Alpha Delta Zatan, features a cast of hot men delivering performances that can charitably be described as amateurish (absolute shit if just being honest), so naturally I checked their filmographies to see if any of them had
done porn. None had—at least according to IMDb—but many of them should. I didn’t have to bother checking the filmographies of
director Art Arutyunyan or writer Armand Petri for porn credits, however. Alpha Delta
Zatan makes it clear that they wouldn’t know how eroticism works if it
slapped them in the face with its dick.
But Alpha Delta
Zatan is supposed to be a horror film, and Arutyunyan and Petri don’t have
much of a grasp of how that works, either. Or basic storytelling, for that
matter. This is Alpha Delta Zatan in a nutshell: A hunky member of the
ADZ house strips down to his skivvies, unaware of a knife-wielding guy wearing a
black Zentai body suit and harlequin mask (not “Harley Quinn,” as one actor insists on calling it) doing poses in the hall. Hunky guy
then steps out of his underwear and into the shower, whereupon he’s attacked
by the harlequin-masked killer. Rinse, repeat.
That’s it. That’s Alpha
Delta Zatan’s story, man-ass and murder, played on a loop, with only the color of the lighting (Artyunyan fucking loves his gels) to differentiate them from each other. There’s
some business about Frat Dad Brad (Jared Fleming) mandating these killings for possible
“Zatanic” reasons, and a lot of the frat brothers are shown drinking blood, but
none of it is fully developed, let alone explained.
As one would expect, Alpha Delta Zatan is about as scary as David
DeCoteau film. Yet, DeCoteau—early 2000s DeCoteau, specifically—would
at least play up the homoeroticism, even if the guys in his casts seldom take
off their boxer briefs. The guys of Alpha Delta Zatan, however, are
decidedly asexual, or possibly just autosexual. They are always admiring their own
bodies yet show zero interest in sex with any gender. Admittedly,several of
the ADZ’s cast’s bodies are quite admirable, and certainly more to my taste than the twinks DeCoteau
favors, but I started getting bored by the third shower scene; by the fourth I
was hoping at least one of the guys would go full frontal, just to break the
monotony (spoiler: no penises are ever shown). You’ll derive more enjoyment
from watching 30-minutes' worth of “fitness inspiration” videos on YouTube
than watching Alpha Delta Zatan. Or you could just watch the hard stuff [NSFW, but you knew that].
David Gordon Green’s The Exorcist: Believer was released earlier this month to reviews ranging from meh to just don’t. I just didn’t and instead watched the 2017 gay-themed possession story, A Closer Walk with Thee, a movie The Exorcist: Believer is most definitely better than.
A group of missionaries belonging to a Christian denomination with very strict edicts against set decoration have set up shop in an East Los Angeles house with the hopes of bringing area residents to the Lord. They have their work cut out for them. Their first convert, Ascencion (Deborah Venegas), comes staggering back possessed by a demon within minutes of being baptized. (This is a horror film, after all, though it’s easy to forget that given the film is as moodily lit as the interior of a CVS.) Fortunately for Ascencion, Brother Eli (Gregory Shelby) is a crack exorcist and casts that demon out of her in time for her to be home for lunch.
But there’s a more insidious possession taking hold in one of the mission’s own members, sweet-faced organist Jordan (Aj Knight), who is not only cursed with Shane Dawson’s hairstyle but is also overcome with impure thoughts of Brother Eli (and, in one scene, the body of Christ). Jordan does his best to keep these feelings under control, but he’s powerless to resist his urges when he spies on Eli in the shower—urges that are so strong (because Brother Eli’s ass is that fine!) that he never once considers consequences of jacking off outside the bathroom door. He’s just asking to be caught by Lindsey (Kelsey Boze), the most judgmental of his fellow missionaries. But it’s going to take more than Brother Eli shouting, “Reveal yourself, you fag demon!” to turn Jordan straight.
