Gay love, shame, blame, pride, change: Take your pick, try 'em all!

Reviewer: James van Maanen
Fixing Frank: Rating (out of 5): ***½
Hard Pill: Rating (out of 5): ***½

Gay film has come such a distance from the days of not being able to utter its own name (see or read The Celluloid Closet) to the likes of award-winning mainstream movies from Philadelphia to Brokeback Mountain that gay/bi moviegoers, interested women and the very few straight men fearless enough to venture into this realm of entertainment can be forgiven for not always being able to keep abreast of what's happening in this growing genre. Yes, there's a lot of mindless schlock making its way onto movie and TV screens, and sitting through even a few hours of this can be enough to turn off intelligent filmgoers indefinitely. Consequently, I want to call attention to two smart little straight-to-video films - Fixing Frank and Hard Pill - that deserve a look from savvy genre buffs. Neither is a fun-and-frolic camp fest nor a brainless soft-core turn-on. Both address the possibility of changing one's sexual identity from gay to straight, the idea of which is certain to drive heavily politicized gay men to frenzy. Yet, because both movies deal with this subject intelligently - addressing morality (I mean right and wrong, not gay and straight); the importance of filling emotional, as well as sexual, needs; and the desire for inclusiveness (and being included) that haunts all of us - each provides a surprisingly rigorous and thoughtful experience.

Fixing Frank, written (from his original play) by Ken Hanes and directed by Michael Selditch, doesn�t bother to hide its theatrical roots. But because Hanes writes dialog that is fast, intelligent and believable enough to keep you hanging on every word, and Selditch (whose first first-length feature this is) proves a good enough director to keep his three-hander aloft, there's little fat. This is a tight, bright film that plays with truth, identity and morality in elusive though pertinent ways. The three men who play doctor (Dan Butler), patient (Andrew Elvis Miller) and patient's lover (Paul Provenza: yes, the comedian and director of The Aristocrats) are very fine actors. If Provenza comes off least of the three, it's probably due to his role remaining less rich than the other two. This threesome's dance around and through the ideas Hanes weaves into his tale should keep you guessing, thinking; by equal turns angry, amused and saddened. Butler - witty, bright and emotional quicksilver - is the stand-out here, as a psychologist who makes falling in love with your analyst look, not simply easy and sensible, but really the only thing to do. At film's end, so much has been stirred up and promised by this talented group that the finale may leave you a tad unsatisfied. But then, resolution is sometimes less fulfilling than the provocation that precedes it.

Hard Pill explores our (gay/straight/men/women) sexuality via an ever-so-slightly futuristic notion: the possibility of pharmaceutically changing one's sexual orientation. This first full-length feature (he's made some "shorts") from writer/director John Baumgartner is never less than interesting, often funny and occasionally oddly moving. It captures quite well the "work" environment that creates a group of friends who enjoy each other's company - bickering, joking and growing attached to each other in ways that sometimes approach and then slip over into the sexual. Baumgartner understands how loaded the issue of male sexual orientation can be (nature vs. nurture, gay pride vs. gay shame), and so he wonders what if, in addition to loving our women friends, we actually wanted - and were able - to make love to them?

The movie dares to explore what "love," as well as sexual preference, really entails - and what effect a change in the latter might have on the experimenter, as well as those close to him. All this will not ensure the movie's popularity among gays or straights who cling to definitive answers. (The hetero/homo scale that appears the first time a character is introduced is almost guaranteed to drive some people crazy.) But Hard Pill makes a bracing 90 minutes for anyone willing to consider the possibilities. The cast (all unknown to me) does a wonderful job creating interesting, layered characters who are worth spending time with. If the acting/writing/direction is not quite up to the level it needs to be in order to maneuver a tricky emotional climax, the sweet, sad denouement (a kiss, and then a deliberate distancing, as if to say, "Wait a minute: What does this mean?") seems as original as it is lovely.