If a festival's lineup purports to reflect its unique identity, then the overarching theme of this year's Broward edition of the MiFo LGBT Film Festival, at least judging from the handful of titles screening over the next two weekends, is assimilation.
The annual event, formerly known as the Fort Lauderdale Gay and Lesbian Film Festival before being rechristened with its current trendy moniker, is unspooling amidst a vastly different cultural landscape from its 2014 edition. Earlier this year, marriage equality became the law of the land in the Sunshine State, and this summer, the Supreme Court made a decent woman out of the blushing bride that are America's same-sex couples.
(For more information about the festival, which runs from Oct. 9-11 and 16-18, go to www.mifofilm.com.)
At the multiplexes, suburban crowds are expected to trickle in to see Freeheld, in which Julianne Moore and Ellen Page play a non-threatening pair grappling with workplace discrimination, earnest dialogue and the perils of what I like to refer as straight hijacking. It's a distressing trend, this tendency of heterosexual characters to take over a narrative ostensibly devoted to their LGBT counterparts. But what's unexpected is that this growing phenomenon has also seeped into the very cinema showcase supposed to put queer lives up front and center, making this frustrated reviewer want to throw his arms in the air and watch helplessly as gay people are reduced to bit players in their own stories. After all, there is a wider audience out there begging to be congratulated for their open-mindedness.
The following grab bag of MiFo 2015 selections features an overeager crowdpleaser, a handsomely crafted sports doc, a nihilistic tale of bohemians in New York City and a rogue anti-biopic by an auteur intent on doing things his way, skittish festival audiences be damned.
Fourth Man Out
Friday, Oct. 9, 8 p.m., NSU Art Museum Fort Lauderdale
Adam (Evan Todd), the auto mechanic taking his first baby steps out the closet in the film selected to kick off festivities, is reserved, soft-spoken and easy on the eyes, yet not too handsome. He is also a relic from another era, a dinosaur whose disastrous handling of his coming out process is meant to elicit good-natured chuckles but instead leads to one cringe-inducing moment after another. Andrew Nackman's feature directing debut is not above resorting to fart jokes as it chronicles the effect Adam's bombshell revelation has on his trio of hetero bros: best friend Chris (Parker Young), uncouth buddy Nick (Glee's Chord Overstreet) and token schlub Ortu (Jon Gabrus). This circle of friends living in upstate New York is an unsophisticated bunch, you see. Because in screenwriter Aaron Dancik's narrow worldview, full acceptance from these guy's guys is something they have to stumble upon, since in their small town, the clock appears to have stopped around 1998, despite the present-day setting.
Whenever it's not indulging in painfully obvious gay-panic scenarios that relegate Adam to thankless “straight man” duties, Fourth Man Out's idea of a knee-slapper is a montage of bad dinner dates that parade a succession of cartoonish gay stereotypes for the enjoyment of the crowds that have bestowed audience awards to this capably lensed but terminally stale comedy at some pretty high-profile festivals around the country. Those audiences didn't appear to mind that the only couples you see having sex on screen are the straight ones. Or that Nackman and Nancik's show more interest in hunky Chris' love life than in Adam's. Or that the film ends in a Fourth of July barbecue in which Adam seems to be the sole gay presence. There's a place for this mediocre trifle in an LGBT film festival. Programming it as the opening night gala, however, is simply not the way to go.
Akron
Sunday, Oct. 18, 5 p.m., Cinema Paradiso Fort Lauderdale
Next to Fourth Man Out's Neanderthals, the baby gays at the center of this low-budget domestic drama appear to have come from the distant future. University of Akron freshmen Benny (Matthew Frias) and Christopher (Edmund Donovan) meet cute during a game of mudball, and a romance quickly develops, much to the delight of Benny's Mexican-American parents (Andrea Burns and Joseph Melendez) and Christopher's divorced mom (Amy da Luz), now a yoga instructor in Florida. These twinks are oh so pretty and make each other giggle and have wholesome PG-13 sex that leaves every strand of hair perfectly in place, even on the morning after. (“You can't put his pinga on lockdown,” Benny's dad tells his wife, suddenly concerned about their son becoming sexually active.)