It’s the treatment of Jordan’s possession where A Closer Walk with Thee goes from bad to patently offensive, and when my rating dropped from a star and a half to a single star. Had the writing-directing team of John C. Clark and Brie Williams chose to fully commit to satirizing the hysteria of religious fanaticism, as they do periodically in the movie’s first half, or base the horror in that same fanaticism, which, as we’ve seen again and again, is pretty damned terrifying, I might have been able to simply blame the movie’s shortcomings on a low budget and limited filmmaking experience. Unfortunately, Clark and Williams chose to literally equate being gay with demon possession, with Jordan becoming a rape-y, homicidal homo, making A Closer Walk with Thee more closely aligned with the shit peddled in an evangelical Christian “hell house”(albeit better acted) than a movie purportedly aimed at LGBTQ audiences.
And yet it’s distributed by Altered Innocence, a company “dedicated to releasing LGBTQ and Coming-of-Age [sic] films with an artistic edge.” I’d argue that A Closer Walk with Thee belongs with a different company, but faith-based outlets generally shun content with f-bombs and butt stuff. A shame, because A Closer Walk with Thee has the potential to be the best thing in PureFlix’s catalog instead of one of the worst in Altered Innocence’s. #PureFlixAfterDark.
Peter Greenaway at half price? An early work of an especially horny—and bi-curious— Richard Stanley? South African director Cedric (American Ninja 3 & 4) Sundstrom, comes really close to earning either distinction with his artsy horror/thriller The Shadowed Mind. If only he had succeeded.
Set in a private mental health hospital operating out of what appears to be an abandoned factory, Dr. Hildesheimer (Towje Kleiner), with the help of his worshipful assistant Helen (Trish Downing), treats patients with all manner of ailments, mostly of the sexual variety. Patients include childlike Matthew (Simon Poland), wrestling with body dysphoria and sexual identity; Julia (Hayley Dorskey), a victim of child sexual abuse who shows signs of multiple personality disorder; and General (Simon Sabela), who marches around in full military dress, randomly barking orders. Tellingly, General is the hospital’s most “normal” resident.
The newest arrival is Stephanie (Adrienne Pearce), a compulsive exhibitionist. She, of course, attracts the attention of others at the hospital, especially Paul (Rufus Swart, who also co-wrote the script), a patient who heretofore has been struggling to ignite a long-dormant libido, and, conversely, orderly Kurt (Evan J. Klisser, showing some serious camel toe whenever he’s clothed), who’s always hunting for partners to satisfy his hyperactive libido. Though Stephanie is quick to flash her tits, she doesn’t give in to either man’s advances as readily. Kurt, knowing he has willing partners in nurse Alice (Jennifer Steyn) and fellow orderly Nick (Nicholas Ashley Nortier), takes Stephanie’s rejection in stride. Paul, not so much.
Then people start getting murdered, and the timing couldn’t be more inconvenient, as the clinic is about to receive a $1 million grant.
Though The Shadowed Mind falls short of being good, many of its flaws are also what make it such a curious viewing experience. The script is often silly and nonsensical, but it’s also enjoyably weird. Sundstrom, helped by Ruth Strimling’s art direction and George Bartels’ cinematography, makes the most of the film’s location, yet you can’t quite suspend disbelief that a private hospital would operate in a warehouse with crumbling walls and busted out windows, no matter how artful the lighting. The performances are uneven, with several actors—Pearce and Dorskey especially—speaking as if they learned their lines phonetically, and yet these off-kilter line readings kind of work with the film’s overall vibe. The Shadowed Mind also pushes the envelope a little further than most American movies, at least as far as the sex and nudity goes, to say nothing of the queer content (the violence is tame compared to your average U.S.-made slasher), yet somehow remains in limbo between arthouse and grindhouse sensibilities.
I didn’t regret watching TheShadowedMind, but wishing it lived up to all it could’ve been prevented me from enjoying it as much as I hoped I would.
The cover is the only thing I like about Rosemary Rogers’The Insiders.
