Queer movie report
May. 16th, 2021 07:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sasha_featherBPM (Beats per Minute)
120 battements par minute - 2017- dir. Robin Campillo. French with English subtitles.
What do you say about a movie like this? It blew me away. It was so emotional, so honest, so gorgeous and heartbreaking.
It is the early 1990s and ACT UP Paris members are protesting using direct action methods. This is a fictional film that at times feels like a documentary. Many of the scenes take place in a lecture hall where the group has their weekly meetings, debating and discussing actions, which include things like going into a pharmaceutical company and throwing balloons full of fake blood onto the walls and windows.
A new member of the group, Nathan, falls in love with Sean, who is vocal, ferociously brave, and sick with HIV. We see their relationship develop, and we see Sean get more and more sick. They are the main characters, but we see many other members of the group, such as Hélène, who is a member with her teenage son Marco, a hemophiliac. Thibault and Sophie are leaders of the group and are tasked with moderating impassioned debates. Jérémie is a quiet young man with a sweet smile.
I was so utterly transported that I didn't notice the time going by; this movie is a lengthy 2 hours 23 minutes. Fans of "Portrait of a Lady on Fire" will notice lesbian actress Adèle Haenel as Sophie. Argentian actor Nahuel Pérez Biscayart plays Sean, and he is outstanding. He has these big, expressive eyes and is totally believable.
Highly recommended, but bring your tissue box. Content notes: illness, death, needles, fake blood that looks real, homophobic slurs.
Battle of the Sexes - 2017
A pleasant and entertaining movie about Billie Jean King (played by Emma Stone) and her famous tennis match with Bobby Riggs (played by Steve Carrell). This is the sort of movie you can watch with your family; most of the characters are portrayed sympathetically and the message is about how women deserve respect. There is a subplot involving King falling in love with her hairdresser, Marilynn, while being married to a man. This involves a little bit of angst but not a lot. Also stars bisexual actors Natalie Morales and Alan Cumming. It's a bit too long at 2 hours 1 min.
Dark Waters - 2019.
This is not a queer movie, but the director, Todd Haynes, is gay, so maybe I can count it here in my queer movie report. It's a drama about a lawyer who investigates water pollution in West Virginia. Although he is a corporate lawyer, he sues Du Pont and represents the people of a small town in taking on this "titan of industry". This takes a number of years from about 1998-2006, and reveals some very scary facts about Du Pont and their capacity for evil.
There is something strange about the lighting in this film, it was very dim and gray, as if shot through a dark filter. It was not enjoyable from a purely aesthetic perspective, at least not to me. The story and acting were good. Mark Ruffalo plays the lawyer, Anne Hathaway plays his wife. Strangely there was only one Black person in the whole movie, and he was one of the corporate lawyers; everyone else was white. This felt like a very Mark Ruffalo film in that it's about water pollution, one of his areas of activism, and it's about investigation similar to "Spotlight".
Content note: animal harm (cows). Cancer, illness, death; discussion of infertility and birth defects.
All these movies made available to me through my wonderful public library.
120 battements par minute - 2017- dir. Robin Campillo. French with English subtitles.
What do you say about a movie like this? It blew me away. It was so emotional, so honest, so gorgeous and heartbreaking.
It is the early 1990s and ACT UP Paris members are protesting using direct action methods. This is a fictional film that at times feels like a documentary. Many of the scenes take place in a lecture hall where the group has their weekly meetings, debating and discussing actions, which include things like going into a pharmaceutical company and throwing balloons full of fake blood onto the walls and windows.
A new member of the group, Nathan, falls in love with Sean, who is vocal, ferociously brave, and sick with HIV. We see their relationship develop, and we see Sean get more and more sick. They are the main characters, but we see many other members of the group, such as Hélène, who is a member with her teenage son Marco, a hemophiliac. Thibault and Sophie are leaders of the group and are tasked with moderating impassioned debates. Jérémie is a quiet young man with a sweet smile.
I was so utterly transported that I didn't notice the time going by; this movie is a lengthy 2 hours 23 minutes. Fans of "Portrait of a Lady on Fire" will notice lesbian actress Adèle Haenel as Sophie. Argentian actor Nahuel Pérez Biscayart plays Sean, and he is outstanding. He has these big, expressive eyes and is totally believable.
Highly recommended, but bring your tissue box. Content notes: illness, death, needles, fake blood that looks real, homophobic slurs.
Battle of the Sexes - 2017
A pleasant and entertaining movie about Billie Jean King (played by Emma Stone) and her famous tennis match with Bobby Riggs (played by Steve Carrell). This is the sort of movie you can watch with your family; most of the characters are portrayed sympathetically and the message is about how women deserve respect. There is a subplot involving King falling in love with her hairdresser, Marilynn, while being married to a man. This involves a little bit of angst but not a lot. Also stars bisexual actors Natalie Morales and Alan Cumming. It's a bit too long at 2 hours 1 min.
Dark Waters - 2019.
This is not a queer movie, but the director, Todd Haynes, is gay, so maybe I can count it here in my queer movie report. It's a drama about a lawyer who investigates water pollution in West Virginia. Although he is a corporate lawyer, he sues Du Pont and represents the people of a small town in taking on this "titan of industry". This takes a number of years from about 1998-2006, and reveals some very scary facts about Du Pont and their capacity for evil.
There is something strange about the lighting in this film, it was very dim and gray, as if shot through a dark filter. It was not enjoyable from a purely aesthetic perspective, at least not to me. The story and acting were good. Mark Ruffalo plays the lawyer, Anne Hathaway plays his wife. Strangely there was only one Black person in the whole movie, and he was one of the corporate lawyers; everyone else was white. This felt like a very Mark Ruffalo film in that it's about water pollution, one of his areas of activism, and it's about investigation similar to "Spotlight".
Content note: animal harm (cows). Cancer, illness, death; discussion of infertility and birth defects.
All these movies made available to me through my wonderful public library.
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