Out gay actor Matt Bomer won his first Golden Globe for his supporting role as Felix Turner in the television film about the AIDS Epidemic ‘THE NORMAL HEART’.
An excited Bomer thanked his husband Simon Halls and their three children in his acceptance speech.
Matt Bomerwho stripped his way in the movie Magic Mike to be named No 2 in Logo’s Hot 100 List in 2013, has just been chosen to play MONTGOMERY CLIFT in a much anticipated made-for-TV biopic on this charismatic but closeted film star’s life. It will be written by Ira Sachs and Mauricio Zacharias who together penned the gay blockbuster ‘LOVE IS STRANGE’ that is about to open in UK Cinemas in February. He has also just wrapped up filming MAGIC MIKE XXL which will be unleashed on our screens later this year.
★★★ | Inherent Vice, Expecting Boogie Nights, you will be disappointed
The reclusive writer Thomas Pynchon is known for his dense and complex novels which he has never allowed to be adapted into movies, until now that is. When ‘Inherent Vice’ his seventh novel was published in 2009 the dust jacket proclaimed that it was ‘part-noir, part-psychedelic romp’.
The piece is set in 1970 and unkempt Doc Spotello a Private Eye sporting big mutton chops and as usual in a dope-fuelled haze, is in his Gordetta Beach hangout when Shasta Fay Hepworth one of his ex-squeezes turns up unexpectedly to ask for his help. She wants him to track down her secret lover, big-shot land developer Mickey Wolfmann, who’s vanished. Shasta is worried that Mrs. Wolfmann who has her own lover, wants to commit her husband to a loony bin but before Doc can even start investigating, Shasta disappears too.
When Doc gets on the case he heads out to Channel View Estates, Wolfmann’s latest cheesy housing development, and en route pops into a sex parlor there looking for one of the owner’s bodyguards who he thinks will be able to help him. As he gets ready to leave Doc is knocked out, only to wake up much later next to the body of the dead bodyguard, a burly Nazi-loving biker, and he is instantly accused of murder by the cops.
Doc gets out of this particular mess as his old nemesis Det. ‘Bigfoot’ Bjornsen knows he is innocent but nevertheless he and the FBI press him into helping them locate Wolfmann and a missing musician Coy Harlington who they all want to talk to as well. And looming over everything is the ‘Golden Fang’ that Doc has been warned to avoid. What this is he is never quite sure, and neither are we. At first it appears it is maybe a blacklisted movie star’s personal sailing vessel, or one that belongs to an Indo-Chinese drug cartel. Or it may even be the name of a syndicate of tax-dodging dentists fronted by a coke-snorting Dr. Feelgood.
Both Wolfmann and Hartigan are found but by this time the plot is so convoluted that we have no chance of making head of tale of it unless we are as perpetually stoned as Doc is. What makes this ‘haze’ so enjoyable however is the inspired and zany delicious humor that is always a strength of Anderson’s films, plus some rather wonderful performances from a fine cast led by Joaquin Phoenix as Doc. Phoenix brings his hallmark manic manner to the role and is excruciatingly wonderful as he totally lives a part that is so tailor-made for him.
Fine turns too from Josh Brolin as Bigfoot, a barely recognisable Benicio Del Toro as a Lawyer, Owen Wilson (who is always happy when he is stoned) as Coy, and delightfully over-the-top performance by Martin Short as Dr Feelgood.
If like me you were expecting this to follow on from Anderson’s 1997 breakthrough movie the sensational ‘Boogie Nights’ set in this same period, you will be disappointed as it’s simply not in the same league. It is however still a joy to watch and appreciate his highly personal stylised approach to filmmaking as he revels in a period and culture that he has such empathy with. Just make sure you read the novel first, and maybe take a puff or two as well.
John Eleuthère du Pont the spoilt heir to the vast Dupont chemical fortune was a dangerous paranoid psychopath who ended up destroying lives when he didn’t get his own way. The fact that he was also a deeply disturbed closeted homosexual is also very obvious in this new chilling true crime drama based on his life, yet it is a fact that nearly all the critics, without exception, have chosen to ignore.
Du Pont lived in the shadows of his dominant elderly aristocratic mother on their vast estate in Pennsylvania which he had renamed Foxcatcher Farm. His mother’s one obsession was her herd of thoroughbred horses and the Trophy Room that housed all their awards was the most important place in their Mansion. Du Pont deeply resented his Mother’s preference to her stallions over him, and so he built a gym in the grounds to focus on his one big addiction to the sport of wrestling, well wrestlers in particular.