Trigger warning:
This so-called romance is chock full of sexual assault and stupidity, so proceed
with caution. Also, the review is a bit long (sorry about that).
Well, I have no one
to blame but myself. Though I’m not a fan of romance fiction, I went ahead and
bought a copy of the late Rosemary Rogers’ 1979 novel THE
INSIDERS, anyway.
In my own defense, The
Insiders is from a period in the late ’70s and early ’80s when Rogers,
primarily known for writing bodice-rippers, was writing more contemporary—and
more explicit—fare that seemed to be aimed at Jackie Collins’ audience. Indeed,
cover up Rogers’ name and The Insiders could easily be mistaken for one
of Collins’ or Harold Robbins’ novels. Even the book’s synopsis (“From the
breathtaking northern California coastline to the fierce, competitive media
worlds of Los Angeles and New York City, Eve is caught in a whirlwind of the
beautiful and the rich…”) suggests it’s more about a woman trying to make
it in the sordid world of show business—well, TV news in this instance—than finding
true love. I may not like romance novels, but I love books about the
sordid world of show business!
I was tempted to read these Rosemary Rogers' titles as well...until I read The Insiders.
The Insiders is not about show
business, or the TV news business. It’s not really a romance novel, either. What it is, is a total piece
of shit.
The synopsis was at
least honest about one thing: Eve is our main character. I guess she’s supposed
to be the heroine, except that would reply she’s admirable in some way, and
Rogers makes it clear that the only thing admirable about Eve, a former model
turned TV reporter, is her beauty. In fact, Eve’s hotness is one of her
defining character traits. The other two traits (she only has three) are her
inability to get over her ex-boyfriend David and being a total idiot.
The book’s first
chapter details how Eve is sleeping with Peter, “San Francisco’s most
fashionable analyst,” but only on weekends, and only to distract her from David’s
absence. “I take other men’s rejected lovers and make them over, doll,” Peter
tells Eve. “I fuck them into forgetfulness.” Yet despite that claim, he just can’t
fuck David out of Eve’s thoughts. Eve barely sheds any tears over David’s
predecessor, the rich, handsome Mark Blair, who was not only instrumental in
getting her a job at a local TV station but was also her lover for two years
before he fucking died, yet breaking up with David has left Eve
practically curled up on the floor in a fetal position, blubbering helplessly—until
it’s time to fuck Peter, of course.
Given Eve’s crippling
heartbreak, one would think that David is unbelievably handsome, with a successful
career, a great sense of humor, a giving lover, and always supportive of Eve
and her interests. Only the first two things are true. David’s most dominant
characteristic is being an hemorrhoidal asshole. Rogers tries to soften David’s
edges with a past tragedy, revealing that both his parents were killed in a car
wreck, leaving him to care for his siblings, ranging in age from 7 to 17, yet David’s
care amounts to little more than looking in on the kids every now and then. He
doesn’t even live with them, paying a live-in housekeeper to stay with them in
the family home in Albany, because who wants
to look after kids when you could be getting laid? (OK, I’ll grant him that, but
still….)
So, why did these
two break up? During a weekend house party thrown by Howard Hansen, a senior
partner at David’s law firm, Hansen’s conniving admin assistant/mistress Gloria sent another male guest to get into bed with a sleeping Eve, with the sole purpose of stirring shit up (and steering David to her bed). Eve
protested as soon as she discovered it wasn’t David on top of her, but the man
refused to stop doing what he was doing until David walked in. Eve was sexually assaulted,
but David just thought she was a cheating ’ho and immediately broke up with her.
Consider that foreshadowing.
Of course, a relationship
as toxic as Eve and David’s can’t end so easily. Eve poses for some cheesecake photos
that appear in Stud magazine, the photos first enraging David, then
making him so horny that he gives Eve a call. Eve, ever the doormat, is all too
happy to let David back into her life. David, however, stipulates they will not
be a monogamous couple. Though not entirely comfortable with this
arrangement, Eve goes along with it if this is what it takes to keep David.
