The Star Beast is more style over substance. Those that are getting back into Doctor Who for Russell T. Davies will find a lot of his trademarks, which maybe were emphasized more heavily for this outing that is designed to appeal to people that had fallen off the show since Davies left in essentially 2009. In fact, a lot of it is laid on a little too thick. Essentially at random, David Tennant as The Doctor can burst into some witty or comedic tangent. The mock trial is the prime example. While that and many other scenes do a disservice to the tone, they are at least entertaining. Tennant himself is very breezy with the material, doing a better job than most would at balancing all these disparate tones.
The opening scene of Tennant and Catherine Tate as Donna Noble monologuing about their past encounters and where their minds are at proves succinctly that these actors have a solid grasp of their characters, even when their lines are extremely unnatural. To give the writing some credit, it seems this opener is not even supposed to be canon, just being here to establish the episode. Much of the information is said later on in the story, so why even have this? Tennant is also in front of a greenscreen of space, which implies he’s just out in the stars standing on literally nothing. One of the biggest issues with the 2000s-present era of Doctor Who is how it can be mostly serious, but include odd bits of absurdity that really pull you out of the moment. While it’s good and also common for this show to go for these stylings, some scenes really ask to be taken seriously and they just can’t be because of this sort of thing. They can be balanced a lot better.
The pacing also is often very fast, with little time to let us sit in a certain situation, which makes that situation feel pointless. A lot of information is shot out in long exposition from characters in ways that don’t feel realistically written or it doesn’t make sense why they even would be monologuing. The music choice can also be offbeat, like the light guitar music after the opening titles that sticks out against the intimidating setup. A very common problem in the show that is especially bad here is when the heat gets down on the Doctor, but then he pulls his sonic screwdriver out and saves the day with far too much ease. Later, there’s a wheelchair that also just seems to be able to do whatever is needed for the plot.
The best performance in the episode is the relatively lowkey Jacqueline King as Sylvia Noble. Sylvia is rightfully terrified that her daughter might die, though then when required the character will stay off to the side, even when you’d think she would want to be more active and trying to keep Donna safe. Her pain is also played for laughs, when it could make for a really touching and dramatic plot point if taken seriously. You regardless can’t deny how heart wrenching it is when she’s yelling at Donna that the alien right in front of her isn’t real, because she’s so afraid of what will happen. Catherine Tate herself is very effective in her role of a selfless mother and person in general that always wants to do the right thing, while being easily agitated.
Yasmin Finney as Rose Noble gives a fine portrayal, as well. It would’ve been better if her story of feeling like an outcast connected more to the main plot. It arguably does a little, but the general disconnect makes her feelings come off as tacked on. That being said, it’s certainly not uncommon for shows like this to include relatively blatant commentary of whatever is going on culturally. Also, Rose being trans does play into the storyline and it couldn’t easily be replaced with something else. It does feel like we are being given a message, as opposed to a story, when this comes up. Rose is supposed to be fifteen, though Finney was eighteen and looks a little older.
Note that this episode is pretty much the closest thing to the 60th anniversary special. It aired on the 25th of November, two days off of the actual day of the 23rd. Thus, it’s disappointing how few references there are to the history of the series. Hopefully such a thing would be included in the later episodes with Tennant, possibly whenever it’s explained why the Doctor looks like a past incarnation. Considering the fact that it was established on the 50th anniversary that the Doctor may regenerate into his “favorite” incarnations essentially explains this.
SPOILERS
Rose trying to hide Beep the Meep from everyone else doesn’t serve much purpose. Donna immediately finds the Meep. There’s not even a scene where Rose’s sneaky leanings lead anywhere. Later, Rose talking about feeling like she has gotten over her issues and is finally herself is pretty silly. Her problem was with feeling like an outcast due to dealing with transphobes. Those people have not gone away, nor has her dysphoria. While of course it is possible to change your mindset with that stuff, she would not just get over her stress in a second. This is a very ham fisted way to tie up Rose and her story, which could have just left her an open book that could be explored later. It also would’ve been interesting if the episode covered the fact that if she had not trusted Beep the Meep, the Meep may not have been able to do as much damage as was done. The Doctor was similarly loosely responsible for some of the deaths the Meep caused, which is not taken very seriously or even looked at.
The Doctor seemingly made Donna remember him so she knew what buttons to press, but couldn’t he have just told her which to press? The scene of him realizing that Donna will have to die just flies in seemingly at random, like the script will contrive any reason to make it appear Donna will be killed. Tate and especially Tennant do a good job portraying this struggle, despite some theatrical dialogue and some yelling which furthermore is desperate to pull at the audience’s heart strings. What would’ve made this land better is if this was all covered over a few episodes. Maybe the Doctor feels Donna is destined to die, but he tries to keep her safe, then after a few hours of screen time he realizes he can’t? He even shows off things like the sonic screwdriver, which could remind her. That sort of moment would fit a lot better in a story just about Beep the Meep and new characters and not Donna.
One highlight is Donna acting brassy like she’s done in the past, being annoyed with herself for giving up her lottery winnings. With very little difficulty or fanfare, the day is saved essentially by the Doctor and Donna pressing a lot of buttons, as opposed to something more complex. Beep the Meep has a very over the top villain voice and overconfidence, yelling about how the Meep will win immediately before being defeated. Beep the Meep literally destroying the streets before that is undone is such an absurd way to “save the day”. Why even show such destruction if it means nothing? The workaround for how Donna can live after getting her memories back is quite clever, other than her and Rose to a degree just “letting it go”.
The sudden cliffhanger is, just like much of this episode, a little too convenient. Seeing as Donna is now learning about her past, why not just have her decide to go with the Doctor, instead of it happening by accident? I feel bad for Sylvia.
OVERVIEW
As a Doctor Who fan, I really enjoyed this. However, The Star Beast suffers in delivering a structured and competent narrative, feeling like a collection of tropes. As an example, there are points where the heroes would be worse off if something happened even a few seconds off from when it did. Embracing the silliness of this concept, as seems to be done by the way the creatures look and their names, works in isolation, but it should’ve been married to a story that will let that thrive. The lightness of the threats and how clean most of the issues are does not fit with the fifteen year long storyline of Donna and her threatened safety, which asks for something more serious.
Tangerine on the surface functions as a tried and true comedy about brassy ladies who are seldom willing to not be big personalities, though is more notable and memorable for its subjects. Kitana Kiki Rodriguez as Sin-Dee Rella and Mya Taylor as Alexandra turn in quality dramatic performances when need be. They do seem like real people at points, though in ways they can conversely fill the archetype of loud and boisterous paired with more quiet and subdued. They make the film, especially when they’re funny. Still, the comic sequences don’t play into the larger story. Particularly scenes that are just trying to get laughs could be removed.
The movie looks a little strange, mainly in the color, due to being shot on an iPhone. If it wanted a “street look”, there probably was a better option, as the film just looks a little flat. Movies like Bamboozled had a more interesting and complimentary aesthetic. Sean Baker’s directing however is very strong, creating a dynamic look that helps distract from the cheapness of the other factors.
Sin-Dee does have a few moments of over animation which take her out of relatability. She is also sometimes very unlikable. Her violent behavior towards one character is somewhat played for laughs, when it really is horrific. Obviously, someone can have valid feelings and an electric personality, while being abusive, but the movie not showing her as in the wrong is objectionable. Especially because seeing as she was doing this to a prostitute, it could be implied this is considered okay, as prostitutes are depicted as “used to it” or “mattering less”.
SPOILERS
Mickey O’Hagan as Dinah is numb and unflinching to all that happens to her, seemingly because it’s all happened so much. This is sadly barely touched on and doesn’t fit well with the more comedic scenes. Dinah never gets very much focus. A unifier between her, the two leads, and Razmik is that all four are working more or less throughout the film and are worse for wear by the end. Sex is also a big focal point of the issue here. Sin-Dee, Dinah, and Alexandra get in conflict with each other because of someone having sex with someone else. Those three women seemingly got into those situations by just doing their job or what’s expected of them. By contrast, Razmik is mainly responsible for his own downfall. It seems he left his family’s holiday dinner as he wanted to give head to a hooker, which feels like a contrivance to get him in trouble. When Razmik does so to Alexandra, we focus on him doing it for a long time, perhaps to let us take in as much as possible what this act would be like.