What the lovers don't yet realize is that they've crossed paths before … as children, on the day Christopher's mom accidentally ran over Benny's older brother outside of a supermarket. What happens when that family skeleton is yanked out of the closet? What starts out as a fluffy tale of teen love for the “It Gets Better” crowd morphs into something thornier and more complex. Even though Akron doesn't quite shake off its afterschool-special vibe and it's saddled with thoroughly overwritten scenes, directors Sasha King and Brian O'Donnell deftly examine how the characters' emotional baggage threatens to thwart this photogenic couple's chances. The film's Rockwellian depiction of a functional Hispanic household suddenly forced to deal with unresolved issues from their past is curiously compatible with its progressive portrayal of a fully sanctioned budding relationship between two teenage boys. One may charitably describe the point-and-shoot filmmaking as safe, and the resolution is way too tidy, but this modest production has more weight, and resonance, than first impressions might have suggested.
Bizarre
Sunday, Oct. 11, 3 p.m., The Classic Gateway Theater
Don't hate Maurice because he's beautiful. The enigmatic blank slate at the center of this arthouse oddity from director Étienne Faure garners our frustration because he's, pardon my French, a cock tease. As the movie opens, the hot garçon is aimlessly walking the streets of Brooklyn before he's approached by Betty (Rebekah Underhill), who owns the titular hype bar with her live-in lover Kim (Raquel Nave). They let the quiet kid stay at their apartment and give him work at the bar, where he catches the eye of androgynous bartender Luka (Adrian James, who looks like Keira Knightley's twin brother). Drunk in ambiance, Bizarre ambles along amiably, despite the mixed signals Maurice sends to the lovestruck Luka. Faure is more interested in creating a mood, as this motley crew bonds even with the prospect of losing the bar hanging over their heads. The film's major misstep, and it's pretty significant, is a needless dose of nihilism at the end that feels shoehorned in and breaks Faure's bohemian-chic spell. I'm still very much on the fence about it.
Man on High Heels
Saturday, Oct. 17, 10 p.m., The Classic Gateway Theater
Would it be asking too much of a movie about a homicide detective who's secretly wanted to undergo gender reassignment surgery to actually show her as she really sees herself a little more frequently? But that's what bummed me out about this slick gangster saga from South Korea. Take away the transgender content and the narrative would hardly be affected. Not that Yoon-Ji, the sleek law enforcer who doesn't need no stinking weapons to take down her targets, is an uninteresting character. It's just that the revenge plot she's stuck in is simply not worthy of her talents.
54: The Director's Cut
Thursday, Oct. 15, 8 p.m., Cinema Paradiso Fort Lauderdale
In 1998, Miramax Films released a 93-minute version of this Studio 54 chronicle in theaters. Bad press swirled around the troubled production, and talk of Harvey Weinstein's behind-the-scenes meddling, which resulted in reshoots and taking out whole chunks of Mark Christopher's original cut, doomed the project long before the uniformly negative reviews came in. The theatrical cut was a mess, a cinematic castration that barely made dramatic sense, despite Mike Myers' spot-on portrayal of club co-owner Steve Rubell. Working alongside fellow filmmaker David Kittredge, Christopher painstakingly assembled something approximating the version of the story that he originally envisioned, and all the hard work has paid off handsomely.
