"The People We Hate at the Wedding": Two sisters and their mum find love, the gay guy doesn't, and there's only one penis

  

Link to NSFW version

The 2017 novel The People We Hate at the Wedding is about a wealthy British girl, Eloise, hoping to reconcile with her two American half-siblings, Alice and Paul, by inviting them to her lavish wedding.  Paul is gay, complete with longsuffering boyfriend. 

 Knowing how much Hollywood loves to straighten gay characters, I watched the 2022 movie version on Amazon Prime to make sure that Paul stays gay.

Scene 1: Various childhood antics of the half-siblings, including a disastrous Santa Claus-sitting with a very cute, harried harried Elf photographer (Brandon Johnston, left).

Scene 2: The young adult Alice, who works at a small desk in a big office, checks her mail: the invitation to her half-sister Eloise's wedding!   She calls her brother, Paul (Ben Platt), who works at some sort of counseling center, to see if he got one.  Yep.  "But We're not going.  We hate her!"  

Scene 3: The siblings' Mom tries on clothes and plot-dumps on the sales clerk: Her husband is dead, so her romantic life is over (she'll find love by Act 2). Also, her kids aren't going to Eloise's wedding because they hate her.

Scene 4: At work, Alice gets summoned by the Boss (Jorma Taccone), to screw in the supply closet, followed by lunch.  Jonathan wonders if she just likes him for his money.  "Of course not.  I like you for your dick."  

Scene 5: Paul is out with a straight guy(Randall Park) and three femme, double-entendre-spouting gay guys (Greg Barnett, Karan Soni, Pedro Minas), who brag about the new guy they've added to their threesome. Wait -- they are already a threesome, aren't they?

Three guys doing gay stuff together!  Paul is sick of gay hypersexuality and flamboyance, so he hangs back to talk to the straight guy. So this Paul is straight, too? 

 Then they all go to see King Lear.  At the line "How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is to have a thankless child!," Mom texts Paul, asking him to please come to the wedding. 

Scene 6:  Alice drops Boss off at his house, pretending to be an Uber driver so his wife doesn't get suspicious.  He wants a permanent relationship, so he's going to ask for a separation -- sometime.  Wife comes out of the house carrying a baby, making Alice feel guilty.

Scene 7:  Paul in bed with his boyfriend, discussing their disapproval of the three-way relationship. Wait -- he was one of the flamboyant three-way guys.  I'm confused.   

All they do is hug and chat, but I guess that's enough to make Paul canonically gay at Minute 14.

Paul explains why he hates his Mom: after his dad died, she threw out all of his stuff, and never mentioned him again.  Boyfriend talks him into the wedding anyway, because it's in London.  Ugh!  London is my least favorite city in Europe. I've visited 5 or 6 times, and never had a positive experience. 

Scene 8:  Alice watches her boss/boyfriend living a public life without her and decides to go to the wedding after all.  Then she goes into his office and slips off her underwear -- just as the housekeeper shows up.  Hey, the housekeeper is D'Arcy Carden, who starred with Kristen Bell in The Good Place!  I wonder who else from that show will appear.  Maybe Ted Danson?

Scene 9:   Paul at work.  He mentioned that he doesn't like scones, so the Boyfriend sent him a scone basket to be mean. Mom calls; he hangs up on her.  

Next, the Counseling Center boss, Dr. Goulding (Tony Goldwyn), found security-cam footage of him hugging a patient after an emotional breakthrough. Inappropriate!  A month of unpaid leave!  Now Paul has no choice but to go to the wedding. 

I'm bored.  I'll fast-forward to the good parts after the break

"Fire Island": Swishy, Asian, and fat guys face the world of "No fats, no femmes, no Asians" on Fire Island

 

I lived in Manhattan for four years, but visited the gay resort of Fire Island only twice, in the off season.  But I heard stories of the summertime: nonstop bacchanalia, the whole island turning into a bathhouse, the swimming, dancing, and socializing just breathers amid the tricking.  Guys who lived closeted lives back in the city, who rarely hooked up and never dated for fear of Mom or the boss finding out, became intoxicated by the sexual freedom.   So I am expecting the 2022 movie Fire Island to be a sex romp.  

Scene 1 (Thursday): Asian muscle guy wakes up, thinking of that quote from Pride and Prejudice: "It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife."  Well, Austin was wrong: not every man wants a wife.  Cut back to see a black muscle hunk in his bed!  Surprise -- he's gay!  Not really -- I read the synopsis.  Asian muscle guy (Noah, played by Joel Kim Booster) is shocked that last night's trick is still around.  "He had the boyfriend look -- that's not me."  

Noah rushes to get to the dock on time.  He sees his "faggots" beckoning furiously from the ferry.  "Don't cancel me," he cautions. "I'm reclaiming it."   