David, of course, is jealous of her screwing other men, but feels he’s entitled
to other women. Here’s an excerpt, detailing David’s views on commitment:
Someday, David knew,
he would marry. Because it was expected of him and because it would help him
form and mold the façade he expected to present to the world. But the woman he
would marry would be carefully picked by his head and not by his loins. A
suitable wife—suitable was the key word. Well-bred and intelligent, but not too
intelligent. Not too astute or worldly-wise. Because there would always be
other women—this he already realized and accepted.
Eve eventually
comes to her senses and dumps David. Her taste in men, however, doesn’t improve.
In fact, she ends up with someone much worse: Brant Newcomb.
The
Psychopath and the Jailbait Masochist
Eve encounters
Brant Newcomb earlier in the book, when she accompanies her fuck-buddy Peter to
a party thrown by “a well-known rock singer” (Eve accepts the invitation when told she’d likely appear in the society pages on Peter’s arm, which would make
David jealous). Brant is described as very handsome, very blond and very tan.
Eve wonders if he might be gay, though it’s not exactly clear why she thinks
this, especially when she knows he has a playboy reputation. Brant is also ridiculously wealthy, and about
as charming as Elon. “I think—I just have the feeling we might like the same
kind of things,” he says when he meets Eve. “Why don’t you come home with me
tonight and find out? I’d really like to fuck you, Eve.” As charming as that offer is, Eve refuses. So,
Brant offers to pay her. Eve (and the reader) come away from the encounter
thoroughly disgusted.
In case it’s not
entirely clear how loathsome Brant is, Rogers introduces a subplot involving
David’s rebellious 17-year-old sister, Francie. After school one day, Francie,
her dark hair hidden under a blond wig, hitches a ride with “some old guy
driving a late-model Caddy” into San Francisco (allowing him to finger her for
his trouble), where she has an appointment with photographer Jerry Harmon—the same
photographer who took the pictures of Eve for Stud. Jerry hires her on
the spot and starts taking photos immediately. There’s one other person
present for the photo session, however: Jerry’s good friend Brant Newcomb. Brant
wastes little time propositioning her, telling her that he’ll pay double what
Jerry’s paying (exact amounts are never discussed) for her to pose for a
“special” photo, without the wig, or much else. Following the official
picture-taking, Francie joins Brant and Jerry in the bedroom, the men taking
turns snapping Polaroids of her taking turns with them. Looking at the photos
afterwards turns Francie on so much she “began clawing at Brant’s groin with
her hands [as opposed to clawing with her nose?] until he tumbled her
down onto the floor and began screwing her again, taking his time this go around,
laughing all the while at her eagerness and wildness.”
And, in case a
three-way involving two adult men and an underage girl aren’t enough for you:
His laughter seemed
to mock at [sic] her, and she got so mad she began to bite and claw at him; then
he slapped her hard, slapped her coldly again and again until her anger and
viciousness subsided, and she was clinging to him, begging him in a choked
voice to do it to her again, quickly.
“You’re one of those, are you,
you little hellion? You dig being hurt. Okay, honey, I’m willing to oblige.
Sometimes it even turns me on.”
Francie is
fully in Brant’s thrall by the time he drives her home. Two days later she’s back
for more abuse:
“How
old are you, by the way?”
His
question caught her by surprise, so that she stumbled over her lies, her voice
uncertain.
“I’m—I’m
twenty.”
He
slapped her hard, knocking her off the bed and onto the floor.
“You’re
a lying cunt. Now tell me.”
“Okay,
okay, so I’m still nineteen.”
This
time, he got off the bed and pulled her to her feet by her hair, walking her
over to the far corner of the room, where he proceeded to wipe off all her
carefully applied makeup with tissues dipped in cold cream.
Francie
wriggled and cried and called him all the filthy names she could think of until
he smacked her a few more times across the rump. Then she begged him to stop.
“I’m
seventeen,” she sobbed. “Really, I swear it. But I’ll be eighteen this year,
soon after I graduate. Honest, Brant, I’m not lying this time.”
