Three years ago gay movies went mainstream, thanks mainly to Brokeback Mountain although, sadly, that trend did not continue—that is, until 2008, when conventional cinema again saw a slew of film releases with either positive portrayals of gay characters or gay themes. The year began on a sad note with the death of Brokeback star Heath Ledger; news of Ledger's passing came the same day as the Academy Award nominations. Ironically, his performance as the villainous Joker in The Dark Knight, his last completed film ( and one of the year's biggest financial and critical hits ) will surely see his name announced as a contender with this year's Oscar nominations ( and it's my hope that that he'll win ) .
The ironies continued to pile up as the year progressed with the reinvigoration of the chick flick, a movie genre in desperate need of a hit, with two of the biggest of the year, Sex and the City and Mamma Mia!, both helmed by out directors making their feature-film debuts ( Michael Patrick King and Phyllida Lloyd, respectively ) . And suddenly gays were being portrayed in straight male movies not as the shrieking, lisping, mincing, limp-wristed disco dummies of old but as characters to be envied; emulated as paragons of cutting-edge cool; and looked up to by their straight counterparts. Cases in point included Tropic Thunder; Zack and Miri Make a Porno; and Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist.
The ironies culminated with a serendipitous convergence of real life and cinema art: the year-end release of Milk, the long-awaited biopic of the slain pioneering gay activist Harvey Milk, just weeks after the passage of California's anti-gay marriage Proposition 8. The latter kick-started a new phase of gay rights that is being likened to the shift in the civil-rights movement in the early 1960s, helped in no small measure by out director Gus Van Sant's tremendous movie. At last, it seems, a healthy majority of heterosexuals are ready to stand with LGBT folks in securing our long-overdue rights. It's not surprising that movies have helped point the zeitgeist in that direction.
I'd like to point out—as I do every year—that all these "best of" lists are completely subjective. My list tends to shift around with repeat viewings and reconsiderations. And what exactly constitutes a "gay" movie these days, anyway? As in the past, some of these pictures were "coded" so perfectly for our people that they made my list. And with that, here's my list of the best LGBT movies of 2008 ( in preferential order ) :
—1. Milk: Sean Penn's acting acrobatics in the title role are wonderous in Van Sant's unadorned masterpiece that also features rich supporting performances by James Franco, Emile Hirsch and Diego Luna. The movie also has a great first-time feature script by gay writer Dustin Lance Black.
—2. Were the World Mine: The gay indie release of the year, this full-length version of the short "Fairies" finds queer writer-director Tom Gustafson again collaborating with offscreen partner Cory James Krueckeberg and songwriter Jessica Fogle in this delightful gay fantasia, a musical reimagining of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream.
—3. Tropic Thunder, Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist, Rockrolla and Zack and Miri Make a Porno: These are four films aimed at heterosexual audiences that feature gay characters as either just "one of the guys" or positive role models for their straight counterparts—a refreshing trend after decades of derision and a hopeful harbinger of things to come.
—4. Save Me: Gay actors Chad Allen and Robert Gant star and produce ( along with co-star Judith Light ) this moving character drama about a party boy ( Allen ) who turns to an ex-gay rehab center headed by Light and improbably finds a kindred spirit in Gant, another troubled resident. Out director Robert Cary helmed this movie.
—5. Wall-E: One of the year's biggest hits with audiences and critics was this futuristic tale of a lonely showtune-adoring robot who inexplicably finds true love with another robot and expresses it with the help of a forgotten gem from the score of Hello Dolly—penned by gay musical theatre icon Jerry Herman.
—6. Sex and the City and Mamma Mia!: When out writer-director Michael Patrick King brought Carrie & Co. to the big screen, he brought along not just the hot fashions, the hot men and the dishy comedy that were staples of the HBO series but, more importantly, he brought his innate gay sensibility to his feature-film debut. The result was a huge success that single-handedly saved chick flicks from intensive care. Then there is out director Lloyd's frothy, sun-filled, ABBA-drenched musical concoction. Thanks to mighty Meryl, a strong supporting cast and Dominic Cooper's sensational abs, the film was a hit and gave Streep the box-office clout to match her acting credits.
—7. Brideshead Revisited: This is an admirable adaptation of Evelyn Waugh's sprawling novel that focuses on the super-rich, dysfunctional Marchmain family's effect on a wide-eyed innocent ( played by a marvelous Matthew Goode ) who is torn between the gay son and his mysterious sister. Emma Thompson—as the siblings' controlling, religiously devout mother—is thrilling. Also, unlike the 1981 miniseries, the gay material isn't deep-sixed.
—8. Chris & Don: A Love Story and Black, White + Gray: A Portrait Of Sam Wagstaff And Robert Mapplethorpe: Chris & Don is a charming and moving documentary of the decades-long relationship between writer Christopher Isherwood and his much younger partner, painter Don Bachardy—and it's enlivened by the surviving Bachardy's memories and acidic assessments. The Wagstaff/Mapplethorpe documentary is a cogent look at a great collaboration between art collector/mentor and artist/student, and the impact both had on each other as their relationship blossomed and then withered.
—9. The Witnesses: This movie is Gay French writer-director Andre Techine's movingly observed character piece about the impact of a beautiful Adonis on a group of friends in France at the outset of the AIDS crisis in the early '80s. The sun-drenched exteriors of the film presaged the terrible price the insidious pandemic would soon have on the world at large.
—10. The Life of Reilly: Gay actor-director Charles Nelson Reilly lived an extraordinary life long before he became the Match Game panelist that he's remembered for today. This one-man show is a fascinating, funny, heartbreaking tour of his life and, luckily, was lovingly recorded live on stage by director Barry Poltermann not long before Reilly's death.
—Honorable mentions: Shelter, a gay character-drama/coming-out story about West Coast surfers from out writer-director Jonah Markowitz and Another Gay Sequel were also popular with audiences and just two of the relatively few gay indies to actually get theatrical releases in 2008.
Check out my archived reviews at www.windycitytimes.com or www.knightatthemovies.com . Readers can leave feedback at the latter Web site.
