Awards Watch: Nominations for the 2010 Dorian Awards

The Gay & Lesbian Entertainment Critics Association (of which yours truly and my fellow Movie Dearest Men on Film Chris Carpenter and Neil Cohen are members) has announced its nominations for the group's second annual Dorian Awards, celebrating the best in film and television for 2010.

In 17 categories, including new ones this year for documentaries and "unsung" movies, GALECA has nominated a wide variety of films and TV programs, both with and without GLBT themes. Titles with multiple nominations include such big screen hits as Black Swan, The Kids Are All Right and The Social Network, while The Big Bang Theory, Glee and Modern Family represent the small screen.

See the comments section below for the complete list of nominations. Winners will be announced January 18 in Los Angeles.

Reverend's Reviews: Howl Reveals Poetry of GLBT Liberation

I wasn’t very familiar with Allen Ginsberg's writings or with the 1957 obscenity trial over his best-known work, “Howl,” prior to seeing the fascinating new film inspired by them. Howl, the movie, is scheduled to open in Los Angeles and premiere on video-on-demand this Friday and expand to local theaters in October.

Howl is the first narrative film by Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman, the duo behind such award-winning, gay-themed documentaries as The Celluloid Closet, Paragraph 175 and Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt. Their latest production has already had the honor of being the Opening Night selection at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival and Outfest, L.A.’s Gay & Lesbian Film Festival.

The movie actually entails three distinct but overlapping storylines: the legal case against the publisher of Ginsberg’s poem, which contained then-graphic language and references to homosexual activity; a biography of Ginsberg himself that depicts his inseparable awakenings as a writer and a gay man; and a strikingly animated rendering of the infamous poem, which has come to be regarded as a literary classic.

The People vs. Ferlinghetti, as the obscenity trial over Ginsberg’s work was formally known, took place in the midst of the conformity-driven Eisenhower era. The case has been described as “one that involved as many literature professors as lawyers and put the power of words itself on trial.” The presiding judge ultimately decided in favor of Ferlinghetti, but not before reports from the trial had exposed many mainstream Americans to the “F” word and the mechanics of gay sex. Even today, some radio stations refuse to air readings of “Howl” due to their fear of violating FCC obscenity rules.

The all-star supporting cast of Howl primarily appears during the trial segments. Oscar nominee David Straithairn (Good Night, and Good Luck) plays the frequently flummoxed prosecuting attorney, Ralph McIntosh. Jon Hamm of TV’s Mad Men is Ferlinghetti’s lawyer, Jake Ehrlich, who is said to have inspired Raymond Burr’s iconic performance as Perry Mason. Bob Balaban is great as the conservative yet clear-eyed and thoughtful Judge Clayton Horn (who could well have been a role model for current Federal Judge Vaughn Walker, who recently overturned Proposition 8) and Jeff Daniels, Mary-Louise Parker, Treat Williams and Alessandro Nivola briefly portray various witnesses.

While Epstein and Friedman’s recreation of the trial is illuminating and riveting, it is Ginsberg’s personal story that gives the movie its heart. James Franco of the Spider-Man series and Milk gives an excellent performance as Ginsberg. The revolutionary writer became renowned as one of the fathers of the Beat Generation along with Jack Kerouac, William S. Burroughs and others, most of whom were gay or bisexual. Ginsberg, who passed away in 1997 (his longtime partner, Peter Orlovsky, just died earlier this year), wasn’t exactly known for his looks. As a result, the photogenic Franco has been criticized in the role by some. This is unfair, especially since the film depicts Ginsberg’s younger years, and Franco otherwise nails the poet’s distinct worldview, vocal cadence and passion.

Ginsberg is also regarded as a champion of sexual and political liberation for his honesty and willingness to convey the homosexual experience in “Howl” and many of his other poems. Eric Drooker, who had collaborated with Ginsberg on an illustrated version of his poems, drew the animated adaptation of “Howl” that serves as the third aspect of the current movie. The style is similar to the acclaimed 2008 feature Waltz with Bashir, a stylized animated account of dark historical events.

As guitarist Lenny Kaye said of Ginsberg, “He made us see that poets were pop stars.” He also helped to usher in the modern era of GLBT liberation and equality through his writing. Howl serves as a fitting tribute in addition to being inspiring cinema.

Reverend's Rating: B

UPDATE: Howl is now available on DVD and Blu-ray from Amazon.com.

Review by Rev. Chris Carpenter, resident film critic of Movie Dearest and the Orange County and Long Beach Blade.

