Homosexuality & Hollywood
It’s being reported that Sacha Baron Cohen’s highly anticipated “Bruno” movie – his follow-up to Borat centering around Cohen’s flamboyantly gay Austrian fashionista – has been slapped with an “NC-17″ rating after its first submission to the Motion Picture Association of America. Because Hollywood studios almost never release NC-17 rated movies, it’s a near certainty that cuts to the movie will be made removing the more objectionable parts of the film (and that those parts will later be put back in for a director’s cut DVD). Why the NC-17 rating? According to the report:
Among the objectionable scenes is one in which Bruno — a gay Austrian fashionista played by Baron Cohen — appears to have anal sex with a man on camera. In another, the actor goes on a hunting trip and sneaks naked into the tent of one of the fellow hunters, an unsuspecting non-actor.
Admittedly I don’t know how graphic these scenes get, but I’m willing to bet that an equally graphic scene involving heterosexual sex would not provoke the NC-17 rating. I’m reminded of the cuts made to Stanley Kubrick’s underrated classic Eyes Wide Shut, in which his shots were digitally altered in the famous orgy scene so as to block out a couple instances of lesbian sex, thereby reducing the rating from NC-17 to R.
This story comes on the heels of an even more bizarre story: Times Online reported a couple weeks ago that I Love You Phillip Morris, a new comedy starring Jim Carrey and Ewan McGregor as incarcerated gay lovers, from the guys who brought you Bad Santa, may go straight to DVD in the United States for lack of an American distributor:
Film industry insiders said the movie, which features a graphic sex scene and frequent references to gay sex, had fallen foul of anti-gay prejudice in America.
I’m skeptical that this movie won’t eventually find a distributor, but the fact that it’s even having trouble is a little startling. In the wake of Brokeback Mountain and Milk – both profitable films that portray gay sex and deal explicitly with gay subject matter – it seems a bit bizarre that Hollywood would conclude that American audiences wouldn’t be open to this movie.
It shouldn’t be that startling, however. Homosexuality in film tends to fall into a few limited categories:
- Tragedy: gay characters ultimately meet with a tragic fate, usually death. See, e.g., Brokeback Mountain, Milk, Philadelphia.
- Comic relief: gay characters or homosexuality in general is used as a gag. See, e.g., I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry, any movie with a hilariously flamboyant gay dude.
- Female companions: gay characters exist solely as the fun-loving, sassy friend of the lead heterosexual female, esp. common in romantic comedies. See, e.g., My Best Friend’s Wedding.
- Murderers: gay characters are psychotic killers. See, e.g., Monster, Rope.
I Love You Phillip Morris doesn’t appear to fall into any of these categories. The gay characters here are not mere comic relief, they’re the center of the story. And while homosexuality was also at the center of I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry, the joke there was OMG THOSE STRAIGHT GUYS HAVE TO PRETEND TO BE GAY, THAT’S TOTALLY ZANY, and while I haven’t seen it, I’m told that at one point in the film the characters are told to kiss to prove their homosexuality lest they face some severe consequence I can’t remember, and the joke is that that would be just too gay so they don’t do it. I Love You Phillip Morris doesn’t appear to be going for that kind of humor.
I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry, incidentally, made over $120 million domestically. You hear that, and you hear that I Love You Phillip Morris is struggling to find an American distributor, and you basically want to shoot yourself in the fucking head.
Trailer for I Love You Phillip Morris after the jump (no trailer out yet for the Bruno movie).
Comment by Brian Pierce on 30 March 2009 at 1:29 pm:
I forgot to mention this in the post, but there is an excellent documentary from the mid-90’s called The Celluloid Closet about portrayals of homosexuality throughout the history of film. Worth seeing.
Comment by Tim on 30 March 2009 at 2:24 pm:
I find it interesting that “Monster” made it into this post. Not only is Monster based on a true story, but the character’s homosexuality has little to do with why the film was made.
I have heard some hilarious stories about the new Bruno movie. I hope most of them are true.
As far as homosexuals portraying certain “characters” in movies, I’d say that generic characters (the villain, the girl next store, etc.) tend to exhibit similar stereotypes, and while that may be somewhat unfair, movies generally exist as fantasy in the writer’s mind more than a realistic portrayal of life. Such is not exclusive to homosexual characters.
I’m just glad that we’ve finally progressed to the point that homosexuality can be shown in the movies in a positive and normal light. The discussion about the new Bruno movie and its rating begs some interesting questions, but given the filth of Borat in certain scenes, I wouldn’t be surprised if the scenes in question were quite graphic.