The year is 1987, and three years prior Mark Shultz and his brother Dave had won Gold Medals for wrestling at the Olympic Games in Los Angeles. Whilst Dave has settled down in Colorado and got married, had children and has a job coaching, Mark has a sad solitary life where his main daily function is to train for the next World Games. When he gets a phone call out of the blue from multi-millionaire du Pont inviting him to fly to Pennsylvania as his guest for a meeting, having nothing to lose, he accepts the free plane ticket and goes.
Du Pont tells Mark that he wants not just to underwrite all his expenses but for him to establish a team of wrestlers under the Foxcatcher banner that he would like to help train for the World Games. If they all live on campus, he will also pay them generous wages too. It’s an offer that loner Mark cannot refuse and without even questioning, du Pont’s possible motives, throws his few worldly possessions in a Uhaul truck and drives across country to his new rather lush quarters on the Estate.
Du Pont had wanted both of the Shultz brothers to lead his new team, but when Mark failed to persuade Dave to join him, du Pont lavished all his attention on just Mark. The new training facilities pay off, and three months later Mark won a Gold Medal at the World Games and schizophrenic du Pont started to treat the young athlete more like a son whenever he was in a good mood. Up to this point Shultz had kept to his highly disciplined routine which excluded things like alcohol but pressured by du Pont he tried and liked recreational drugs which would eventually lead to the decline in the two men’s relationships.
Director Bennett Miller shows that du Pont clearly gets off on physical contact with Shultz when the two men attempt to wrestle (du Pont misguidedly thinks he also has a talent for the sport too) and leaves the implication that this may have satisfied the effete older man’s homosexual desires. However, when du Pont doesn’t get what he wants and it seems that Shultz’s new unhealthy addictions render him unable to win matches, he throws a heap of money at Dave to persuade him to come and train the Team after all.
The vain du Pont who is now underwriting the US Wrestling Team for the Seoul Olympics insists on being recognised as the official coach even though Dave Shultz is actually doing the work. Dave accepts this to a point but a now sober Mark is deeply resentful of du Pont and his power, and although he is still prepared to accept his money, he refuses to have anything do with the man who he once allowed to fawn over him. After he fails to win a Gold Medal at the Olympics, Mark finally moves out of the Foxcatcher Estate leaving his brother to face a fate that no-one could have predicted.
Miller, working with a script by E. Max Frye & Dan Futterman, allows this excellent creepy tale to unravel at a pace that is a little too slow at times. It’s a great ‘vehicle’ for the talented comic actor Steve Carrell to show his remarkable range playing the thoroughly unpleasant du Pont, but as good as he is I don’t think he will join the list of actors who wore prosthetic noses and won an Oscar for their efforts. He was joined on screen by the great Vanessa Redgrave who had a very tiny lame role as the mother; Channing Tatum as Mark which was at least a role that suited his expressionless style of acting; and Mark Ruffalo who was totally superb as a beefed up Dave.
P.S. Back to the question of du Pont’s sexuality that Miller throws us so many clues about, from him waking up a near-naked Shultz after midnight to give him a book (!), to his insistence on demonstrating intimate crutch grabbing wrestling moves that he wasn’t trained to do, to the sight of his horrified mother watching her effeminate son getting ‘low’ on the mat etc. To a gay audience this will undoubtedly appear as a classic case of a rich older effete man chasing a big dumb blond sports jock: known as a ‘chicken hawk’: not too dissimilar to ‘foxcatcher’.
Bad news for all those JUSTIN BIEBER fans who drooled over the new photos this week of the boy in his CK pants.
It turns out that maybe Justin Bieber is not quite as hot as we were led to believe as the folks at CK have appeared to have enhanced the photos to make the boy seem bigger all over. Just like most people do with their Grindr profiles.
Celebrate the end of 2014 with this rather sensational mega-mash video by the film website JoBlo.com that collects the best moments from 330 memorable movies released this year.
We are fast approaching the New Year’s Honours List when HM The Queen will make a few more illustrious women who have made significant contributions to society a Dame (of the British Empire to be exact). It’s a very select ‘club’ and includes some of our very favourite ladies who have enriched all our lives one way or another. So to honour them, here’s THE GAY UK‘S TOP TEN DAMES
1) DAME JUDI DENCH: if you can win an OSCAR for a performance that lasts no longer than 8 minutes (‘Shakespeare in Love’) then you really are a Star in every sense of the word.
2) DAME MAGGIE SMITH: two-time OSCAR winner and the cutting queen of the perfect put-down with her scary withered looks, we’d watch this grand Dame if she was just reading the phone directory out loud.