Reel Thoughts: 2010 Fall Movie Preview

From Facebook to gay poets, the new season of films is getting some buzz. The end of summer brings prestige pictures and big budget blockbusters to movie screens, with the beginning of the end of Harry Potter sure to draw the most attention.

Also coming this fall: Wall Street’s Gordon Gecko sprung from jail, a preteen vampire and Ryan Reynolds in a box, plus the return of Cher in Burlesque. Will it be the Showgirls of the new millennium?

It’s going to be an interesting season. Here are the films we’re excited to see.

September:
Going the Distance (now playing): As onscreen/off-screen couples go, for every Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn, there’s also a Sean Penn and Madonna. We’ll see how Justin Long and Drew Barrymore fare in this story about a long-distance love affair.

The Tillman Story (now playing): Pat Tillman’s life was inspiring enough – the Arizona Cardinal football star gave up his athletic career after September 11 to join the military and fight overseas. That’s before the Bush Administration got its hands on his death-by-friendly-fire. This searing documentary exposes how Tillman’s death was abused, and the struggles his family endured finding and publicizing the truth.

Machete (now playing): Grindhouse, by Roberto Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino, was an inspired homage to trashy B-movies of the ’70s, complete with fake movie trailers between the double feature. Machete, starring Danny Trejo, fleshes (and bloods) out one of the trailers, a Mexploitation flick about a man with a big grudge ... and a bigger blade.

I'm Still Here (September 10): No, it’s not Barbara Cook saluting Stephen Sondheim with a medley from Follies. This is Casey Affleck’s film following Joaquin Phoenix’s bizarre quest to become a rap star while wearing a Grizzly Adams beard.

Devil (September 17): Maybe that guy with burrito breath isn’t the worst person you could get stuck with in an elevator. That would be the devil himself, who torments a group of lift takers. The scariest part? The script comes “from the mind of M. Night Shyamalan.”

Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps (September 24): Gordon Gecko (Michael Douglas) is out of jail and pushing a new book, while Shia LeBeouf is the young moneymaker who has lessons to learn in the new economy.

You Again (September 24): Kristin Bell plays a former nerd appalled to find that her brother is marrying her high school nemesis (Odette Justman). Add to that the rivalry between Bell’s mom Jamie Lee Curtis and Justman’s aunt Sigourney Weaver, toss in Betty White and Kristin Chenoweth (as a perky wedding planner), and you’ve got a lot more potential than When in Rome.

Buried (September 24): Ryan Reynolds re-enacts the end of The Vanishing as an American contractor captured and buried alive by Iraqi insurgents. Claustrophobics, beware!

A Woman, a Gun and a Noodle Shop (September 24): Turnabout is fair play as Chinese director Yimou Zhang remakes an American film, the Coen Brothers’ Blood Simple, about a man whose plan to murder his cheating wife goes horribly awry.

Howl (September 24) is the most eagerly awaited GLBT film of the fall. James Franco (Milk) stars as gay Beat poet Allen Ginsberg, who was put on trial for obscenity due to the frankness of his poem, "Howl". Directors Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman (The Celluloid Closet) explore the influential poet’s significance with scenes from the trial and Ginsburg’s life and relationships. The film also includes black and white scenes of the real Ginsberg performing "Howl" in a coffeehouse.

October:
Never Let Me Go (October 1): Carey Mulligan, Keira Knightley and Andrew Garfield (the next Spider-Man) play British boarding school kids raised for one very dark purpose.

Let Me In (October 1): It girl “Hit Girl” Chloe Grace Moretz plays the little vampire next door, a 12-year-old bloodsucker who befriends and protects a bullied little boy. This remake of Let the Right One In moves the action to 1983 New Mexico.

A Film Unfinished (October 1): An unflinching documentary about the infamous Nazi propaganda film that romanticized the Warsaw Ghetto, complete with lost footage.

The Social Network (October 1): Seven director David Fincher cast Jesse Eisenberg (Zombieland) as Mark Zuckerberg, the billionaire creator of Facebook. Forget your Farmville and find out how it all began.

Hereafter (October 22): Clint Eastwood treads in to Shyamalan territory with tales of people affected by disasters (the Indian Ocean tsunami, the London Underground bombing) and a psychic (Matt Damon) who can communicate with dead people.

November:
Morning Glory (November 12): Broadcast News 2010? Rachel McAdams plays the put-upon producer of a terrible morning show (hosted by Diane Keaton) who spices things up by adding Harrison Ford’s seasoned newsman to the mix.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part I (November 19): Harry’s Hogwarts saga draws to a close as he, Hermoine, Ron and the forces of good battle the evil Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes, last seen releasing his Kraken in Clash of the Titans).