Us seeing Sin-Dee without a wig, then Alexandra giving her hers is a powerful moment due to it showing the two in a vulnerable position, taking off a projection of femininity. Them opening up like this is seemingly what could cause their friendship to improve, though it’s questionable if they’re even in a different place than at the start. It seems Alexandra knew it was wrong beforehand to sleep with Sin-Dee’s boyfriend and now she still knows that. Sin-Dee arguably only changes if she will take to heart her friend doing this, but she didn’t learn anything else, like from dating pimps, abusing another prostitute, or making life harder for a random client. She possibly doesn’t even learn anything about Alexandra, due to the ending implying they’ll makeup.
OVERVIEW
Due to the fluid nature of the structure, especially with certain prominent characters being out of the picture other than for certain moments, there seems to be little point to the narrative itself. What does Sin-Dee’s behavior accomplish for her or the other characters? Not much, we just see her and others deal with her, then move on with no or little growth. The point is clearly to see a real human struggle not often focused on, the life of a black transgender prostitute. It’s not some big tragedy or significant embrace of any of those factors, but just letting us see these events play out.
Thus, if Tangerine was made in a society without racism, transphobia, or objections to sex work, it would not be exceptional. It’d seem like a pointless movie about some misadventures, with the most interesting part being a handful of good performances. Seeing as we don’t live in that world, the movie is very much worth seeing, though there are other similar movies that have more to say and also are better stories. The Watermelon Woman is one favorite.
Multiple Maniacs is arguably something best understood with auteur theory. The acting is undeniably and consistently very bad, with the aesthetic and visual look trashy and cheap. This comes down to moments like the characters walking on loud and distracting leaves. However, all of these play as strengths. Writer and director John Waters has created a captivating world of outcasts and misfits. The filmmaking matches that style, with everything being as shoddy and bizarre as possible, sometimes seeming like it was deliberately unapproachable, at least to the average person.
“Yeah, but they got puke eaters, lesbians, mental patients and stuff. You’ll see two actual queers kissing each others like lovers on the lips.” A potential message here could be that people can look at anyone “different”, whether they be gay or mentally ill or a murderer, as being cut from the same cloth. That is absurd, so the film opts to laugh at that and have fun with it. Characters like the glorious portrayal of protagonist “Lady Divine” embrace anything distinct or weird and love it, as if made to be unlike anyone else. It’s hard not to be electrified by how animated she is, though she doesn’t take away from the atmosphere set by the other much worse performances. She goes far to being disgusting and deranged.
The opening credits are extremely cheap and dingy, being very solid mood setting. The movie afterwards opens on David Lochary as Mr. David with a mic. He is hilarious in how terrible he is at acting. The atmosphere just gets moldier and moldier. A naked woman not really doing anything disgusts people. One of the men watching two men kiss at the show seems really into it. One person says they have no choice other than to see the “main attraction”, when there’s nothing stopping them from just leaving. This is arguably a commentary on how people want to be “normal” and many can pretend to be, yet they do have darker parts of themselves, at least liking gross things. Otherwise, why would these people have wanted to see this show in the first place? “Dykes” and “Faggots” are emphasized as part of the attraction more than anything else. Maybe that was considered most shocking?
The camera is sometimes out of focus or shaking. When David’s talking to a girl, there’s silence for the first second. It shows them getting in character. There’s a handful of times when someone messes up their lines. More structurally, how is the beginning of the film particularly related to the rest of it? It makes sense if the whole movie is about Divine’s cavalcade, but the cavalcade suddenly is mostly irrelevant. More likely than everything here having some deep meaning was that it was all made cheap and things like Waters’ vision and Divine’s performance really support the vehicle. Without Divine, the other actors might not be able to carry this story and Waters’ films progressively looked more professional.
The rest of the movie feels almost improvised and like it’s not important. It just fits as much raunchiness in the time as possible. There’s long conversations about nothing. The story is sometimes cliché and always camp. Some particular favorite lines are, “Then we just lay there and made love.” “And fucked.” Another is, “I love you so fucking much that I could shit.” Finally, “Gay? I’m no lesbian, at least not until a little while ago.” Tellingly, the movie ends with a focus on Divine. There’s a powerful performance of her raving about nothing at the end. It’s hard to look away and summarizes how manic the whole film is.
SPOILERS
There’s an entrancing and horrific quality to the patrons yelling as Divine threatens their lives. Later, two vagrants struggle to pick Divine up and then there’s a cut to her already being held up. There’s a surreal and unreal quality to Divine being sexually assaulted as saxophone music plays. Obviously her skirt wasn’t pulled up. That error might have been intentional. Who knows with this film? Why didn’t David resist being stabbed? Was that deliberate? Did he not know how to act that scene? Again, who knows?
This film blends what could be thought of as “high art” and low degeneracy. An example of this and probably the best scene in the flick is the church scene. The character of Divine is explored as she discusses her love of Jesus and compares herself to him. We see scenes of Jesus. The scenes of Jesus look very cheap, probably by design. Many of the actors look dirty and unwashed. The set is the woods somewhere and when Jesus turns a little fish and bread into a plentiful amount, they’re in containers that you’d buy at a supermarket. She then has a sex scene with a woman she just met. The woman speaks of Jesus’ sacrifice and we cut from the sex scene to the crucifixion of Jesus. This is Divine’s moment of divinity. Arguably this sequence is too needlessly shocking, but it shows how Divine sees herself and how there is value to this “community theater” style, with the scrappiness conveying a spirit and youthfulness hard to capture elsewhere.
OVERVIEW
For better or for worse, the ending devolves into some pretty random events that don’t feel connected to anything else. At least the opening of the movie sets the mood. Some may like that randomness. No matter what, it shows that Multiple Maniacs is more about spectacle than story. It does have plot development and some interesting things to say, especially with the religious imagery, but is really just some enlightened performances and creative visuals. It’s a very fun and watchable film.
All in the Family has generally been praised for its enlightened views of minority groups, especially for the time and especially because of its somewhat sympathetic view of its extremely bigoted protagonist, Archie Bunker, played by Carroll O’Connor. In what little I’ve seen of the show, Archie does have a nicer heart to him than it may seem at first, seeming to have a better grasp on how wrong his behavior can be. This was apparently in response to some viewers actually agreeing with him. At least taking the episode “Cousin Liz” on its own, his humanity is tapped into where his apparent love and respect for his wife, Jean Stapleton as Edith Bunker, is what becomes an important focus of the drama here. Arguably, Archie is way ahead of the types of Conservative men that don’t like listening to their wives, sometimes because they’re women.
This episode shows how even people that support harmful ideologies can support the types of groups targeted. This point is mainly channeled through Edith, who seems unwilling to really embrace the negative things Archie believes, though also isn’t willing to strongly challenge them. The only other character in this episode is Veronica Cartwright, played by K Callan. While never upstaging the Bunker leads, she does work well as a counterbalance to them. At a pivotal moment, Veronica has a great look of terror on her face. She makes great facial expressions.
Edith doesn’t seem to understand homosexuality, but she understands love. Someone taking the Conservative talking point of “supporting family and being against those that want to destroy order” at face value should be pro-gay, as destroying them would be destroying a family. Edith seems to understand this. Archie doesn’t like looking at someone not looking back at him, like how a lesbian wouldn’t like him kissing them. This speaks to how homophobia is often based in insecurity. Maybe a man is so afraid of women dating each other, that he thinks they should essentially be forced or encouraged to date him instead?
Edith mentioning “adult movies” might parallel the perception of homosexuality as something underground that sometimes pops up in polite society. You can tell that Veronica has dealt with homophobic nonsense before. She seems somewhat used to it. That brings another dimension to this episode, as Archie might be an undistinguished part of a long line of these types of people. Conveniently, no one else is present other than these three people to complicate the situation. The ending seems rushed. When Archie leaves the bedroom to the living room, the episode’s almost over.
SPOILERS
Edith going on about the tea set’s family history foreshadows her caring about family and thus wanting the best for Veronica. It’s sobering and uncomfortable when Veronica essentially has to push and beg for Archie to not ruin her career. Archie is not some expert, so the fact he’s empowered so much is heartbreaking.
When Archie says God will judge Veronica as justification for getting her fired, Edith’s response of “He’s God, you ain’t!” gets a big applause from the studio audience. While that line probably had the best of intentions, it does still imply that gays should be judged, even if not by other people. It also doesn’t really challenge those that use religion as backing for their bigotry. “Maybe I shouldn’t get this person fired, but I still will think horrible things about them, as God would want.” When Archie tells Veronica to go get a man, she doesn’t at all seem disgusted by him. Hopefully she is just pretending, seeing as by this point she has what she wants. Unfortunately, Archie afterwards asks if she “minds” the advice and sincerely says no. You’d think a real life lesbian would at least say no through tensely gritted teeth.
