Gay-themed cinema
By Irene Lacher Apr 13, 2006
Brokeback Mountain' scored the latest in a series of coups when its
DVD was featured on the home page of eBay`s Half.com Web site prior to
Universal Studios Home Entertainment`s release on Tuesday. That sort
of placement is an honor awarded icons and other temblors on the
pop-culture meter, a status that few in the industry expected the
cowboy romance to achieve before its December opening. But by Oscar
eve, Ang Lee`s elegiac, ill-fated story of love between two handsome
sheepherders had become the film to beat _ and Lionsgate`s 'Crash' did
just that, though Lee took home a directing statuette nonetheless.
The surprising thing was that the gay romance - which won the award
for outstanding film (wide release) at the 17th annual Gay & Lesbian
Alliance Against Defamation Media Awards in New York on March 27 -
resonated so far beyond the Hollywood elite. The buzz permeated
America`s heartland, the same turf where gay-marriage opponents had
been beating the drum on behalf of the religious right. In some
places, audiences didn`t just go to see the movie - they demanded it;
residents of Mason City, Iowa, reportedly went so far as to petition a
local theater to show the film.
'`Brokeback` isn`t a hit movie,' says producer Craig Zadan, who
executive produced 2002`s 'Chicago' with his partner, Neil Meron.
'It`s a cultural event, and that`s different - something that
permeates your consciousness where you can`t pick up a magazine or
newspaper or turn on the television without (people) talking about
`Brokeback Mountain.`'
Oscar buzz is one thing. Dollars, Hollywood`s siren song, are
something else. And 'Brokeback`s' greatest influence might lie in its
ability to break away from the pack of gay-themed films with modest
boxoffice, limited by an inability to preach much beyond the choir.
Movies about homosexual life might typically gross only a couple of
million dollars, but 'Brokeback,' made for $14 million, took in $82
million domestically in the three months after it opened in limited
release Dec. 9. Still, while it`s a truism that studios sit up and
listen to filmmakers who show Hollywood the money, many purveyors of
gay-themed fare are only cautiously optimistic about the future for
such projects.
'Perhaps it`s slightly easier to tell a gay story than it was before
`Brokeback Mountain,` but it`s still a huge uphill battle,' says Ilene
Chaiken, creator of Showtime`s lesbian drama series 'The L Word.' 'It
takes a long time to convince Hollywood of anything.'
But Zadan expects 'Brokeback' to open doors for the genre, much like
'Chicago' did for the previously maligned movie musical. After
'Chicago' became the first musical to win the best picture Oscar in 32
years, he notes, the industry greenlighted 2004`s 'The Phantom of the
Opera,' 2005`s 'Rent' and 'The Producers,' DreamWorks` upcoming
'Dreamgirls' and New Line`s 'Hairspray,' which he and Meron are
producing.
'I believe the same thing applies to `Brokeback,`' says Zadan, who has
lined up out director Bryan Singer for the upcoming 'The Life and
Times of Harvey Milk.' 'As a result of `Brokeback,` there will be much
less fear because of the acclaim the movie received, because of the
boxoffice it`s getting.'
There`s already plenty of gay-themed fare in the pipeline, much of
which launched even before 'Brokeback' started to make waves. GLAAD
lists as many as 60 upcoming films with gay, lesbian, bisexual and
transgender images on its Web site, including Universal`s
as-yet-untitled biopic of Dusty Springfield, featuring Kristin
Chenoweth, and Sony`s 'Running With Scissors,' starring Annette Bening
and directed by Ryan Murphy (FX`s 'Nip/Tuck'), which is set to open in
September.
And that doesn`t even include content aimed at television like ABC`s
comedy pilot 'Him and Us,' about a gay British rock star, which is
being executive produced by Elton John.
While upcoming movies like the indie documentary 'Fag Hags: Women Who
Love Gay Men' seem destined for the art house circuit, others are just
as clearly headed for the mall. The typical boxoffice for an indie gay
film wouldn`t even begin to pay the tab for the big-ticket stars of
Universal`s upcoming comedy 'I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry,'
featuring Adam Sandler and Kevin James as straight firefighters who
pose as a gay couple so that they can get domestic-partner benefits.
Their casting is emblematic of the increasing willingness of marquee
talent to take on challenging gay roles, thereby bringing in big
audiences. Tom Hanks was a pioneer with his Oscar-winning turn in
1993`s 'Philadelphia.' More recently, Oscar has acknowledged a spate
of such envelope-pushing performances by stars such as Philip Seymour
Hoffman, Felicity Huffman and Charlize Theron. Indeed, Hoffman`s best
actor win for Sony Pictures Classics` 'Capote' and Huffman`s
nomination for playing the transgender lead of the Weinstein Co.`s
'Transamerica' made this year`s Academy Awards ceremony an
unprecedented showcase for actors taking on gay roles. Such
recognition primes the pump for more A-list names to do so in the
future, making it ever more likely that such films will find backing.
'Tom Hanks was hot as a pistol and a huge movie star' when he starred
in 'Philadelphia,' Zadan says. 'People will take chances commensurate
with who the stars are.'
Of course, that creates a chicken-and-egg dynamic. Studios like
projects with stars, and stars like projects with studio money.
'Especially in the last 10 years, you have stars who have become fed
up with doing the Hollywood blockbuster and are willing to work for
scale on smaller pictures,' says Kevin Sandler, assistant professor of
media arts at the University of Arizona. 'So, you have big, macho
stars like Heath Ledger who are willing to experiment with what was
once taboo for most star players. It`s reflective of a change of mood
of younger audiences and of studios who are putting more money behind
independent film, so maybe stars are more attracted to a film that
will be assured a marketing budget.'
Sandler credits television with laying the groundwork for mass
audience`s growing comfort level with gay images in film. 'I always
think (the film industry in) Hollywood is five years behind
television,' he says. 'Audiences on a mass scale will certainly,
though hesitantly, go to those movies, but (`Brokeback`) was done on a
low budget intended for a niche audience and broke out. It`s an
exception to the rule, a reflection that there is a possibility for
these films in the marketplace, not too many but certainly a few. That
progressiveness comes from the `Will & Graces` and `The L Word` and
other types of shows.'
Ironically, as network television has prodded the film market to
become more accepting of gay content, it also has grown more
conservative, Zadan says. While comedies remain fair game,
broadcasters have become more likely to shy away from controversial
dramatic material in the wake of the government crackdown on CBS after
Janet Jackson`s 'wardrobe malfunction' during the 2004 Superbowl, as
well as the Republican outcry against Zadan and Meron`s 2003
miniseries 'The Reagans,' which Viacom ended up moving from CBS to
Showtime, he says.
While NBC readily broadcast Zadan and Meron`s 1995 telefilm 'Serving
in Silence: The Margarethe Cammermeyer Story,' about a gay officer`s
legal challenge to being thrown out of the military, Zadan says it
would be much more difficult to make that film for network television
today.
'Gay films - anything that`s considered controversial - will not get
made for the major networks anymore,' he says. 'We`ve entered a period
of repression and censorship that did not exist when we made that
movie 10 years ago. The conservative Republican organization that went
after `The Reagans` also went after (2004`s) `Fahrenheit 9/11,` but it
didn`t matter because theater owners don`t care, whereas the networks
are looking at boycotts and losing advertising and government
indecency laws.'
Link to original source:
http://movies.monstersandcritics.com/features/article_1155116.php/Gay-themed_cinemaJennis.x