3) DAME HELEN MIRREN: whom we actually call Deputy Queen after she stole our hearts and her first OSCAR for playing H.M. with such dignity and style.
4) DAME SHIRLEY BASSEY: the brassy girl from Tiger Bay who has belting out hits for years and sued for belting her staff too. We love her regardless.
5) DAME KIRI TE KANAWA: we fell for this operatic diva from New Zealand when we saw her recording ‘West Side Story’ with Leonard Bernstein (later parodied by French and Saunders who both should be made Dames too)
6) DAME JOAN PLOWRIGHT (Baroness Olivier): if you had ever had the good fortune to see this sublime actress on stage you’d appreciate that she was every bit as good as her famous late husband.
7) DAME EILEEN ATKINS: celebrated actress & writer (she co-created Upstairs Downstairs) with a lengthy stunning resume, but in our eyes she will always be the wonderful snobby Miss Deborah (and big sister to Dame Judi as Miss Matty) in ‘Cranford‘ TV series
8) DAME DIANE RIGG: a multi-awarding winning ‘serious’ actress and one of the first to ‘bare all’ on a West End stage, she is still however best known for her sexy leather clad Emma Peel in the hit TV series ‘The Avengers ‘in the 1960’s
9) BARONESS BAKEWELL D.B.E.: one of very first female TV presenters on the heavyweight current affairs programmes to be taken seriously. Never afraid to be forthright and frank with her views she was dubbed ‘the thinking man’s crumpet’.
We couldn’t decide on 10th place so we are awarding this spot to two great Dames
10) DAME JULIE ANDREWS: probably one of the most ‘English’ of our list even though she left our shores many years ago to climb every mountain and fly over chimney pots.
10) DAME EVELYN GLENNIE: profoundly deaf since 12 years old this Scottish virtuoso percussionist not only doe she make such incredible music, Dame Evelyn has a seemingly limitless capacity to inspire all of us.
With the North Korean Government furious about the Hollywood comedy that dared to portray an assassination of their Supreme Leader, they hacked into Sony’s computers and scared the Studio to make them panic enough to withdraw the movie from all US screens before its release date on Christmas Day. Even President Obama pitched in to this unprecedented major public controversy, and so a few days later Sony relented and allowed the movie to be shown in a few theatres and online after all.
t’s not due in UK cinemas until February 6th but we had THEGAYUK’s Contributing Editor Roger Walker-Dack take a sneak preview to review the film and tell us if the fuss was really justified. Here is his report:-
If the North Korean Government hadn’t insisted on making this the most talked about movie this Christmas there is little doubt that this off-colour sophomoric comedy would have quickly passed through cinemas practically unnoticed by most of us. It’s crude and smutty humor that, like most movies that the actor James Franco is connected with these days, is overly obsessed with being ‘gay’, and it also relies heavily on his and the writers obvious fascination with anal matters too.
If you have been anywhere near a newspaper this past week you will know that this comedy is about a fictionalised attempt to assassinate Kim Jong-Un the Supreme Leader of North Korea. Mr. Jong Un felt so miffed at the idea that he may have had his people hack Sony’s computers and issue threats of dire consequences if the movie was shown. If only he had bothered to watch the film himself then I think if he would be outraged at anything, it would be much more about how the plot totally disintegrates towards the end and just sinks into a rather pathetic bloody battle giving the film a very unfunny finale.
Essentially its the story of a lightweight TV presenter Dave Skylark who fills his nightly talk show with ridiculous reality items but then one night the singer Eminem accidentally comes out as ‘gay’ and for once the show’s ratings soar. It whets the appetite of Adam the show’s producer who is desperate for more serious content, which they suddenly think, is possible when they discover in magazine that the North Korean Leader is a big fan of the show. He has refused interviews with the world’s press to date but agrees to grant one to his hero Dave Skylark. A fact that attracts the attention of the CIA who recruit both Dave and Adam with a request that they seize this unique opportunity to take the Leader out.
The plan almost fails before it begins when nice-but-dim Dave decides to do things his way when they arrive in Korea, and then he changes his mind completely anyway after a day of male bonding with his new ‘best friend’ the ‘Kate Perry’ loving Kim. Adam meanwhile does some ‘bonding’ of his own with their ferocious female guide Sook and afterwards together they plot to sabotage the rather innocuous interview that Leader’s handlers are insisting on.