OVERVIEW
As a political work, it’s hard to deny “Cousin Liz”, considering it arguably served a role in getting a real life bill that would get gay teachers fired turned down. On its own, it’s fine, but way too of its time and devoid of sentiment that is more solidly pro-gay. Maybe it was intended to be as appealing as possible to homophobes, which only proves how hollow they are, unwilling to deal with a more complicated defense of another person’s right to be happy?
I wanted cheesy, corny, stupid Lesbian rom-coms and this movie turned out to be that. I’ve seen many straight rom-coms like Kissing Jessica Stein and basically everyone has. This film is ridiculously samey and undistinguished, other than a fair twist of gayness. That twist may be enough for some. Despite not being very funny, this movie might pass as a decent watch for a queer crowd if it wasn’t for the ending that betrays a lot of the movie before it and makes the whole experience unsatisfying.
The dialogue is unintentionally silly. The film establishes the character’s personalities by them saying things that are very defining of that type of person, but there’s no subtlety or masking to what the point of the dialogue is. As an example, the dating scenes are overly goofy and cut too fast, with Jessica’s dates absurdly uncharismatic. Let the tone seep in a little. There’s also points like when Jessica keeps talking as someone tries to tell her her phone is ringing, which she somehow misses. She’s supposed to be clumsy, but this is a little much. Jennifer Westfeldt as Jessica Stein can often be way too bombastic instead of going for something simpler that would be more relatable.
The movie has some nice little moments. While not terribly subtle, there’s an amusing transition from the dates with weird men to two women kissing. Heather Juergensen as Helen Cooper dumping her purse is hilarious. As Jessica and Helen’s conversation progresses, the shot gets closer, like they’re becoming closer. The two guys at the bar are hilariously douchey. “But no one special?” “You know, I just don’t know.” When the film has less comedy around the start of the wedding plot, it gets a lot better. The leads pull off drama decently. There’s one shot where someone isn’t at their desk because it was established what it looked like earlier.
Scott Cohen as Josh Myers goes on a long tirade at a dinner table with Jessica where he criticizes her in front of a bunch of people. This early scene makes him extremely unlikable and his image never recovers after this point. Josh is supposed to be more sympathetic. The comedy scene with all the papers is particularly bizarre. It’s treating our protagonist as a stereotypical nerdy girl. She was more fleshed out before, being nerdy, but having various other qualities. The several kissing scenes are strange. Many of the jokes in them are so forced, when these scenes should just be romantic.
“You like the penis!” is a terrible line in an intended serious moment, though amusingly the conversation is overheard by an old woman who dawns a disgusted face. The handheld camera is sometimes too sporadic and moves too much, but it occasionally is very effective. When Helen and Jessica argue at one point, the camera is moving a lot because it’s a tense situation.
A little obsessed with these outfits and this picture
SPOILERS
Jessica’s discomfort around many men suggests she’s not that attracted to men. The upbeat music stopped when Jessica was asked to not sit with Helen, which shows the divide in their relationship. I was really curious if Josh was going to catch our two protagonists having sex when they were at Jessica’s mother’s house. It’s some quality suspense. Later, Jessica’s mother asks if she got an invitation and Jessica looks down in shame. Helen has a great shocked look on her face.
When Jessica comes out to her friend, Westfeldt gives a good performance as someone panicked. This scene is another example of a lot of fast dialogue shoved in one moment. It’d be more realistic if the characters were less wordy. Jessica’s mother’s monologue was well acted and well written. It seems like she knows too well about her problem, then there’s the reveal and it leaves the audience very surprised and relieved. Jessica inviting Helen and her family being supportive is very cathartic, as we never knew how they’d feel. Later we get the chuckle-worthy line, “Are you the lesbian?” The ending is foreshadowed a little heavily when at a party, Jessica kisses Josh for a lengthy amount of time.
The ending of Helen leaving Jessica, causing the latter to get back with Josh is pretty controversial. It doesn’t fit the story before it. The main problem with the ending was a lack of foreshadowing, though there was some, and that the whole emotional thrust of the movie was on these two women working it out. The concept of the ending, which seems to be that people can realize they’re bi, but still end up with someone of the opposite gender, is okay. Here, the two leads seem fine once they get over their bump. If the ending was going to work, there should’ve been seeds that Josh was really what Jessica needed and Helen wasn’t and not frame the lesbian relationship as satisfying and fulfilling.
Josh seemed antagonistic, with us at one point thinking he was going to fire Jessica. Thus, him being her real love interest is jarring. Scenes like Jessica’s mom affirming her daughter’s sexuality are so powerful for how it builds on and puts importance in the relationship between Jessica and Helen. Why not cut this moment if they were just going to break up later? This plays into how this ending is weird structurally. The main tension is relieved with the mom revealing her support, then another is created right around the end. “Jessica finds love, figures out how to accept what that means in her reasonably intolerant mindset, and then she just loses it for something that didn’t even seem like it would work.” Jessica and Josh already dated and broke up before the movie started.
The ending feels like a series of vignettes, with us getting a bullet point look at how Jessica and Helen part and then move on, with little breathing room. At one point, Jessica said Helen wanted to be with someone “A little more gay.” That line makes Jessica feel clueless, like she can’t grasp what Helen really wanted in a relationship and boiled it down to her being gay. A way to make this breakup work a little better is to take an element of the story that was underemphasized, Jessica’s love of art. Maybe there’s some way Josh was able to support that or at least her breakup made Jessica realize something about her art? Maybe she was putting off working on art because of her relationship, then got back to it when she needed something to keep her mind off Helen?
Admittedly, Josh’s presence throughout the film doesn’t make a lot of sense here unless he’s going to ultimately have some big role, which could probably be guessed to be him ending up with Jessica. If Helen had been a man, it’d be a lot more predictable Jessica would go back to Josh, as this movie’s attempt to seem daringly progressive made that not seem so likely.
OVERVIEW
The movie was okay for the most part, at least those looking for a light lesbian romance flick that feels a lot like most other romance flicks. The ending is so bad that it really sinks the graces the film had set up. Especially for those that like the comedy, you could theoretically edit out the ending and the few bits of short foreshadowing and have a better experience. “What do you do to be happy?” “Nothing, I’m not!”
Harry Langdon is yet another black and white comedian that missed my radar when I was discovering a lot of the greats. The one and only Langdon film I’ve seen is Three’s a Crowd in 2019. After learning of ‘queer’ themes in his next film, The Chaser, it became too intriguing to turn down. There’s an interesting article giving its own take on the film called The Trans* Fantasy in Harry Langdon’s The Chaser, written by Sabrina Sonner, which further intrigued me to this story. Langdon’s character is both disarmingly innocent and simple, while having layers underneath. He also plays well enough as a silent clown that does silly things, a uniformity of essentially all these types of comedies. Not a quality of them all is the little ways Langdon can give deeper emotions to his role. After the proper story has started and Harry is clad in a dress, he runs up the stairs while hiking up the outfit. He runs with a youthful drive to manage with what’s going on and solve the stairs in his own way. Most would just go up the stairs normally. When he’s upset later, he jumps up and down with a face of not knowing how to understand the situation, while his distress shines to the surface. We even learn of this character just by how still he sits, like he is a nervous child.
Langdon is great at directing. The lighting captures the tone of a given scene. Many here are damp and moody, so as to suggest the issue at hand. The camera can stare at a character like it’s digging into their soul. Some of those long takes and dry angles can make us feel like we’re trapped in a distressed person’s head. After a scene in court, we learn that something strange was ruled by the judge, with excellent buildup to what the ruling was… that Harry and his wife need to swap their gender roles for a while. The film has generally good editing, but occasional moments that look poor; as if the movie had to be rushed. At one point, all the food in Harry’s skirt disappears after a cut.
Gladys McConnell, Harry’s wife, is also a great actor, despite her limited screen time. Take the scene of her crying or her “acting like a man”, telling Harry to make her eggs. It’d be worthwhile to see more of how her character thinks and feels. She never minds or complains about acting masculine. Assuming she likes it, let’s see her enjoying herself more clearly. If she doesn’t, let’s get some of that. Confusingly, the wife never wears pants. Perhaps the reason she doesn’t is that it might seem too much like a challenge of power. Didn’t want it to seem like that’s something they should be allowed to wear. A man in a dress on the other hand is considered more silly. Harry’s wife is very stylish in the film, while he isn’t.