Burlesque (November 24): Christina Aguilera is a small town girl who heads to LA to become a burlesque star, tutored by a former showgirl played by Cher. Will she be “all pelvic thrust” like Nomi in Showgirls? Somewhere, Elizabeth Berkley is nodding knowingly.

December:
Black Swan (December 1): Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis play rival ballet dancers in Darren Aronofsky’s All About Eve-esque thriller. Expect some sexy fireworks between the women as they fight to be the last Swan standing … on pointe.

Review by Neil Cohen, resident film critic of Movie Dearest and Phoenix's Echo Magazine.

Reverend’s Previews: Outfest 2010 Celebrates GLBT Diversity

This year’s Outfest, the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Film Festival, will boast 60 GLBT-themed feature films and 87 shorts from 23 different countries. The 28th edition of the oldest film festival in LA and the leading GLBT festival in the US will run July 8th-18.

Having had the opportunity to preview a number of the movies to be shown, I can attest that this year’s Outfest selections are generally more thoughtful and of higher quality than those I saw the past two years. As Outfest’s Executive Director, Kirsten Schaffer, rightly proclaimed, “This year’s incredible line-up celebrates all of the forward-thinking artists that push the boundaries for LGBT rights and equality.”

One such artist was the poet Allen Ginsberg, who is the subject of the Outfest Opening Night Gala film, Howl (the movie also opened the prestigious Sundance Film Festival earlier this year). James Franco of the Spider-Man series plays Ginsberg. Howl is the first dramatic feature from veteran documentarians Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman, who made The Times of Harvey Milk and The Celluloid Closet among several acclaimed prior films.

The opening night festivities will kick-off at 8:00 PM on July 8 with a special presentation of the annual Outfest Achievement Award to lesbian actress Jane Lynch. Currently enjoying huge success as the domineering cheerleading coach, Sue Sylvester, on the Fox TV series Glee, Lynch has also given memorable performances in such diverse films as The 40 Year Old Virgin, Best in Show and last year’s Julie & Julia.

Each year, Outfest features a foreign film as its International Dramatic Centerpiece. Contracorriente (or Undertow) will be this year’s selection on July 13. It is set in an exotic Peruvian fishing village where love between two men is forbidden. The film was a rare gay-themed winner of the Sundance Film Festival’s World Cinema Audience Award in January.

There are too many movies that I’d recommend to list here, but a few highlights are:

The Topp Twins: Untouchable Girls, an insightful and thoroughly enjoyable documentary about New Zealand’s legendary yodeling lesbian twins. Jools and Lynda Topp have been performing together since the 1970’s, and were pivotal figures in the 1986 passage of their country’s pioneering gay rights bill. If you want to learn the hysterical punchline to the twins’ joke, “Why can’t lesbians wear make-up when they go to Weight Watchers?,” see the movie!

Grown Up Movie Star, written and directed by the talented Adriana Maggs, is a smart, observant study of a teenage girl in rural Canada’s coming of age. Living with her closeted gay father doesn’t make things any easier for her. The movie also benefits from an excellent cast (newcomer Tatiana Maslany is a revelation as the teen, Ruby) and great, naturalistic — if dysfunctional — family rapport.

Children of God utilizes overlapping storylines and characters in its expose of closeted homosexuality and religious hypocrisy in the Bahamas. An attractive, interracial gay couple run afoul of the local fundamentalist pastor, who at one point privately sums up the motivation behind his anti-gay campaign thusly: “You have to give people something to hate; it brings them together.” The film is also worth seeing for its beautiful photography of sun-bathed, seaside locales.

Forever’s Gonna Start Tonight, with its title taken from Bonnie Tyler’s hit song of the 80’s, “Total Eclipse of the Heart,” is an admirably unsentimental documentary that turns its lens on 75-year old, transgendered drag performer Vicki Marlane. Still performing today after 59 years as a drag artist at Aunt Charlie’s in San Francisco, Marlane speaks candidly of her upbringing, legal run-ins, ill-fated love affairs and addictions. Marlane and the film’s producer-director, Michelle Lawler, are scheduled to appear at the Outfest screening.

Role/Play, the latest from Rob Williams, director of past gay hits Back Soon and Make the Yuletide Gay. It is a smart and sexy account of what might happen if a closeted gay soap opera star (hunky Steve Callahan) and an outspoken gay activist with marriage troubles (Matthew Montgomery, Callahan’s real-life partner) were to meet at a Palm Springs resort.

A Marine Story is timely to say the least, what with the current debate over revoking the US military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy. Based on actual events, the film focuses on a recently-discharged lesbian (a dramatically and physically strong performance by Dreya Weber) who discovers her troubles are just beginning once she returns to her hometown. Written, directed and even edited — all very well — by Ned Farr.