Like an
alley cat, she rubbed herself up against him, touching him eagerly, licking at
his skin with short, urgent jabs. Suddenly, he began to chuckle, his anger
gone.
Yes,
decades before Erika Mitchell ever wrote her first sentence as Snowqueens Dragon, Rosemary Rogers was
confusing abuse with BDSM.
Rosemary Rogers demonstrating in 1985 how best to enjoy her work.
Though he
only visits on weekends, David notices a change in Francie’s behavior. By the
time he confronts her, Francie has been a regular fixture at Brant’s place in
San Francisco, helping herself to whatever drug is offered and letting herself
be used by Brant and whoever happens to be visiting, including a rock band that
treats her so rough that even Brant feels compelled to intervene. However,
David can’t get her to confess to anything, and spanking her only turns her on,
which horrifies her oldest brother (remarkably Rogers doesn’t cross that
line). Only after Francie runs away does David learn of her relationship with
Brant, Francie ratted out by their younger siblings.
David is
furious, yet he refuses to get the police involved. Why? Because Brant Newcomb
is a client of his firm. Yep, David is putting his career ahead of the safety
of his sister. Eve just happens to know that Brant is having a party that very
night (she was invited to attend as a gay actor’s beard) and suggests David attend
so he could look for Francie. David is adamant that he cannot be involved. Eve,
on the other hand…. Eve refuses, but caves when David applies just a little bit
of emotional manipulation.
When Eve
arrives at the party she’s surprised by, as well as suspicious of, Brant’s
polite treatment of her. She accepts a drink from one of the nudie models in
Jerry Harmon’s company and then wanders through Brant’s house, keeping an eye
out for Francie. This part includes one of my favorite observations from Eve, one I had when I first moved to Atlanta: She
could smell the acrid, burned-leaves odor of marijuana—it seemed to hang in the
air, stinging her nostrils. Didn’t anyone smoke cigarettes anymore?
Eve spots
Francie, looking strung out, her dress torn, and her body bruised. The crowd is
too thick for Eve to get to her. Then, to Eve’s horror, Brant announces he’s
having a slave auction, and Francie is the featured merchandise. Eve does try to fight her way
through the crowd to get to her, but only after Brant smacks Francie
around when she protests being sold to some hippie dude named Derek and is forcibly
carried away to go live on his commune in New Mexico. Let’s repeat that: Eve
passively watches Francie get auctioned off and only springs into action when
the girl is being carried out the door. As suspected, David sending Eve to rescue his sister
made about much sense as asking Lauren Boebert to lead a college course in
theatre appreciation.
Obviously,
Eve’s too-late attempt to do fuck-all is unsuccessful. Brant dismisses her
protests, assuring Eve that Francie was auctioned off for her own good and that
Derek is a psychiatrist “into social work.” Do you trust him? Me neither, but
Eve and the reader are asked to take him at his word, because Francie is now
out of the book for good.
Now, with
Francie gone, Eve must contend with Brant, who gets her another drink and then,
under the pretense of wanting to discuss Francie, takes her to another room.
This other room is his “playroom,” and the only thing Brant wants to discuss is
fucking Eve. Eve announces she’s leaving. Brant accuses her of putting on an
act. “Eve, it’s too late to stop anything. If you want it to be rape, then I
guess I can oblige you.” And so, he does, slapping her around for good measure.
As if that’s not bad enough, the party’s other guests barge in (“We watched you
through the two-way mirror for a while,” says one), and proceed to join in,
making this a gang rape.
It only
gets worse from here.
Sorry
About Raping You. Will You Marry Me Now?
We’re only
at the novel’s midpoint, and already Rogers has crammed in an epic amount of
offensive material. I’ll admit I was kind of impressed as I didn’t think she’d
have it in her. I also hoped this would be the point in the story where Eve might
develop a spine if not a personality and dump David, get violent revenge on
Brant and, only because this is allegedly a romance novel, meet a man who
actually treats her well.