The movie is a reuniting of Seth Rogan (who also is a co-director and co-writer with Evan Goldberg) and James Franco after their first, and much superior comedy ‘This Is The End’ in 2013. The two have great screen chemistry together but the lion share of the laughs is left to Rogan who is much more at home in these frat-boy comedies than his co-star. The one thing Franco is good at however is over-acting which suits him to a tee in his role of the eager-to-please tabloid TV presenter.
There are a few good laughs … mainly at the Korean’s expense in this silly uneven comedy … and compared to something that is really offensive like ‘Borat’ in the end this is tame stuff that will very soon be forgotten, and in the end we are much more likely to remember the drama surrounding it instead.
Hollywood has a knack of bungling the adaption of hit Broadway musicals when it tries to capture the same magic for the silver screen.
Just think of the turgid Les Miserables in 2012 or the excruciatingly painful ‘Nine’ in 2009. However when they get it right as with Tim Burton’s take on Sweeney Todd, or discovering Jennifer Hudson in Bill Condon version of Dreamgirls, then the results are wonderfully entertaining. Of the two musical movies vying for our attention this Christmas, one at least is as good as it can get, and something that its original writer and composer Stephen Sondheim can be relieved and even happy about.
‘Into The Woods’ is a wonderful mix of classic light and dark fairy tales that Sondheim uses to weave around an original story of his own. It’s the tale of a Baker and his childless wife who have been cursed by a witch after the Baker’s late father had stolen her magic beans. To enable them to break the spell so that they can conceive a baby, the witch sets them a list of things they must acquire for her before the 3rd midnight. It includes a cloak as red as blood, that they ‘relieve’ Red Riding Hood of; a cow that is milky white which they barter with Jack of Jack & the Beanstalk; the slipper as pure as gold that they get from Cinderella as she is running from the Prince; and the hair as yellow as corn which is snipped off Rapunzel after she lowers it out of the window of the tower she is imprisoned in .
As the Baker and his wife go about encountering all these characters we get a slice of each of their stories. Jack egged on by his mother steals from the Giant who lives at the top of the Beanstalk, and when he is pursued, kills him only to have the rage of the Giant’s wife inflicted on the whole village. Cinderella gets to go to the Kings Festival thanks to her Fairy Godmother, but when she is eventually tracked down by the Prince, she discovers he is not quite as wonderful as we thought. He quips in defence ‘I’m meant to be charming, not sincere!’ Rapunzel is pursued by the Prince’s younger brother but when her mother (the witch) discovers the lovers she blinds him. Luckily Rapunzel’s tears give him back his sight.
The real magic though is in Sondheim’s outstanding music in what is probably one of his best ever scores. Director Rob Marshall opens the movie with a long take of the song ‘I Wish’ which cleverly introduces all the major characters and sets the storyline up from the start. It establishes a pattern for really making the extraordinary songs a much more integral part of the story than usual. What Marshall has added to some pieces is a campy touch of humor that may offend real Sondheim elitists, but in most instances, as in the case of the two Princes so brilliantly mugging their way through the song ‘Agony’, it will surely provoke a spontaneous round of applause from the audience as it did last night when I saw it.
The stage musical has been revived many times on Broadway and on London’s West End and the role of the Witch has been played by a whole slew of the cream of musical theatre. In the movie, however, The Witch is played by Meryl Streep who really adds much more dimension to the part in what is one of her best performances for years. She is both funny and scary and proves that she can really deliver a song with more nuance and power than most.
In fact, Marshall could not have selected a more perfect ensemble cast than he did. Brits James Corden and Emily Blunt had remarkable chemistry together playing the central characters of The Baker and his wife; Anna Kendrick was sublime as Cinderella, as was the ever-fabulous Christine Barenski as her Wicked Stepmother; a welcome return to the screen for Tracey Ullman as Jack’s mother; Chris Pine and Billy Magnussen played the handsome Princes; and in two scene-stealing roles wonderfully talented Lilla Crawford was Little Red Hood and young Daniel Huddlestone was Jack. Plus lest I forget a brief cameo from Johnny Depp as The Wolf.
Using the line from one of the best songs (‘Children Will Listen’) the adverts for the movie warn ‘Be careful what you wish for’. If you are a Sondheim fan or just like musicals, then you’ll learn to that after you see this movie that wishes do come true though, and in many ways.
P.S. Last month we reported in THEGAYUK of the buzz surrounding Meryl Streep’s performance would lead to another Oscar Nomination. Now we can tell you emphatically that we are convinced she is a dead shoo-in for one!