They are all 30-ish queens who flutter and carry handbags and call each other "girlfriend."  He explains: they all met ten years ago, when they were working at a brunch spot in Williamsburg: "Bottomless mimosas."  

1.-2. Luke and Keegan (back row left), a couple, I think, dropped out of film school.

3. Max (back row right), a little chunky, reading a biography of Marilyn Albright, is super-smart but a bit of a downer.

4. Howie, his best friend (front row right), has a cushy job in San Francisco, but returns for the Fire Island trip every year.  They bonded over the anti-Asian prejudice they experienced in the gay community. 

Hey, there are five friends, and there are five Bennett sisters in Pride and Prejudice.  Could there be a connection?

Noah takes his shirt off, but doesn't draw any attention from the other guys on the ferry.   Although he's a muscle-hunk, he still has trouble hooking up in a culture that values whiteness, thinness, and masculinity: "No fats, no fems, no Asians." He's two out of the three!

Scene 3: They arrive at Fire Island, and drag their "hello, kitty" luggage all the way up to the beach house.  Most of the men they pass are cruising everyone -- except them.  Howie tries a "hello," and is told "No, thanks."  This seems a little harsh.  Surely someone on Fire Island is into feminine men! 

They are greeted with "Bitch!  I thought I smelled some bottoms!" by their lesbian fag hag friend, Erin.  (It's ok, I'm reclaiming it).  Noah explains: ten years ago she accidentally ate a piece of glass at an Olive Garden, got a huge settlement, and bought the house where they all spend a week every summer.

Scene 4: Noah and Howie smoking and drinking.  Howie is upset because Fire Island is all about hooking up, and he wants a boyfriend.  Noah scoffs: monogamy was invented by heterosexual men to maintain control over their wives' bodies.  Gay people are free from all that nonsense; so just pick a dick or two, and have at it!  Ten to one they get together. 

Howie also states that he's never had sex.  A cute, young guy living in San Francisco wants sex but can't find a partner?  Impossible!  Just walk down the street; you'll be cruised a dozen times.  I'm over 60, living in a small town on the Plains, and if I want "Mr. Right Now," I just have to go on Grindr for about 20 minutes.  

Howie agrees to let Noah set him up with a trick.  Except he has to be a nice guy.  

Scene 5: Plot complication: Mama Erin reveals to the "girls" that she's broke, so she has to sell the house.  They're too poor to come unless they get free lodging, so this will be their last week on Fire Island, ever.  

I'll stop the scene-by-scene there.  You just need to know that:

1. This movie is heftier than I expected, centering on the problems that feminine and Asian men face in a gay culture that denigrates or fetishizes them.  

2. There are lots of parallels with Pride and Prejudice.  It's easy to identify Noah as Elizabeth Bennett, Howie as Jane, Will (Conrad Riccamora, left) as Mr. Darcy, and Charlie (James Scully) as Mr. Bingley.  

3. And there's all of the foam parties, underwear parties, fetish parties, dark room hookups, beach hookups, veranda hookups, and behind-the-bushes hookups that you remember (or heard about).  I didn't think that such things still happened in the era of Grindr, and in fact Noah loses his cell phone right away, giving his erotic machinations a distinctly nostalgic feel. 

My Grade: A.

"Just Friends": Dutch Rom-Com about RIch/Poor Boys and their Overbearing Mothers

 Just Friends, on Amazon Prime, a tv-movie from 2018: "Something beyond the pleasures of a young gay love story, and the conflicts with their families have nothing to do with their sexuality."  

It might be a change of pace from the endless autobiographical "coming out in a world where no gay institutions exist."  

Plus it's from the Netherlands. I'll check it out.

Scene 1:  The motorcycling Joris (Josha Stradowski) leaves Amsterdam, stops to play with his drone, and calls his mother.  At a shopping mall, the heavily-shopping, smoking socialite, who looks the same age as Joris, upbraids him for forgetting Mother's Day. Suddenly her heel catches on the escalator, and she falls on her face. Har-har.  Serves her right for being an entitled richster.    

Joris continues on the motorcycle, and finally meets Mom and snippy, entitled teenage Sister.  They criticize him for not visiting his father while he was sick, although they didn't visit, either.  

They've come to the cemetery to pick up Dad's ashes.  No one wants them, so Joris gets them by default.  

Scene 2: Feet getting off a train. No doubt Yad (Majd Mardo), Syrian refugee, waiting at the train station.  He remembers working as a stripper (in a gay club, I assume) and overdosing on GHB and vodka.  A nice, non-critical middle-class Mom picks him up -- she even brings pastry!  She tells him not to use the name of Jesus in vain (fundamentalist -- is she going to be homophobic?  And not Muslim.  I guess there are Christians in Syria). 