Instead,
this happens: Eve regains consciousness after her gang rape (her drinks were
drugged, naturally) in Brant’s bedroom. Brant tells her that he had a physician
friend check her out while she was out, assuring Brant that Eve would be OK.
Isn’t that sweet? You better think so, because from this point forward Brant will
be gaslighting Eve (as Rogers is gaslighting her readers) into falling in love
with him, though maybe he’d stand a better chance if he didn’t start slapping her
and threatening her with blackmail/revenge porn the moment she says she’ll go
to the police.
Brant
drives Eve home, where David is waiting for her. David, seeing Eve get out of
his car, is immediately and predictably consumed with jealousy. Though Eve
doesn’t do the best job of explaining what happened to her, she does make it
clear she was raped. David, however, doesn’t believe her (“My God, everything
you’ve told me sounds like part of some crazy trip—some coke nightmare.”) He
says he’s going to leave and come back when she’s regained her senses. In a
rare show of spinal rigidity, Eve tells him not to bother, they are through. Good
for you, Eve!
Alas, Eve
just can’t stand up to Brant (the only character to do so is Marti, Eve’s lesbian
roommate, whose own story arc has very little bearing on the overall narrative
other than adding homophobia to the list of this novel’s sins). His courting very
much reads like an abusive husband pleading with his wife to come back from her mother’s, insisting he’s changed. Of course, in this case the abuser
has unlimited funds and connections, enabling Brant to arrange for Eve to get tapped
to audition for a nightly anchor spot with a New York City station, one of the few times in the book when her career is mentioned. Eve thinks
she was selected because of her on-camera skills (that she allows her possible
co-anchor introduce her to the joys of anal sex should also give her an edge)
but learns the truth when Brant surprises her on her return flight home.
Then Brant
proposes, which proves, once and for all, that he is indeed a psychopath,
especially when he says: “You’re a bloody Puritan in some ways, and yet you
like to fuck, but only when you’re ready and when you want it—and that night
you wouldn’t give in, would you, you stubborn bitch? You made us take it[.]”
See, it was Eve’s fault for just not giving in.
Eve is not
stubborn bitch. Stubborn implies she is capable of thinking for herself.
No, Eve’s a stupid bitch, because she ultimately marries Brant and has a
son with him! Good thing Brant is rich, because that boy is going to need lots
of therapy, especially when he’s old enough to hear about how his parents met. Christ,
I think Massimo and Laura of 365
Days had a healthier relationship.
This book
was written during a time when rape-and-forgive trope was common
in romance fiction, especially in the bodice-rippers, which had been Rogers’
bread and butter. The thing is, while rape is no less problematic in a story
set in the 1800s, the mental gymnastics to explain it away as fantasy are less
strenuous: the 1800s weren’t exactly a time of sexual permissiveness,
especially for women, who were culturally discouraged from openly enjoying sex. “No” was the default answer, and thus men wouldn’t always accept it. But
Rogers’ rape fantasy schtick doesn’t work so well in a story set in the late ’70s,
making the mere act of reading of The Insiders feel like #MeToo experience.
Yes, men need to learn about what consent means, but it seems like romance
authors could also benefit from sitting in on those consent workshops college athletes have to attend. It’s too late for Rosemary, but maybe E.L. James could sign up, and since she’s on campus, sign up for a few writing courses as well.
I
mentioned waaaaay back at the beginning of this review that The
Insiders seemed to be Rogers’ attempt to muscle in on Jackie
Collins’ territory. Rogers had a more expansive vocabulary (Rogers attended the
University of Ceylon; Collins was expelled from Francis Holland School at age
15), but Collins was way more playful and, in her prime, had no problem getting
raunchy (The Insiders has a lot of sex, but Rogers refrains from getting
too graphic). The two writers had lot in common stylistically, with both
taking a laissez faire—if not just plain lazy—approach to plotting (I’m pretty sure Rogers never wrote
an outline for The Insiders and just made it up as she went along); both
writing American characters that sound British; and neither author having much
patience for describing settings, to the point where San Francisco, New York
and Los Angeles could just as easily be Fresno, St. Louis and El Paso. Like
Collins’ novels, The Insiders is populated with hot, vapid people, but
none of the Jackie Collins novels I’ve read were ever this mean-spirited, vile and
misogynistic. Eve has no real identity or agency, so maybe it’s no surprise she’s
stuck choosing between two abusers. All I know is even Collins would balk at
having, say, Lucky Santangelo marry her rapist. No, Lucky would make the
motherfucker pay.
