent/contemporary songs including Neil Sedaka’s “Love Will Keep Us Together” (popularized in the 1970’s by The Captain & Tennille), “Reflections” and “Miracle,” the latter written by Michael Buble collaborator Alan Chang. Trouble in Paradise is definitely worth a download or purchase, and be sure to also check out Rose’s terrific YouTube video co-starring drag divas Hedda Lettuce, Ivy Winters and Paige Turner!

Reverend’s Ratings:
I’m a Porn Star: B
Violence of the Mind: C
Trouble in Paradise: B+

Review by Rev. Chris Carpenter, resident film critic of Movie Dearest and Rage Monthly Magazine.

Reverend’s Reviews: Death Becomes Them?

Suicide, sibling abandonment, adultery and pedophilia might seem like awfully heavy subjects for a movie starring Saturday Night Live vets Bill Hader and Kristen Wiig plus Modern Family’s Ty Burrell. Meet The Skeleton Twins, now playing in US theaters. Hader and Wiig play the title characters, whose actual names are Milo and Maggie Dean. Their adolescence damaged by their father’s suicide and Milo’s sexual abuse at the hands of one of their teachers, Maggie and Milo have spent ten years apart on opposite coasts basically giving each other the silent treatment.

After Milo (who is gay) attempts suicide, however, Maggie flies to LA and reunites with her brother. She invites him back to their hometown in upstate New York to live during his recovery with her and her devoted husband, Lance (the always likable Luke Wilson). It doesn’t take long for trouble to start brewing between Maggie and Milo again, especially once Milo resumes a sexual relationship with the disgraced instructor (Burrell) Milo considers his first love. But by film’s end, the twins come to a new appreciation of their ultimately unbreakable, warts-and-all bond.

The screenplay by Craig Johnson (who also directs) and Mark Heyman is generally sensitive and heartfelt. Those viewers who may be attracted to The Skeleton Twins expecting a load of laughs will be disappointed. Even I found it darker than expected with all its suicides and suicide attempts (there is another before the film is over), and this unfortunately prevented me from fully enjoying or loving it. I was impressed though by all the performances, especially Bill Hader’s. His unapologetically gay Milo is also nicely nuanced, especially when compared with the flamboyant, hilarious Stefan character Hader occasionally played on SNL. All in all, it is good to see this usually comedic cast do some truly dramatic work.

Agatha Christie couldn’t have concocted a more intriguing 1930’s-set murder mystery than the one spotlighted in Dayna Goldfine and Dan Geller‘s The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden. Now available on DVD and VODfrom Zeitgeist Films, it is one of the best-made documentaries of the year as well as one of the most intriguing.

This stranger-than-fiction saga begins in 1929, when Dr. Friedrich Ritter and his mistress, Dore Strauch, abandoned their native Germany to begin life anew on the remote, initially uninhabited Galapagos island of Floreana. Fortified with little more than the clothes on their backs and inspired by the self-actualization theories of philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, the vegan pair carved out a decent life for themselves from their environment’s flora and fauna.

Paradise would too soon be lost, however, as word of this new “Adam and Eve” (and possible nudists to boot) got back to Europe. Other settlers arrived on Floreana and neighboring Santa Cruz, which was 60 miles away, within a few years. Some of them were fellow Germans fleeing Hitler and the impending World War II. The most colorful and contentious of Dr. Ritter and Dore’s new neighbors were Baroness Eloise von Wagner and her two attractive “servile gigolos,” Robert and Rudolf, both of whom she slept with at the same time. The baroness quickly declared the island her property and even starred in a movie made about her exploits, footage of which is included in the documentary.

In 1934, von Wagner and Robert inexplicably disappeared amidst Rudolf’s allegations that they were abusing him. Most suspected Rudolf of murdering the pair and disposing of their bodies. Rudolf subsequently left the island with a Norwegian sailor but they never reached their destination. Dr. Ritter himself fell ill and died soon after while Dore, afflicted with multiple sclerosis, returned to Europe.

The filmmakers’ use of archival footage is masterful, and is further brought to life through readings from the principal players’ journals by the starry likes of Cate Blanchett, Diane Kruger, Connie Nielsen, Thomas Kretschmann and Josh Radnor. Interviews with several still-living subjects as well as modern-day social anthropologists are also well employed. From these, we viewers gain such educational pearls as “you can’t leave civilization without being punished” and “Paradise is not a place; it’s a condition.” Richly observant (including of the unique wildlife that calls the Galapagos Islands home) and absolutely engrossing, The Galapagos Affair should not be missed.

Reverend’s Ratings:
The Skeleton Twins: B
The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden: A-

Review by Rev. Chris Carpenter, resident film critic of Movie Dearest and Rage Monthly Magazine.