★★★★★ | Leviathan
Award-winning Russian director Andrey Zvagaintsev’s new epic movie opens to the dramatic tones of a Phillip Glass prelude as the camera scans over the desolate sight of a remote small fishing community that looks like it may have seen better times. It is on the Kola Peninsula in northern Russia and its almost deserted coastline is littered with discarded wrecks of boats and the carcases of whales. One of the last residents is Kolya an ex-fisherman now eking out a bare living as a motor mechanic with his pretty younger second wife and his teenage son in a riverside property that the crooked local mayor wants to seize from him in order to construct a new major development.
Kolya is no easy pushover however and enlists the help of Dimitri his ex-army buddy who is now a lawyer in Moscow. The two of them put up a brave fight but they stand no real chance of winning when they find out that everyone in authority in the town is clearly on the mayor’s ‘payroll’, including the local police force and the repugnant Orthodox Christian clergy. Dimitri, however, has an ace up his sleeve as he possesses a detailed File of evidence about the Mayor’s corruption that could be his undoing, but playing this hand could also backfire as it is clear that the Mayor will stop at absolutely nothing to continue to fill his pockets and increase his power.
Nothing quite pans out in this drama as one would expect, and what seems to start out as a political satire on the inbred Russian system of corruption turns into a murder mystery with more than the occasional masterly touches of some brilliant black humour. Zvagaintsev’s passionate portrait is of a culture where the benefits of a contemporary society are still restricted to a privileged few, whilst most of the local population’s lives are firmly stuck in the past which they have no way or means of escaping. The despair and hopelessness seem even more pronounced with such stunning dramatic cinematography that focuses on the cold steel blue of the oft-barren landscape.
The ‘leviathan’ large sea monster that writer/director Zvyagintsev refers too here is metaphorical but the epic struggle that the likes of Kolya must deal with in this very loose retelling of the Book of Job, is not with his faith in God but with the unwieldy and unforgiving Russian state.
It is an extraordinary near perfect masterpiece of storytelling that keeps one on the edge of the seat for the lengthy 142 minutes, and it is very clear to see why it is swooping up Best Picture Awards all over the place, and is on the shortlist for an Academy Award too.
Here’s our Top Ten List of Fab Films to Fill a Christmas Stocking to suit any (movie) buff boyfriend from Amazon that will still arrive by the 25th if you have still not bought a Christmas gift for ‘him indoors’?
A more apt title for this preposterous and painfully unfunny comedy would be ‘Lost in Translation’. Based on a best-selling novel by Richard C. Morais this new movie from the Oscar-nominated king of syrupy schmaltz Lasse Hallstrom (Cider House Rules & Chocolat) and produced by Oprah Winfrey and Stephen Spielberg must have seemed like a fantastic idea on paper as they managed to persuade none other than Oscar Winner Helen Mirren to be their very uncomfortable looking star. After filming this very inane and somewhat patronising piece she could only have only ended up asking the same question as we do now i.e. whatever possessed her!
The story is of an Indian family who has to leave Mumbai in a hurry when their restaurant is destroyed and the matriarch is killed after a political uprising. They seek asylum in London and settle in a cramped home next to Heathrow Airport right under the flight path. However it’s not the fact that they can almost touch the planes as they land that drives them out, but the cold and damp English climate and they set off in a dilapidated camper van to warmer climes of France.
When their van breaks down outside Saint-Antonin-Noble-Vala small picturesque one-street village in the middle of nowhere, Father spies an empty restaurant for sale that he deems will be perfect for the family to establish their new Indian Restaurant. This village evidently only has one other eating establishment (other than the café where everyone has breakfast) and this is smack opposite their new venue. It is in fact just a hundred feet from their front door. This very popular fine dining establishment, which possesses a coveted Michelin star, and a fancy Chef, is run by a chauffeured driven Grand Dame who, for some inexplicable reason, is paranoid about the new competition from a fast-food Indian eatery run by a cook.
The rivalry is petty and too silly for words and is as ridiculous as the silly French accent of the English speaking Madame Mallory. After a chance encounter, Hassan the Indian cook falls in love with Marguerite a sous chef who works for Madame and she encourages him to read a recipe book about fine French cuisine. Then after a few attempts at re-creating classic dishes and before you can say Nigella Lawson he is a cordon-bleu chef and immediately deserts his family to work for Madame herself. Next stop for him is Paris and an even fancier restaurant where as Chef de Cuisine he becomes an overnight sensation winning more Michelin stars with easy.
However, fame and success isn’t everything for Hassan and as he misses his family he hurries back to Madame‘s country restaurant where he can get the taste of both Marguerite and fresh local produce once again.
This rather innocuous tale is an excruciating 2 hours long and has no redeeming features other than the location of the small town, and the rather scrumptious food.