Watching this phoenix rising from this ashes of its past misfortune earlier this spring during the Miami edition of MiFo, I grew angry that a film this good was taken away from Christopher and then altered beyond recognition. Better late than never to introduce moviegoers to busboy/audience surrogate Shane O'Shea (Ryan Phillippe), his bisexuality gloriously restored, along with 36 minutes of material Harvey Scissorhands deemed too gay to appeal to a mainstream audience. The much-hyped intimate scene between Philippe and Breckin Meyer, who plays fellow 54 barkeep Greg Randazzo, is a bit of a letdown, even if the characters' friendship, and the romantic triangle that develops between the boys and Greg's wife Anita (Salma Hayek, channeling Rita Moreno circa The Ritz) is considerably more endearing now than it ever was. There's a genuine affection in the way Christopher depicts the camaraderie of the club's employees and the bonds they formed with the regular guests, famous and obscure alike. As of press time, only a digital release is planned for this film, so catch it on the big screen while you have the chance.
Tab Hunter Confidential
Saturday, Oct. 10, 5 p.m., Cinema Paradiso Fort Lauderdale
The subject of this breezy, dishy and unexpectedly poignant documentary didn't quite linger in moviegoers' memories after his heyday the way some of his other contemporaries like Rock Hudson, Montgomery Clift and Anthony Perkins did, but make no mistake: Tab Hunter was a big star, the kind of heartthrob that women wanted to date, straight guys wanted to emulate and gay guys secretly crushed on. Director Jeffrey Schwarz fumbles the beginning, an uninspired mix of archival footage and talking heads. The film finds its footing once Hunter discovers high cheekbones and a chiseled physique can only take you so far in Tinseltown. When the film deals with this icon coming to terms with his limited acting range and the measures he took to hone his skills, all while hiding his sexual orientation, it becomes an irresistible treasure trove for movie buffs and celebrity gossip fiends. It helps that some of the talking heads Schwarz has assembled include Clint Eastwood, Debbie Reynolds, Robert Wagner, John Waters and, of course, Hunter himself, still a stud muffin at 84.
Game Face
Sunday, Oct. 18, 3 p.m., The Classic Gateway Theater
This tight, deeply empathetic sports doc is a dual portrait of personal strength under the most trying of circumstances, a truly inspirational portrait of perseverance and self-realization that pays equal attention to its subjects' setbacks as it does to their rousing victories, on and off their respective arenas. For Oklahoma college basketball player Terrence Clemens, it's his struggles to put his criminal past behind him and for his teammates to accept him just the way he is. For transgender MMA fighter Fallon Fox, it's striving to rise beyond her peers' (ill-informed) misgivings that she may have an unfair advantage over her cis female opponents. Director Michiel Thomas is not afraid to suggest that Clemens may be better off waiting until the tournament season is over before he comes out to his team. He also pulls no punches when he depicts a fight in Miami in which Fox's foe relentlessly pummels her while the audience cheers. The disturbing connotation from the crowd's reaction is loud and clear: The real woman is emerging victorious. It's a hard moment to watch, and Game Face is all the stronger for refusing to look away.
Eisenstein in Guanajuato
Saturday, Oct. 10, 10 p.m., The Classic Gateway Theater
By far the best film out of the MiFo sampling I got to see is this thrillingly intertextual gem from director Peter Greenaway (The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover) that follows Russian auteur Sergei Eisenstein (well played by Finnish actor Elmer Bäck) as he visits Mexico circa 1931 after being declared persona non grata by Hollywood's conservative elite. Ah, but the whiz behind Battleship Potemkin has a plan. He intends on the grand epic that became ¡Que viva Mexico!, financed in part by author Upton Sinclair and his wife. What the influential filmmaker wasn't counting on is falling for Palomino Cañedo (Luis Alberti), his (married with children) guide who stimulates his intellect before he stimulates something else. In true Greenaway fashion, the clothes come off early and often, and the graphic sex scene between both men that forms the film's centerpiece is rendered with immaculately framed rigor. Some of Greenaway's previous work was too coolly detached for me to connect to it. Not here. Eisenstein in Guanajuato sees the veteran filmmaker in playful form, and his spry, nimble ode to Mexico, creative genius and bubble butts is a treat from start to finish. One of the year's best.
View a complete list of films at www.mifofilm.com/films/program/datetime.