The first forty minutes follow Harry’s confrontation with his gender-problem, which is very compelling with a lot of sharp scenes. It’s such a shame that the last twenty minutes see a change from this. There’s an unrelated comedy sequence that feels like it was lifted from a one-reel short and thrown in. To top it off, a friend of Harry’s is introduced suddenly when he easily could’ve been included earlier. There’s also a little plot point related to the judge that has no payoff. Why include it? Afterwards there’s a section that is reminiscent of experimental films. This ending third being so out of place and strange suggests it really does have a place, it’s just under the surface. Still, the sacrifice of the story in the first two-thirds is so frustrating that the film can be a disappointment. There was so much that could’ve happened.
SPOILERS
In the beginning, Harry gets home late, so his wife and mother-in-law incorrectly believe he was having an affair with other women. His typical quiet and nervous nature makes him look guilty. The mother-in-law is so furious that she tries to shoot him. She has the line, “I’ll show you how to run around after wine, women and blondes!-” After the duo swap roles, Harry doesn’t initially seem to mind much, just trying to do what he has to. He doesn’t appear to like it, but can easily cope. His wife is far more confident, seeming to really enjoy being assertive. The duo don’t wear their familiar clothes even when no one is around to see them. Even though arguably there was no chance to, a scene of them more expressly hating this would make sense in a story that doesn’t want to challenge 1920s ideals and such a scene easily could’ve been included. They do ultimately change back, but because of outside factors.
One man, who Harry seemingly doesn’t know well, calls Harry madame and his wife his husband. He is explicitly shown to be attracted to Harry. Two other men also have romantic attraction to Harry. Harry is horrified by this and the unwanted kiss of one. In the finest scene of the whole picture, Harry looks at himself in the mirror. While the character is usually timid, here he looks angry and calls himself a sissy, not targeting the man who sexually harassed him, but himself. The lighting is dark and a little angular, as if depicting something scary, yet it’s just normal Harry; which shows how he feels. He possibly thinks he’s gay just for receiving a kiss from a man and can’t handle such a thing, not being able to handle the perception that would afflict him. From here, he seems to more mind his new feminine role. That does introduce a plot hole of why he wouldn’t just take the jail sentence instead of the gender punishment.
From this point on, the film becomes more absurdist and strange. Harry decides to kill himself. He commits to it, but circumstance saves him. It’s a little silly he would rather die than take the jail sentence, which suggests this is supposed to be a ridiculous way to solve the problem. You could say he wanted to die because of being gay, but it still comes off as too sudden. There should be more of him hating the situation first. Harry writes a letter to his wife, whom he mistakenly calls his husband, but he crosses it out and writes “wife”. To contrast, his wife never calls him her wife. After McConnell stretches her acting chops by crying and Harry is shown to be missing, one of the wife’s friend says after seeing her friend find her husband’s suicide note, “Well, goodnight, dearie – we’ve had a lovely evening!”
Probably the most complicated scene of the whole film is when Harry is kissed by a milkman and doesn’t seem to mind. He doesn’t in any way show a dislike of the kiss, though he didn’t ask for it. Based on how Harry was positioned, he was arguably expecting it and fine with it happening. This isn’t directly acknowledged in the story. The milkman also never appears before or after. Right after, Harry’s friend, Bud, shows up and says, “Take off those skirts! Be a man before your voice changes.” After this, we move to Harry wearing pants and the main plot being kind of dropped. Arguably Harry here is consciously rejecting the kiss that just happened by dressing male. It’s worth noting that he dressed male because he was told to. The movie unfortunately has this weird golf sequence near the end and only returns to the main plot briefly. Will Harry act like how the judge hoped he would after the film? Is there a poignant lack of resolution? Does Harry have to challenge himself or his life? No. The movie just doesn’t tie that up! At least not unless you take certain interpretations from what happens in the last third.
Bud breaking golf sticks could be intended to portray a very aggressively manly man. He’s firing off a lot of self-destructive anger. He later is with a bunch of women and fits in, as if he is a man that knows how to “treat a woman”. When the two find the group of women, the movie becomes much slower for this segment. We get surrealist static shots of Harry and characters moving slowly. Two women he kisses and/or embraces fall ill afterwards. The sickliness and slow pace is like the movie is dying. The scene is so moody and lacking in humor that it suggests some experimental edge to Langdon, like he wanted to intricately portray something, but what doesn’t come across. The lack of stronger things to infer could suggest he didn’t know how to make such a film properly.
Because of Harry being blamed for the women getting sick, the two men have to leave. After an accident, Harry in the car flies down a hill. Him going down it takes a while, but it wasn’t shown to be so long earlier. The car crashes and Harry flies into his house, a bucket of white powder that sadly wasn’t established earlier falls on him. Harry not dying from that could suggest this movie isn’t trying to tackle realism. That’s such a goofy moment that feels out of place from the initial serious comedy and later surreal sequence, though fits reasonably well with the golf portion. There could’ve been more value to the golf sequence or him falling down a steep hill. He could try and perhaps fail to act masculine or feminine, proving some kind of point. That’s not to say he had to act differently, but it could’ve made those sequences matter more in an on-the-surface way.
While probably not, there could be a sexual meaning to certain moments. Harry accepts a kiss from the milkman, but rejects it from someone that sold him items for a baby; Harry hands golf clubs to Bud, who then angrily breaks the phallic-shaped objects; women Harry kisses fall unconscious, with him not kissing his wife at the end of the film; and Harry falling into white powder at the end. All these could suggest that Harry likes receiving male affection and doesn’t fit in with women. The clubs could suggest his friend rejecting homosexuality and finding comfort with women. Harry wants to do the same but it just doesn’t work out for him. Harry handing the clubs to Bud could represent Harry making or wanting to make an advance on him, which is turned down.
Harry does some unlikable things, like kiss a woman without consent. The movie doesn’t “reward” him or clearly state he’s in the wrong. There’s an unreal feeling to how he’s depicted, sometimes childlike and sometimes broken. Based on scenes like Harry calling himself a sissy and being unable to handle his emotions, the film could be about his character confronting his homosexuality, transsexuality, or gender non conforming behavior. The film is like a dream a child might have, specifically a misogynistic one. Harry is an average married man who is accused of doing something ‘adult’ that the child may not understand. Based on how Harry didn’t do such a thing and was just watching a party, you could imagine a child thinking sex might be done by going to a party and cheating by doing that when you’re not supposed to be there.
The child then thinks he’s queer because another man kissed him and is afraid of that. When he is “treated like a woman”, he can’t handle it and tries to kill himself, with him escaping death by absurdist circumstances. The suicide could represent the extreme places a dream can go. Him referring to his wife as his husband could mean he liked the idea of having a husband, but was able to not really address that. If he liked being kissed by men, that’d be harder to push aside. Given that he does really like kissing men, his guard can be later down and can enjoy the milkman’s kiss. The golf sequence matches how dreams can diverge into something only loosely related to what came before, with some hints like Harry’s friend being very masculine and breaking the golf clubs. It also served as a distraction from Harry with the milkman. The male-attraction does creep back in. If Harry likes being alone with a man, but doesn’t want to like it, he could queue in what else but a group of women?
Harry kissing the women represents him finally actually doing the cheating, possibly because he thinks it’ll make him “a real man to just take any woman he wants”, though it doesn’t work. Him kissing women doesn’t fit him, when he tries they go sick. Harry arguably accepts his femininity when after he golfed and “acted like a man”, he crashed into his house into some powder. That incident realistically should’ve killed someone. The powder making him look like a ghost could mean that he did die, except only this need to be masculine did. What’s left is a happy ending of him in that dress and the person in his life he loves not appearing to mind. Their bond is now stronger due to self acceptance. Due to the film demonstrating that gender roles are only as valid as we humans want them to be, the return of the opening title card, “In the beginning, God created man in his own image and likeness. A little later on, he created woman.” at the end could be considered ironic due to the film challenging gender roles. Also, the car crashing through billboards can signify that these sorts of “gender crises” are unnecessary and started by culture and social expectations hitting people in the head.
On the other hand, the women Harry kisses becoming ill could also represent his internal rejection of his feminine leanings, not his heterosexual. The brain wants to “kill the femininity.” Harry getting away with kissing a woman without consent and getting in a dangerous stunt that he makes it out of okay suggests that this aggressive behavior is fine to him. He acts like, “I’m such a man that I can do unsafe things and be fine afterwards!” Despite this, Harry doesn’t act too differently for a lot of the runtime, with him not embracing or rejecting any part of himself or acting differently. He rejects what others label onto him, like “woman”. That could mean he’s unwilling to consider femininity or he is still a valid man even if society doesn’t consider him to be one. At least from a simplistic view, the worst thing that could befall someone like this would be for society to just decide he’s a woman. It doesn’t have to make sense or be true, he just is. He takes it better than you might expect from someone with “toxic” traits.