Though the U.S. QAnon party would have its base believe that trans people are a recent phenomenon, dating back to when the Obama administration, colluding with Hollywood elites and woke millennials, performed gender reassignment surgeries on unsuspecting preschoolers as part of a sinister plot to send them into our nation’s schools as trans adults to read books to kids and compete on varsity swim teams, it turns out that they have been around significantly longer than the 2010s.
In fact, way back in 1970—a good 53 years after the first gender affirming surgery was performed in the U.S.—Hollywood released two very different films centering on trans women (but played by cis-gendered actors): the turgid biopic THE CHRISTINE JORGENSEN STORY, and the botched adaptation of Gore Vidal’s 1968 satirical novel, MYRA BRECKINRIDGE.
It should go without saying that neither film would be considered politically correct today, though The Christine Jorgensen Story, about the United States’ first celebrity trans woman (Dora Richter was the actual first, completing her transition in 1931), comes closer than expected. I remember seeing the movie in the early ’90s, when it aired on AMC, back when the channel was TCM with ad breaks rather than the home of mad men, meth cooks and walking dead. At that time, my attitude towards the trans community could be summarized thusly: To each their own, but it’s kinda’ funny, though. Consequently, I viewed the movie like it was an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000, minus Joel (or Mike) and the ’bots. When I decided to rewatch the film, I was prepared to judge it harshly now that I’m more enlightened—woke, if you will (but please don’t).
But despite the crass exploitation of the movie’s marketing (“Did the surgeon’s knife make me a woman or a freak?” reads the poster), the actual film shows far more sensitivity in its handling of Jorgensen’s story (Jorgensen herself is credited as the movie’s technical advisor). That story begins, predictably, with Jorgensen’s unhappy childhood as George, Jr. (Trent Lehman), a boy more inclined to play with his sister’s dolls and his mother’s makeup than play football. His concerned mother tries to steer George, Jr. toward more traditionally masculine pastimes, while George, Jr.’s father does his level best to convince himself his boy is just going through a phase. He’s encouraged—overjoyed, even—when George, Jr., having taken on some school bullies, comes home with a black eye. “You’re going to remember that black eye as one of the proudest moments of your life,” he tells his son, going so far as to take a photo of George, Jr.’s shiner.
Is this fucked up or what?
Loretta, the cunty model.
Adulthood isn’t any happier for George, Jr. (now played by John Hansen). Though he finds some success as a photographer for an advertising agency, he’s still the target of bullying. “One thing I can’t stand is a damn fag photographer,” sneers Loretta (Elaine Joyce), a model so cunty that she causses George to flee the photo shoot in tears. His boss, Jess Warner (Rod McCrary), offers a shoulder to cry on, and his dick to suck. George, Jr., is horrified (“Good God, you don’t think I’m one of those?”) Jess thinks he just needs to lighten up, telling him lots of artists are queer, “You think Shakespeare wrote all those sonnets to a dame?” Jess goes in for a kiss, but George ain’t having it and, for the second time that day, flees in tears. (One of the issues I had with this movie when I first saw it, and still do, is it seems to be making the argument that Jorgensen’s reason for transitioning was born out of homophobia, and that the audience should appreciate that, if nothing else, at least she chose to live as a hetero woman rather than a gay man.)
Are you trying to seduce me, Mr. Warner?
