Short Takes: ‘The Leather Boys’ (1964) ★★★ 1/2

A gay-themed movie entitled The Leather Boys suggests it’s a porno about twinks being initiated into the world of BDSM. Except, remarkably, there isn’t a gay adult feature by that name, at least not one I could find (the closest I got was a video series of suspect quality called Little Tattoo Leather Boy, Parts 1-3). No, The Leather Boys is a 1964 British drama about a young married couple and the man who tries to come between them.

Dot (Rita Tushingham, who most recently appeared in 2021’s Last Night in Soho) is a teenager in love with Reggie (Colin Campbell), a cute biker who wants to make her his bride. Their parents’ reaction to their engagement speaks volumes about their home lives: Reggie’s parents, who at best share a grudging tolerance for each other, savor a bit of schadenfreude at the thought of the teens’ doomed marriage, while Dot’s mother looks forward to her 16-year-old daughter getting hitched so she can rent out Dot’s room. The teen couple may be too young to get married, but who can blame them for wanting to get out from under their respective parents’ roofs ASAP?

We see the first sign of trouble during the couple’s honeymoon at Butlin’s Camp. Dot wants to experience all the resort has to offer; Reggie just wants to stay in their room and bone (“If you must know, I’ve had enough,” Dot says). Things only go downhill from there. Dot wants Reggie to take care of her, funding her shopping sprees and trips to the hair salon, but Reggie wants Dot to take care of him, keeping their one-room flat clean and having dinner—preferably something other than canned beans—waiting when he gets home from work. And forget sex. They argue more than fuck.

Reggie starts spending more time down at the Ace Cafe, the diner where all his biker buddies hang out. (I call them bikers, but they have more in common with middle-aged motorcycle enthusiasts than Hell's Angels.) This is where he meets Pete (Dudley Sutton), a slightly older guy who leads a seemingly carefree, itinerant life of a merchant marine. Reggie and Pete become fast friends, spending more and more time together—practically living together when Pete rents a room from Reggie’s grandmother. Dot is coached by her mother to lie about being pregnant to force Reggie’s return to their marriage. The ploy fails, with Reggie preferring Pete’s company. It’s only when Dot snarls that he and Pete “look like a couple of queers,” that Reggie begins to worry about the optics of their friendship. He’s quickly talked out of those fears—by Pete, who clearly wants to be more than just friends. Still, Reggie starts to rekindle his relationship with Dot, but don’t expect a happy ending for any of the three main characters.

I knew nothing of this “classic [of] ’60s British cinema” before putting it in my Tubi queue, so I went into The Leather Boys expecting a campy good time. But instead of something kitschy like The Set, you get a kitchen sink drama akin to Tushingham’s film debut, A Taste of Honey. 

Though Dot’s blond helmet rivals some of
the ’dos in John Waters’ Hairspray.

Screenwriter Gillian Freeman adapted The Leather Boys from her novel of the same title, and though she was credited under her own name for the movie, her book was published under the pseudonym Eliot George. According to Wikipedia (I haven’t read the book, though I might now that I’ve found an affordable reprint), the relationship between Reggie and Pete is more explicitly gay than in the movie, though still quite restrained (i.e., don’t expect graphic descriptions of cock sucking and butt fucking, though do expect Dick, as that’s Pete’s name in the book). Fortunately, not much is lost in the story’s sanitation for the screen, thanks largely to the quality of the production. Tushingham, Campbell and Sutton are all excellent. Even though the story is kind of straight-washed, the character of Pete is sensitively handled. He’s not a villain, he’s just fallen for a guy who doesn't like him in “that way.” Director Sidney J. Furie treats the material with respect, delivering a film that’s far more thoughtful and stylish than what I’d expected. (There are a lot of acclaimed titles in Furie’s filmography, but he also directed Superman IV: The Quest for Peace, so The Leather Boys really could’ve gone either way.) While I’m disappointed that I can’t make fun of this one, I can’t complain when my exploration of cinematic trash unearths a genuine treasure.