Harry being in the incident that should’ve killed him and then the powder in the dress means that what is supposed to die is him accepting his femininity. Him in embrace with his wife could mean running to those gender roles and not allowing himself to consider being gay, with the end title card referring to Christianity, which especially in 1928 wouldn’t accept gender divergence. Harry and his wife’s relationship not being healthy is suggested by the reason they reconnect after their rough patch being that she thought he killed himself. That’s not anything inherent to him as a person. She was just afraid of losing him. That can ignite good times, but their actual issues aren’t solved. That would suggest that what Harry really needs is to reject being hyper masculine, but he won’t.
Harry is not good at being a typical male or even a typical female. No matter what he wants to be, his friends want him to be, or society wants him to be, he has qualities of both. The different interpretations could suggest that he is hard to be “boxed into” an identity or that it will take a lot of work to accept himself as something, whether it be a masculine straight man or not. Instead he is more complex. Maybe he’s not gay, but bisexual; or he’s transgender but still loves and wants to be with his wife? Maybe he’s a straight man that likes wearing dresses? The film portraying Harry and especially his wife as comfortable with having elements of both shows this complexity and could hopefully mean that the intended message is that you should be allowed to explore yourself and dress how you like.
OVERVIEW
The Chaser is a film probably everyone interested in silent films, experimental films, queer films, and maybe, maybe films in general should watch. It not focusing much on its original and great, great premise to go with a loosely related segment that could be its own film is a tragedy. The “heightened realism” earlier scenes have is phenomenal. With both this film and Langdon’s previous directed feature, Three’s a Crowd, they have segments that feel out of place and like filler. Certain scenes don’t make much sense or aren’t comedic. Thus, they are ripe for analysis and are great films for thinking about. In a different time, Langdon could’ve been popular with fans of experimental films or if his stories were more fleshed out he could be more popular with silent film fans of the now. Due to the “messy” movie we have to watch, it can’t be recommended on the basis of wanting a good story, but there is more to it if you’re willing to give it a chance.
The Children’s Hour is an entrancing film. The excellent performances by the two lead actors create an experience both riveting and depressing. Shirley MacLaine as Martha Dobie carries an angst in every scene. She wants the best for everyone and feels a sense of distress from the constant influx of forces fighting her. Whenever things go for the worst, she has a drowning look on her face. There’s so much despair and despite her best attempt to keep herself, she knows she must go with the whims of reality. Karen Wright, played by Audrey Hepburn, is dealt many of the same blows as Martha. There’s a great look of confusion on her face which pops up. Both protagonists are portrayed as fairly honest and kindhearted people thrust into a bizarre and unexpected situation. Martha is more likely to boil over in anger while Karen tries harder to maintain composure, though she doesn’t always succeed. You’d think they would know the characters very well, but they weren’t in the play the film is based on. Karen and Martha have a strong bond with many moments of connecting. Their motivation for their actions is often to protect the other.
It’s all too easy to be taken in by the captivating sense of danger and anxiety that MacLaine and Hepburn expertly portray. The side cast, however, are also very good. James Garner is Dr. Joseph “Joe” Cardin. He’s a principled working man. He is cut from an early 60s cloth and is fine with that. He takes a protective role over Martha and Karen as things go badly. His face and tone of voice reveal how confused and sometimes lost he is, though often he’s quick to find solutions and act as if he knows what to do. Karen Balkin is Mary Tilford, a devilish and mischievous little girl who is determined to have her way. She’ll change her mannerisms and act differently as a façade to as strongly as possible get her way. During one scene, she pieces together a lie as she goes, building off of the other character’s reaction to make her tale more believable or disturbing or cruel. There’s several children in the movie. Most get little to do, though even their stray few lines or moment to shine are handled well. They’re kids who gossip, get upset, and have a lack of agency in their lives. The children behave as you’d expect children to. Miriam Hopkins is Lily Mortar, Martha’s egotistical aunt who is often difficult. She has good moments of conflict with her niece. Fay Bainter is Mrs. Tilford, Mary’s grandmother. She is impulsive and difficult, though everything she does she thinks is for the best. While she is in a sense an antagonist, it’s not out of hatefulness. Throughout the film she has great startled or concerned faces.
This film is based on a play from the 1930s. Despite the play being set in the 30s, this adaptation is set in the 60s. This can be gathered from the clothes and hairstyles being very 60s and certain things on the walls not existing in the 30s (such as a poster of Steve Lawrence). Karen and Martha act like reasonably conservative 60s ladies, very unassuming in nature.
The storyline is very enticing throughout. There’s constantly something happening to stress out or at least change the characters. An unfortunate exception is that one entire sequence was cut from the middle of the film, with us going straight from before it to its aftermath. Time jumps are often bad as it’s good to keep up with characters, here is no exception. The characters are now suddenly in a different state of mind. Seeing that change would be really interesting. Clearly someone thought it was important as that missing segment was filmed, but then cut. That, as well as various deleted scenes throughout the film, sound very enticing based on what is known about them. It’d be great for them to be put back in the movie, but they may be lost and/or no one thinks it’s worth the trouble. The score gives a stronger dramatic weight to the events in the film, especially a very strong violin which intensely plays when things get heated. Certain scenes can have an added sense of uncomfortableness due to how unsettling the music queues are.
SPOILERS
When Mary is talking to another girl, she tells Mary that someone said that Martha didn’t want anyone to ever fall in love with Karen and that was “unnatural”. Mary seems disturbed by this. On top of Balkin’s dramatic facial expression, the music gives insight on how she’s taking that information. Another great use of the violin score is used in the scene where Mary tells her grandma of things she has heard about Karen and Martha, piecing together her story based on how her grandma reacts. She whispers the worst bit as Mrs. Tilford begins to believe her. It was probably something too graphic for a 1960s film. Who knows? Mrs. Tilford goes to the school for answers. Martha tells Lily Mortar she has to leave because she’s too much trouble. As she leaves, she runs into Mrs. Tilford and rants about Martha, not knowing what Mrs. Tilford is thinking. “She has no interest in them [dating men], only the school… and Karen Wright.” That excellent score shoots up as the camera shows Tilford’s disturbed face. She is now convinced that the two were together.
We see Karen and Martha panic over all of the parents of the children coming and taking their kids away. The two dissolve over what is making the kids leave. When they find out, they go to Mrs. Tilford and there’s a bit of a showdown between Mrs. Tilford and Karen, Martha, and Joe. The characters go through a lot of states here. Joe is bewildered but still seems confident in the claim being false. The sides argue it out, though Tilford reluctantly. There’s a battle of emotions by people who generally act very proper, making them vulnerable. Eventually, they get Mrs. Tilford to doubt Mary. The film doesn’t want to make Mrs. Tilford a villain. It would be very human for her to be so headstrong that she refuses to entertain that she’s wrong, though she does. Mary is brought into the action and emotionally manipulates a fellow student to corroborate her story. While this scene is very suspenseful, it’s weird how the adults were yelling at/around the children.
The film turns into a constant series of blows against Karen and Martha. They go to trial with Mrs. Tilford and lose, that only being the second big one after the kids leaving. Joe tries to get them to leave for a new life. We see his honest and caring nature here. He just wants the best, emphasized by a heartfelt monologue, “We could sit around the rest of our lives and live on that trouble and we’d get to where we’d have nothing else, because we wanted nothing else.” Joe’s notion of “pushing forward” is challenged when Karen convinces him to ask the question she knows is on his mind and he does, Were Martha and Karen even together? Joe felt like a fool after asking, all his ideas of what he is supposed to be began to disintegrate. Karen didn’t think things could ever be the same and now that he doubts that she wasn’t with Martha, she can’t let their relationship go on. Her ending the relationship has come under some discussion, as to why she really wanted to end it.
DISCUSSION OF THE ENDING (WITH SPOILERS FOR THE FILM AND THE PLAY)
Karen tells Martha about her ending things with Joe. Martha is really upset about her doing that, saying she wanted it for them, despite her seeming to not like the relationship before. Martha is afraid suddenly, causing her and Karen to lose their cool about what to do. Martha asks Karen to go back to Joe and she refuses. Karen says they should go somewhere and Martha says people will know about them. Karen replies that other people accused of being gay weren’t destroyed by it. One of the most defining moments of Martha comes when she says that the difference is that they chose it for themselves, unlike her and Karen. She rambles about how they’ve only loved each other like friends. Karen, likely realizing that this is a weird thing to go on about, asks why she is. Martha looks away and says, “Because I do love you.”