Standouts among the numerous recommended short films to be shown during Outfest are the cute and funny Go Go Reject, which features the adorable Heath Daniels as a stripper hopeful who is labeled as too skinny but who isn’t going to take “No” for an answer; Last Address, an unusual, quietly devastating travelogue of the final residences inhabited by New York City-based artists who died of AIDS; and Public Relations, an upbeat romantic-comedy in which two female personal assistants meet and fall in love.

For me, Outfest wouldn’t be complete each year without its Sing-Along Musical night at the Ford Amphitheater. The 2010 winner of the annual online vote by Outfest fans is Grease 2, the campy 1982 sequel to Grease. Hardly as well-received as its predecessor, Grease 2 is still entertaining and somewhat underrated. It stars Michelle Pfeiffer in her first big-screen lead role, as well as then-pretty Maxwell Caulfield, a then-hot Adrian Zmed and Judy Garland’s daughter, Lorna Luft. What’s not to enjoy? It will screen at 8:30 PM on July 15. Feel free to dress as a T-Bird or Pink Lady!

The hilarious-sounding new comedy Spork will wrap up Outfest during the Closing Night Gala on July 18. For a complete listing of films or to purchase tickets for screenings and related events, please visit the Outfest website or call (213) 480-7065.

Preview by Rev. Chris Carpenter, resident film critic of Movie Dearest and the Orange County and Long Beach Blade.

Liberace: The Movie!

It seems some projects never die. The long rumored feature biopic of the legendarily flamboyant entertainer Liberace has resurfaced, and with some unexpected names attached to it.

Variety reports that Academy Award winner Steven Soderbergh will direct, with his Traffic star Michael Douglas as Mr. Showmanship himself and his Ocean's Eleven star Matt Damon as his boyfriend, Scott Thorson. You may recall the palimony suit that Thorson hit Liberace with, claiming they were lovers, which was ultimately settled out of court. A year later, Liberace died due to complications from AIDS. Even adding all that up (not to mention pictures like this one), some people still insist he wasn't gay.

There has been two previous made for television biopics of Liberace, starring Andrew Robinson and Victor Garber, respectively. At one time, Robin Williams was rumored to play Lee on film, but nothing ever came of that (he has the (hairy) legs for it though, again referencing the attached picture). Richard LaGravanese is currently working on the script for this one, which has no set schedule at this point.

And in more gay biopic news, Alan Alda, Jeff Daniels, Mary-Louise Parker, Paul Rudd and David Strathairn have all signed up to join James Franco as Allen Ginsberg in Howl.

Contrary to previous reports, documentary filmmakers Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman will be making their narrative feature debut with the project, which will focus on the obscenity trial launched to censor Ginsberg's groundbreaking book-length poem, the Howl of the title.

Cinematic Crush: James Franco

Crush object: James Franco, actor.

- He first caught our attention as one of the Freaks and Geeks in that short-lived but still fondly remembered television series.

- Critical acclaim and a Golden Globe came with his strong performance as legendary rebel James Dean in the 2001 TV movie of the same name, for which he was also nominated for Emmy and Screen Actors Guild Awards.

- Originally considered for Peter Parker, he ended up cast as his best friend/future nemesis Harry Osborn in Spider-Man and its two sequels.

- Other notable films include Sonny, City by the Sea, The Company, Tristan & Isolde, Annapolis, Flyboys and In the Valley of Elah.

- In the tradition of Brad Pitt in True Romance, this pretty boy goes to pot in this weekend's Pineapple Express. Next up, two high profile gay biographic roles: this December's Milk (as Harvey Milk's lover Scott Smith) and next year's Howl (as beat poet Allen Ginsberg).

Franco as Ginsberg

Here's some unexpected queer cinema scoop from Comic-Con, of all places. While promoting his next movie Pineapple Express, James Franco revealed to MTV News that he has been cast as legendary "Beat Generation" poet Allen Ginsberg in Howl, an upcoming documentary by the award winning team of Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman.

Considering that it is a documentary, I'm not exactly sure how Franco could "play" Ginsberg; perhaps in reenactments and/or voice-overs. Interestingly enough, this will be the second time this year in which Franco went "gay for pay" on film. He will also portray Scott Smith, Harvey Milk's lover, in Gus Van Sant's biopic Milk, due this December.

Epstein and Friedman are no doubt familiar to Movie Dearest readers as the creators of such seminal gay docs as The Celluloid Closet, Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt and, ironically, The Times of Harvey Milk. The latter two films won Academy Awards.