At home, Dad is busily working on his book.  Yad hugs him and his baby sister.  Mom says that since he's moved back home, he'll pay rent and do his own laundry.  I get it -- rich is entitled and bitchy, poor (or middle class) is kind and virtuous.

Scene 3:  Yad goes to the beach and asks for his old job as a surfing instructor back.  Nope, full up.   A girl hugs him and welcomes him home -- he was in a downward spiral in Amsterdam.  They go surfing (surfboards with little sails attached). 

Meanwhile, Joris is at the same beach, playing with his drone.  He sees Yad, and sends his drone out to investigate. "Yum...what a hunk!"

Scene 4: Back home, Joris mixes up some muscle-building powder.  He passes Mom -- super-strung out on drugs -- and goes to the gym, where the personal trainer criticizes his technique (poor guy gets criticized by everybody).  He stops to gaze at the bulge of the guy doing bench presses (um...we already knew that he was gay before we started the movie.  He calls his grandmother, and promises to pick up milk.

Meanwhile Yad is filling out a job application. "It's just cleaning, no nursing or groceries, and it's just 14.5 per hour" ($16.45 U.S., which is double minimum wage.  What's the problem).  She gives him the job -- and her phone number.  Hey, that's sexual harassment!

Scene 5: Cut to Yad making an old lady's bed, while she bemoans world events, mentions that she lost her best friend Sophie to the Holocaust,  and asks where he's from.  He won't say.  Suddenly her grandson arrives with the milk.  Time for a meet-cute.

But first Grandma sits Grandson Joris down with chocolate milk to discuss family squabbles.  Yad comes in; Joris turns in slow motion.  His jaw drops to the floor.  The most beautiful man he's ever seen!  Geez, they do that old cliche even in gay romances. 

They shake hands.  Yad finds some reason to bend over to display his butt (I knew you were a bottom three scenes ago).   Unfortunately, Joris is too overcome by horniness to say anything.  

Joris goes out to trim Grandma's hedge, and takes off his shirt, but Yad is not impressed: he complains to Grandma about her grandson's use of  "ridiculous muscle-building machines."  It's called a gym, dude. You have to join one, or they take away your gay card.

Scene 6:  Upset over his inability to attract the hunk, Joris goes home and collapses onto the bed.  Meanwhile, Yad tells his Mom about his new job.  She disapproves; "You went to medical school!"  "I dropped out."  "Cleaning old ladies' rooms is beneath you!"  "I like it"

Scene 7:   Joris at a barbecue at his Sister's elegant house, chatting while her husband tries to grill while holding a baby. Give him a hand instead of ruminating over your problems!  He decides to take surfing lessons to impress the hunk, and doesn't stick around for dinner. 

Scene 8:  Joris paying for his surfing lessons.  The sign says "No Credit Cards" in English.  That's the problem with the Netherlands -- you rarely hear Dutch in public.  Whoops, he's assigned a girl teacher.  Nope, changed my mind!  

Next stop: Grandma's house, where apparently Yad has a full-time job cleaning and being hunky.  Yad asks: "What music are you listenng to?"  A conversation opener! Go for it!  But Joris is too overwhelmed by horniness to answer properly, so Yad takes the lead, going through his playlist and commenting.  

Overcome by horniness, Joris rushes off.  This guy is a basket case!  Is he not, like, aware that he is gay?  Yad yells "Hey, can I get your number?"  Grandma gives it to him.

Scene 9:  Joris on the exercise bike at the gym.  Yad sends him some sexy pics.  He texts a date request.  But Yad never responds! 

Scene 10: Mom is at Grandma's house to discuss her birthday.  Yad introduces himself.  Mom is prejudiced against refugees or Syrians: "he'll steal all your valuables."  But Grandma insists on giving him his own key. to the house.  

When she leaves, Grandma apologizes: She used to be a nice girl.  Then she got rich. 

Scene 11:  Back home, Mom rants at Joris about Grandma's new "Muslim type."  Finally the "Muslim type" texts him back; they set up the date.  The overjoyed Joris rushes to shower and change clothes.  Mom is suspicious.

While Joris picks up Yad for their date, Yad's Dad stares from an upstairs window.  Does he, like, not know that his son is gay?

Scene 12:  The date is hanging out at the beach -- where they go every day anyway.  How about something a little more elaborate, like a nice dinner -- in town?  I'm sick of looking at a beach.  They play with the drone, swim, and finally do a weird upside down kiss. 

I'll stop the scene-by-scene recap there. 

Yad and Joris are both out to all their relatives, so that's not a problem.  Everyone approves of the match except the Moms, each of whom thinks that the boyfriend isn't good enough for her son.  Conflict comes with....um...Joris's Dad had an affair before he died?  