Perhaps the most famous part of the film is when a broken Martha confesses her romantic feelings to Karen. Karen tries to make excuses for why Karen is acting like this, saying she is tired or that Mary made it up, but Martha clarifies that “Maybe I’ve wanted you all these years.” Martha has learned about these feelings more recently than when they met. It can be difficult to describe something when no one ever talks about it. There’s just a feeling of weirdness. Holding it in is incredibly uncomfortable, which is why when Martha comes out to Karen, she can’t really stop herself or be composed. There’s so much pressure just now being released. Karen even tries to leave, but Martha says she has to tell her. There’s foreshadowing to this moment in the film. Whenever the claim of them being lovers is brought up, Karen is always a little more dumbfounded and confused than Martha, because Martha knows of its “hint of truth”. When someone comes in to drop off food, he stares at them and Martha says, “I’ve got eight fingers, see? And two heads! I’m a freak!” sarcastically, though this could be seen as a reflection of her feelings, she feels like a freak. As mentioned, Martha didn’t like that Karen was to marry Joe. Deleted scenes featured little moments like hair brushing and other nuggets specifically made to be foreshadowing.
Mrs. Tilford returns and says that Mary has confessed and she wants to make things right by paying Karen and Martha in addition to a public retraction. Karen says that she wants to pay them so she can “rest her head again” and she shouldn’t, this being the only time Karen is vindictive. In fact, she’s normally the opposite. Mrs. Tilford says she wants help in knowing how to make things right. Martha says, “Help you?” and laughs, probably thinking that she needs help, not Tilford. Martha goes to her bedroom and Karen follows her. The curiosity of how Karen will respond to Martha’s confession is revealed when she says something unexpected, “I’m going away someplace to begin again. Will you come with me?” I expected the line to end with the first sentence, with the implication being that she was not interested in staying with Martha. That second line gives a lot on how she feels, despite how little is said. Martha says they can talk after she’s rested, Karen goes on a walk, Martha looks at Karen through the window with teary eyes, Lily tells Karen that Martha’s door is locked, dramatic music plays as Karen breaks into Martha’s door while screaming her name, and gets in only to discover that she’s hung herself.
There’s a transition to Martha’s funeral. Karen says, “The Lord bless you and keep you and make his face to shine upon you and give you peace. Both now and evermore. Goodbye, Martha. I’ll miss you with all my heart.” and walks off, ignoring all the other characters in the film, who are there. The final shot is her walking off, briefly looking up, then back forward.
Martha’s death was very heart wrenching. She didn’t have the chance to feel comfortable with herself or see things go right for her. Karen is now alone and left to contemplate what to do with her life without her friend but with the knowledge about her. Should she share it? That could make them look bad, but keeping it to herself might also hurt her emotionally. She’ll have most of a lifetime to consider what that knowledge is and means. Martha’s own self-hatred boiled over and now that she can’t go back to how things were before, it would be easier for her to just end it all. This film serves as a time capsule of a time when there was so little discussion of homosexuality that people might either think they’re the only one and/or that it’s an illness and they’re bad for having it, though society could always return to that point. The 2022 Florida “Don’t Say Gay” bill should be proof of that, though hopefully one day it will be so far in the past that no one will understand this sentence. There should always be an understanding of what has and could happen even upon the failure of that specific bill.
It’s chilling that in-universe, Martha may never be understood or appreciated, with her chilling revelation being an ever more distant memory in Karen’s mind. While it’s possible the film was punishing Martha for being gay by killing her, she is portrayed as a good person in the story. It can be assumed that none of the characters other than Karen know of her sexuality, so the only character that knows her secret wishes the lord to bless her and will always miss her. Due to Martha being portrayed sympathetic, it seems probable that the film was intended to be pro-gay. It’s a potent irony that due to homosexuality being considered immoral, the solution in many gay books and films was for the gay characters to die for morality to be kept, in a sense saying that gay characters dying is okay as they do something wrong by existing. Martha’s comment about how they “didn’t choose it unlike the other people” suggests that she’s drawing lines in her head to justify her to herself. I might have unnatural feelings, but at least I didn’t act on them. Even that level of trying to hide your feelings isn’t good enough to the “bury your gays” trope. If this film is pro-gay, it still has to conform to a trope that is utilized so much. A gay person, especially a teen or young adult, watching this movie in 1961 might feel like they’re being told that suffering and maybe death are the only options. The film is irresponsible for that, though it still can be appreciated for what it does right. It’s understood that the movie couldn’t get much more pro-gay without getting called out for it.
Some have felt that Karen developed romantic feelings for Martha in the film. On the surface, Karen is shown to be completely straight, possibly to justify her not dying at the end, she wants to be what women of the time were expected to be, married mothers, even to the point of agreeing to marry a man she probably didn’t love. Karen and Joe don’t commit until the beginning of the film. She only agrees to marry him if they can have a kid as soon as possible. Karen is in love with the idea of being a wife and mother. Joe is willing and able to supply that, but Karen doesn’t show an actual interest in him as a person. When he says they’ll have to wait a while to have a kid near the end of the film, she breaks things off, though that isn’t the only reason. This could be a sign of her catching feelings for Martha. If her priority was really to have children as soon as possible, she’d stay with Joe. It would be difficult to find a man that’s interested in her so quickly. Perhaps that was an excuse on her part to get Joe away. She’s baffled at Martha’s confession a little later, but this earlier scene could show unconscious feelings. It at least demonstrates her turning away from the traditional gender roles she initially accepted.
Karen asking Martha to go with her could mean she is willing to explore a romantic relationship with Martha because if not, why would this line be in the film? What point does this scene serve otherwise? Karen would also understand that Martha’s confession would be on her mind, so the next thing she said should be an answer to how she feels about it. Karen’s look on her face as she leaves Martha to sleep is very loving, as if she’s excited to progress forward with this person that’s so special and beautiful to her. When Karen goes on the walk, she takes Martha’s coat, perhaps to symbolize that they’re one in her eyes. It would be too quick to declare that Karen had feelings for Martha, especially before Martha’s coming out, though it would not be hard to believe that she was finding those feelings or something she didn’t understand and was willing to explore them. Karen cares about Martha and wants things to be well for them more than anything else. Their many moments of being together, fighting together, peacefully talking to each other are not too unlike what you might see from a romantic couple in a movie.
Another arguably queer part of Karen is that she hasn’t been shown to love men. Her interest in Joe only extended to him being able to give her children. The sort of things that go against Karen liking Martha are things like her not explicitly saying it or her shocked look when Martha first reveals her feelings, though these can be explained away. There’s also no point where there is no conceivable way to take a platonic reading of their relationship, though that interpretation often isn’t as apparent as a homosexual one.
In the play, Karen asks Martha to leave with her before Martha comes out. When Martha does, Karen is callous about what she was told by her best friend. After the confession, Martha immediately kills herself. Lily is frantic at her death, but Karen doesn’t seem to care. Mrs. Tilford comes by to tell her that she knows the whole thing was a lie. Karen is aggressive to her and mentions Martha’s death only to make her feel bad. There is no funeral scene or scene where Karen shows compassion to her colleague that just committed suicide. This could be a sign that film Karen is supposed to be queer. It would be socially acceptable in 1961 for Karen to be cold to Martha, but things were still added, removed, or moved around to make Karen and the film more sympathetic to Martha.
The scandal almost gave Martha a happy ending. If it wasn’t for the scandal, Martha might not have revealed her feelings to Karen or even figured out she had them. She wouldn’t have been offered money from Mrs. Tilford and Karen would be married. Plenty of fanfiction on the film keeps Martha alive and has her end up with Karen. If the film was released in a time when homosexuality was frowned upon, but not so badly that gays had to die at the end, would Martha have killed herself? What would’ve happened in the ending? If the film ended with Martha and Karen restarting their school or running off together, a lot of people would probably interpret that queerly.
Seeing as Martha’s suicide was right after Karen undoubtedly showed an acceptance of her, it could be taken that Martha’s self hatred was so strong that she didn’t want to confront her homosexual feelings being explored, which maybe she realized could happen with Karen, which just makes the character’s death all the more depressing. My brain couldn’t take that, I wanted things to be made right. Martha spent the duration of the film, months, and possibly longer hating herself and building up a fragile mental support that everything was okay, making justifications like, “We never actually did anything”, and when that was challenged, she disintegrated and couldn’t handle life. This is a very real thing that people go through and it’s not hard to believe that real people might’ve had the same fate.
The film ends with Karen giving a look of contemplation as she walks off. There are several interpretations that could be made, but one that seems likely is that she is going to try to do something about the bigotry she experienced. It resulted in her best friend losing her life. She doesn’t focus on anyone else, ignoring the other characters. She might see entertaining them as getting stuck in the past, which Joe suggested avoiding, and they are best left away from her. A gayer interpretation is that Karen is leaving behind the claustrophobic life that bred hate and is going to find acceptance for others and maybe herself. She’s leaving behind the gender roles she once was going to fall headfirst in and embrace the nuances Martha exposed her to.
It’s good that Martha was made gay, because if she wasn’t then the film would have a veneer of, “Isn’t it so unfortunate when homophobia affects straight people?” Now, the film actually is looking at the horrors of homophobia more directly. There is a vibe of the former takeaway, especially because conservatives might not like that a straight couple was prevented from having children, but the film overall feels more about tackling the latter matter.
It could be considered a biting social critique that such a little lie from Mary would cause so much to disintegrate, that both of the protagonist’s lives would be so thrown into chaos. It’s a message worth being handed to viewers who may very well think homosexuality is sinful, though if the critique is intended, it doesn’t hit hard enough. The film’s generally pro-gay message probably did more good than bad, especially in a more modern time when people can watch this film with other movies with happier endings or deeper discussions. It’s just a shame The Children’s Hour entertains the prejudice view to any extent.
Noted for the sake of novelty is that some websites list this film as a romance. The Karen-Joe romance doesn’t go anywhere, so it’s probably talking about Karen and Martha!
OVERVIEW
Apparently there’s going to be a tv show adaptation. It wouldn’t be surprising if it was just the same story over a few episodes but hopefully the elements tackled in the ending could get a more thorough depiction now that audiences are more tolerant of that being discussed. It’d also be nice to see the story continue after this one ends. The show is very tantalizing. The film is very progressive and valuable. It especially is recommended to young queer people, due to it being a good representation of the times, though it’s important to watch it with other queer movies that are more modern. Even for those not interested in that aspect, the acting and drama are top notch and fans of either would be pleased.
Recently I discovered an important figure in the LGBT, specifically Lesbian, community, Edythe Eyde. Many who know of her know her as “Lisa Ben”. This is quite possibly my favorite thing ever. Dumb puns are my oxygen. She has been involved in two films, both as someone providing music for them. The first of which is Before Stonewall. Those wanting a lot of Lisa will be disappointed, but those wanting a lot of Lesbians won’t be. This film is a fascinating study of gay people from a time many alive now aren’t familiar with or at least struggle to comprehend.
Various people give their stories of being gay in a world that doesn’t appreciate that. It’s great seeing these people progress and discuss the changing tides. The film’s structure is like many non-documentary films. Here, the underknown group of people scratch at the surface of public knowledge until it breaks. They then start growing their roots, very slowly. However, there’s various points where progress moves forward, then it moves back due to some problem. The lens of people’s stories can get you into the stress and reward of it all from a human perspective. You’re glad when these people are glad. This film is especially moving as these people are real. The film’s approximating how these individuals lived and they covered numerous topics related to that. This is emphasized by scenes of these people having a life or relaxing. These scenes show their humanity.
Several amusing clips of movies and songs were utilized. It was fun trying to spot them. Gay life was portrayed to varying degrees in films like, A Florida Enchantment (1914), Different from the Others (1919), and The Wizard of Oz (1939). One can come to realize that these films are an important avenue in how gay people were represented. Many of these clips played near the beginning of this film and they get the audience to understand and feel the world we’re in. Media is a big reflection of culture. Culture has its ups and downs. Gay people aren’t always portrayed negatively but often they are. These clips show a clash of ideas in how various people perceive Homosexuality. Another interesting portrayal of gay people is when one guy says, “I had a size advantage when I was very young, and the fact that I had an aunt, Kate, and an uncle, Vince, who were both gay.” This line, which is from the beginning of the film, show that gay people will still get in straight relationships due to pressure and will still encourage the younger generation. It also shows that being in a straight relationship doesn’t get rid of one’s Homosexual tendencies.
Everyone is painted in a very human light. There’s many ties to other civil rights movements, mainly black civil rights. This leads to a feeling of community. The end of the film is very uplifting. Several people from the film reunite and catch up. There’s tons of catharsis to seeing them just be able to live a little and not using any methods to hide their sexuality. The film paints a picture between when Homosexuals were being slandered as Communists in the 1940s and the contemporary 1980s. The film ends with lots of optimism for the future. One point of interest is that one woman that is interviewed is filmed in darkness so she couldn’t be seen. This shows that this time isn’t as progressive as one might hope as she doesn’t want to be shown. Another point was when two black women discussed how they feel that they were somewhat marginalized among other Lesbians, as if there’s a racial component. This brings up memories of The Watermelon Woman (1996) which is about black Lesbians and one of the older ones in that film mentions that they only have each other.
There’s several elements of note here. For starters, gay marriage is never brought up. I was expecting someone at the end to say, “We’re so close to equality, but we’re waiting on marriage!” You’d think that’d be on their minds. Perhaps it wasn’t what the filmmakers wanted to focus on. Secondly, Stonewall was barely mentioned, as well as goings on after 1969, when Stonewall happened. Once Stonewall is mentioned briefly, the film is basically over. This does work here, as this is about the story of “the past”. The film leaves on the note that this is the end of this story, but the beginning of the story for younger people.
Thirdly, some have criticized the film for not discussing Transgender people, who were instrumental to Stonewall. While I understand that people might not like the lack of representation, this isn’t a story about Stonewall or the Trans story. While Trans people are an important part of LGBT history, the film is about the perception and mindset of Homosexuals. Anyone in the interview that I could find info on was Homosexual and not Bisexual with the exception of one Heterosexual who did a lot of research into Homosexuality. Point being that any gender non-conforming person was excluded other than Homosexuals. This lack of mention didn’t personally bother as the film so well painted this very particular tale. Lastly, it would’ve been interesting to see a discussion of gay pornography. That’s a very intimate thing that might out someone at the time. Videographic pornography (including Homosexual porn) has been around since give or take the 1920s. By 1984, gay porn was relatively normal, with Lesbian sex often portrayed in porn for straight men, who are the biggest demographic for porn. Someone interviewed for this film might have had an interesting thought on the subject. Did they watch that stuff in their youth? How’d they hide it? This isn’t a slight against this film as it’s simply “Not porn’s story”, but it was something that entered my mind.
OVERVIEW
Before Stonewall effortlessly shows life before “the modern era” of gay rights activism. It’s a humble and human tale of perseverance and what humans can do if they put their minds and hearts to something. The film ends on a very comforting note with a Lisa Ben song which discusses how being gay is a good thing and not something to be ashamed of. It kept me and hopefully many others optimistic about positive changes in the future.
Ambition, outsider perspective, and low budget pop art are all jacked up to eleven in The Watermelon Woman. A young, black, lesbian filmmaker who wants to make something meaningful makes a film about a young, black, lesbian filmmaker who wants to make something meaningful. This has all the hallmarks of baby filmmaker’s making their statement. The setting is the modern day, the footage is filmed on the streets and in little houses as that’s what can be afforded. The same person writes, directs, and features in the film in question and the film is, to a degree, biographical about that person. You see this stuff in My Best Friend’s Birthday, you see it in Clerks. This film is especially like Clerks. Both feature characters who work in a video store. Both feature characters in frayed relationships with girls. This film can almost be called “black lesbian Clerks”.
Our main character is Cheryl Dunye, played by Cheryl Dunye. She mirrors a lot of filmmakers. She’s desperate for ideas for films and hates working at crappy, low end jobs. She discovers a film from the 1930s with a beautiful, black woman in it. She wants to learn more about her. The Watermelon Woman’s plot follows Cheryl trying to learn more about this mysterious girl. The plot is great. Cheryl learns info about the girl one step at a time. Like any good mystery, there’s no large info dump at once. That makes sense as the only available sources give very little info as no one bothered to compile info on her before.
We see excerpts of 1930s films that were actually filmed in the 90s and made to look like the 30s. The first clip we see perfectly parodies cheesy, dramatic moments from those movies and looks convincingly from that period. The next one is obviously from the 90s, with the sound quality, camera quality, and framing clearly contemporary. There are some strange choices, like a scene featuring a confrontation with the police which doesn’t seem to add anything to the narrative, though it is likely here to depict how black people are treated by police to make a point. There’s many other little bits of superfluous information, scenes of minor characters like Cheryl’s boss which were presumably supposed to be comedic. They remove from the more serious tone of the film. Some shots cut a little later than they should, which is a common occurrence in many “early films”, including my own.