Beefcake:  Joris has his shirt off a lot, and displays an underwear bulge.  Yad, not so much.  There are no other significant male characters, just sisters and mothers.

Gay Characters:  Just Joris and Yad.

Locations: Just the beach at Almere, 30 km from Amsterdam.  I wanted to see the Oude Kirke and some canals.

Rich/Poor Divide:  They appear to be trying a rich boy/poor boy conflict, but I can't really tell the difference between the two families.  Both are clearly affluent.

Title:  They're never just friends, that is, not-romantic.  Does "gewoon vrienden" mean something else in Dutch?

My Grade: B.

"Call Me By Your Name": Or Better Yet, Don't Call Me At All

 I didn't want to see Call Me By Your Name (2017).  Movies about teenagers struggling with same-sex desire in a world where gay culture doesn't exist are so 1990s -- Edge of 17, Beautiful Thing, Ernesto.  Plus the whole "call me by your name" thing makes me sick to my stomach, evoking the old homophobic myth that gay people are all narcissists, falling in love with themselves.

But Bob ordered it for movie night, as a break from the endless rounds of superheroes.  

It's 1983.  A wealthy (as in two servants), multinational, multilingual family is spending the summer in their huge house in Tuscany, where Dad dredges up archaeological artifacts and writes books that for some reason reference Heidegger (what does the meaning of ontology have to do with underwater archaeology?).  Mom has some sort of job translating Medieval French romances from German into English.  16 year old Elio (Timothee Chalamant) spends his time his time writing and transcribing music, usually while swimming so the paper gets all wet, and playing Bach through the lens of Chopin or something.  

Elio does not own a shirt, and the camera positively drools over his body.  Granted, some teenage physiques are attractive, but the actor kept playing Elio as so aggressively childlike that I couldn't think of him as anything but a little kid.  

There is no gay culture in this world, but Mom and Dad are ultra-laid back about gay people.  When a gay couple comes over for dinner, Elio snidely refers to them as Sonny and Cher, and Dad berates him for homophobia: one of them knows more about economics than anyone else in the world.  Who cares if he's gay?  He's important!

When 24-year old Oliver (Armie Hammer) arrives, Mom, Dad, and an unspecified friend fawn over him so exuberantly that I thought he was a famous movie star.  Turns out they're just absurdly over-enthusiastic about Dad's new research assistant, staying with them for six weeks to help catalogue some of his archaeological finds or edit the Heidegger out of his latest manuscript or dispute the Greek-Latin-Arabic etymology of the word apricot.  But Oliver doesn't do much work; he spends most of his time swimming, playing volleyball, going to village dances, and riding his bicycle endlessly through the countryside.

Elio instantly falls head-over-heels for the "arrogant" American.  It's unclear whether he has experienced same-sex attraction before, but he tries to counter by having sex with two girls (or with the same girl twice, I'm not sure).  

Oliver, busily courting a girl of his own (or it might be the same girl), pretends not to notice Elio's flirtation.  Then he says "We can't talk about this.  We just can't."  Finally he permits a kiss, but refuses to go farther: "We've been good so far.  We haven't done anything wrong.  But this has to stop here."

I was confused, and I'm still confused.  Why can't they date?  Is it the gay thing or the age thing?  Same-sex acts have been legal in Italy since 1890, and the age of consent is 14.  

Finally Oliver permits a sneaky clandestine relationship, which includes sex (while the camera shifts to a potted plant) and that "call me by your name" thing, which made me sick to my stomach to watch.

Oliver gets a little aggressive, forcing Elio to eat an apricot that he's just...um, never mind...and saying "Come here. Drop your pants," which gave me a bad feeling.  There's already a power differential, and now he's borderline abusive, after just one date?

Mom and Dad deduce that the two are dating, and are absurdly supportive.  Dad welcomes Oliver to the family.  Mom arranges for the two to go on a romantic vacation together.  But Oliver obviously wasn't planning on settling down with a 16-year old life partner; when his research assistant job ends, he says "it's been real" and high-tails it back to America.  

Six months later, he calls to tell Elio that he is getting married to a woman.  Dad tries to cheer Elio up with a long, rambling, convoluted heart-to-heart, but it doesn't work.  He sits by the fire and cries.  The end.

The movie is beautifully shot, with lots of scenes of the Italian countryside (no cities), but very, very long.  The two hours and 15 minutes drag and drag, as nothing happens, then nothing happens, then nothing happens. And I still don't understand why Oliver was so resistant: the gay thing, the age thing, or "I'm not into relationships.  With guys, anyway."   

Final thought: it's 1983  Why have I never heard of any of the songs they listen to?  

My grade: C+.