Cheryl’s friend, Tamara, treats and thinks of white characters negatively. Not only is that aspect irrelevant to the main plot, but it portrays the stereotype of black people (especially women) not liking white people. This film is mostly incredibly good at avoiding and criticizing stereotypes. One of the points of making this film was to challenge stereotypes. “This is how black Lesbians actually are!” Characters mention being gay a lot, especially the black ones, to emphasize the message. In fact, this is the first feature film directed by a black lesbian ever, which gives another layer to the movie as a whole. It’s a shame there’s even a crumb of stereotyping present.
SPOILERS
Cheryl learns more of the black, lesbian experience of old and is ready to move on, demonstrating that each generation has to keep progressing. The ending is simple but effective. Cheryl discusses some changes in her life which give her perspective, like the older characters have. She then shows her film on the titular Watermelon Woman, which is about a minute long. It’s strange that it’d be so short. Perhaps Cheryl’s film project was this whole film, mirroring the fictional Cheryl to the real one.
OVERVIEW
You see a lot of the life of Cheryl and a little less of the various interesting people she meets. A memorable gay sex scene adds to the unapologetic tone and the symbolic revealing of who she is. “I’m a person! This is what I am. This is what I like! This is my life.” It’s a dive in black culture and lesbian culture and perhaps more importantly, black gay culture. Historians of either of those two fields can appreciate The Watermelon Woman for that. Future film historians hopefully and probably will hold this up as an important, brilliant film about life and human nature, like many other films that were appreciated more well after being made. This film lays a groundwork unprecedented. There was such a scarce of information of this history that the movie depicts a fictional 30s black lesbian instead of a real one, because the real ones weren’t written down.
I’m going to end this review like how this film ends…
Manji is really weird and pretty gay. Thank goodness for that! This is one of the most interesting films I’ve had the pleasure to have watched. This movie is so moody. There’s little buildup before jumping into the meat of the plot. It makes sense as thematically, our protagonist is thrown into a weird state suddenly. Sonoko Kakiuchi is our protagonist, played by Kyōko Kishida. She is a pretty interesting and also relatable character. She’s, in a sense, under a trance. Sonoko’s not using her best judgement, but she has an awareness of this. She is good at realizing what people are thinking or doing, though she sometimes isn’t so good at that, as her emotions are often controlling her more than her brain. Mitsuko Tokumitsu, played by Ayako Wakao, is delightfully devilish. It’s often hard to place what she’s really doing. Her exterior is often very sweet, but not always. It’s easy to see how people are interested in her, despite how problematic she is.
The directing is solid. There’s a comfort and mundane quality to it at times, when the director wants everything to be normal. When things get weird, so does the lighting or other qualities. The main way of portraying this is with the actors, who can emote a lot or very little and do a great job of expressing a range of emotions. Sonoko’s husband is Kotaro Kakiuchi. He is level headed and composed, but you can hear his true feelings under his voice or see his true feelings under his face.
The plot, while bonkers, doesn’t go too bonkers to the point of losing the audience’s engagement, though some parts can confuse. “Why did Character X do that?” A common problem in film is when a character needs to think or act one way for the plot to work, but then they need to act in a contradictory fashion. That happens a little here, but these complaints aren’t too big of a deal. A common motif of the film is death. Sometimes its reference doesn’t fit with what’s happening. I was often thinking, “Calm down, this isn’t that big of a deal.” The characters don’t take death very seriously, so perhaps they were being metaphoric. Betrayal is also discussed throughout the film.
It’s fortunate that the Homosexual angles of this film are not emphasized at all. It’s just two people who happen to be the same gender. The film is made more engaging as it’s not focusing on details that aren’t important. If a character said, “Why am I gay??!!”, that would distract from the main plot. The two gay characters are often depicted as carefree and in love. They don’t care about being gay, it’s just how they role and what they do because that’s who they are.
SPOILERS
Rumors are started at an art school that two of its students, Sonoko and Mitsuko, are romantic together. There’s never a reference to them both being women, which was very unexpected and interesting. The concern is that Sonoko is married and Mitsuko is engaged. The two women decide to befriend each other to show everyone who’s boss! Seems strange as everyone already thinks they’re together. Sonoko falls for Mitsuko as they’re together. One particularly striking part of the film is when Sonoko confesses her romantic feelings for Mitsuko. Sonoko pressures Mitsuko to get naked. Most of the film doesn’t depict her as pressuring. Mitsuko is uninterested, but is ultimately persuaded. The two have sex, though the film doesn’t show anything. Is it because it’s gay or because the film just doesn’t want to? Her change in mind is quite jarring. It’s not revealed why she changed her mind, but Mitsuko is portrayed as very manipulative later in the film, so perhaps her resistance was part of that. The filming of this scene is very good. We get good, creative shots from various places in the room. This more thoroughly paints the picture of this situation being a tad odd and frantic as we’re cutting to a lot of angles.
Sonoko greatly concerns her husband by spending almost all of her time with Mitsuko. Kotaro figures out that they’re having a love affair. He doesn’t seem to mind her cheating on him as much as she’s clearly worse off constantly obsessing over someone. His intentions are for her to move on for her own benefit. After being embarrassed by Mitsuko, Sonoko leaves her and seems better off with Kotaro. In a dramatic scene, Kishida overacts a bit when Sonoko tells Kotaro she’ll never see Mitsuko again. Mitsuko’s devilish web pulls Sonoko back in. This is brilliantly done. Mitsuko seems very vulnerable and needing of something small, like friendship, but it’s all to take more. After the two resume their love affair, Mitsuko and Sonoko decide to pretend to overdose on sleeping powder so Kotaro and Mitsuko’s fiancé, Eijirō, will think they died, then the women will runoff together. For whatever reason, they decide to actually take too much sleeping powder, but probably not enough to die. Another of the most striking and disturbing scenes is when the women promise that if one of them actually dies, the other will go with them. There’s a few references to them not leaving each other and killing themselves together.
Sonoko wakes up later to find Mitsuko having sex with Kotaro. We see a little more here than the lesbian scene earlier, perhaps because it’s straight. It was confusing as to why Kotaro did this. According to sources I read, a few chance encounters between Mitsuko and Kotaro made him fall in love with her, but it wasn’t very clear. Why not have the audience get in Kotaro’s head a little whenever he talked to Mitsuko? Why not have a scene of him seeing her and her seeing him and a little click happens? How the film depicts this relationship is very sudden. The scene isn’t done too poorly. Mitsuko has shown an ability to be so tantalizing that nothing can dissuade someone from loving her. Earlier in the film, she complains of pregnancy pain to Sonoko and makes a big scene. She later reveals she wasn’t actually pregnant. Sonoko continued to be on her metaphorical leash.
Kotaro and Sonoko become subservient to Mitsuko. Mitsuko makes them live with her and she treats them like pets. The two understand that they’re being manipulated by her, but they never try to leave. Why? They casually discuss them dying more. Mitsuko is outwardly manipulative at this point. However, a twist comes at the end. The seemingly docile and impotent Eijirō reveals what Sonoko and Kotaro have been doing to the public, killing their social lives and Kotaro’s professional life. Sonoko, Kotaro, and Mitsuko very warmly and positively decide to kill themselves. Sonoko and Kotaro literally treat Mitsuko like a goddess. They seem to have lost their individuality and are tranced by Mitsuko. This is the sum of the whole movie so far. Lots of little moments, such as the “trance” by Mitsuko, is emphasized more here. The filming is stylized. We’re getting shots that show Mitsuko like a goddess. Sonoko and Kotaro act very similarly, as if they lost their personalities and it’s all about Mitsuko.
Mitsuko administers the three of them poison-laced sleeping powder. Sonoko wakes up later, alive and well. She realizes that she was betrayed by the other two. They intentionally didn’t poison her, so she wouldn’t die. Unfortunately, this was spoiled for the audience as Sonoko has been narrating for the whole movie. Why not make the audience think she was talking from a point before the ending or actually have it set before the ending? This was utilized in Forrest Gump. The narration finished up, then there was more movie left and scenes for Forrest to continue the plot. The ending is still effective due to the acting and excellent look of horror on Sonoko’s face. It’s just not as good as it could’ve been. That’s a shame. The ending is better when one thinks about all the mentions of love and death throughout the film. Mitsuko promised Sonoko that if she died, she’d take her with her. One can empathize with Sonoko here.
OVERVIEW
Manji is really weird and very interesting. It’s worth a watch for those that like a mind screw or to feel weird during or after a movie. You’ll think about this one for a bit after watching it, considering every little line or action by a character and how it paid off later. “Was character X always thinking Y?” It’s not a bad movie to rewatch.
The Filme Diary 