George, Jr., heads to the library, where he discovers the book Sex and the Glands by Dr. Stephen Estabrook. The book proves so enlightening that George enrolls in the doctor’s college course just to speak to him about his theories. After explaining to the endocrinologist that he’s always felt his instincts and impulses are female, Estabrook (Will Kuluva, who really could’ve benefitted from a Klipette) takes some blood for testing. The test results confirm that George has a chemical imbalance. “Your glands are secreting more female hormones than male—three times higher than expected in a normal man.”
A penectomy is exactly what you think it is.
Under the pretense of shooting photos for a travel book, George, Jr. goes to Copenhagen, where a sympathetic Dr. Dahlman (Oscar Beregi, Jr.) offers him a chance to be his true self. “You Americans, you’re advanced in so many ways, but when it comes to sex, you’re childish. Operate on the brain, perform a lobotomy? Fine. But take a pair of testicles and everybody explodes.” Before George signs the one-page application for gender reassignment surgery (yet I must fill out at least six pages before an annual physical), Dahlman explains what the surgery entails, then warns George there exists a chance for failure. None of this dissuades George, who quickly signs the application.
A couple montages later, Christine is born, her name selected in honor of the late daughter of her Aunt Thora, with whom she’s been staying (in actuality, the name was chosen in honor of endocrinologist Christian Hamburger). While Christine, now looking like a young Rosie O’Donnell in Doris Day drag, is pleased with the superficial aspects of her transition—there are lots of shots of her modeling the dresses her aunt’s made for her and patting her hair—she’s remains hesitant to fully live as a woman, which, as far as this movie goes, means she needs a man.
From man to matron.
Christine Jorgensen's transition is front page news.
But romance is the furthest thing from her mind when the media—and her family—learn of her transition. Her family gets counseled by a surprising voice of reason: their minister, who tells Christine’s anguished parents that if their new daughter is happy, they should be thankful. “Remember, she’s still the same person.” The media is less reasonable. “These days a fella never knows what he’s going to get on a blind date,” snorts a newscaster, who could be mistaken for a 2023 Fox News pundit were it not for his use of the word “fella.”
However, one reporter, Tom Crawford (Quinn K. Redeker, who would later have a hand in writing The Deer Hunter), approaches Christine as a person, not a freak. Christine works with Tom, allowing him daily interviews for an in-depth magazine story, only to back out before the article’s completion when she suspects Tom has feelings for her. This is for Tom’s protection; sooner or later, he’ll see her as an oddity. “Are you going to stop reading the newspapers? Or listening to the radio? Or watching television? Will they ever stop making jokes? They’ll never stop laughing.” Tom is undeterred, and urges “Chris” to stop being afraid. The pair kiss, then slowly sink onto the sofa in a love scene that could be right out of a 1950s Douglas Sirk film.
In fact, except for its subject matter and featuring some nudity, The Christine Jorgensen Story could easily be a product of the 1950s. This is likely attributable to director Irving Rapper, who helmed several Bette Davis movies, including Now, Voyager and Another Man’s Poison. In Rapper’s hands, The Christine Jorgensen Story is just an old-fashioned melodrama with a twist. Rapper’s approach keeps the movie from becoming exploitative, but it also heightens its campiness.
When Christine dreamed of doll murder.
That campiness is heightened further by the acting. Trent Lehman—yet another child actor who came to a sad end—portrays George, Jr., not as a child wrestling with gender dysphoria but as a future school shooter (when George, Jr.’s mother takes a doll away from him, we suspect she’s more concerned that he might dismember it than she is about her son conforming to gender roles). John Hansen’s performance, while earnest, often becomes parodic, the actor’s pearl-clutching rendering Jorgensen an object of pity rather than someone driven to live her life on her terms.
Ultimately, it’s this portrayal of Jorgensen as a delicate flower in need of a hand to hold as she faces the big, bad world that is the movie’s downfall. The real Jorgensen was an outspoken trans activist, described on her Wikipedia page as having been known for her “directness and polished wit,” qualities you can see in her TV interviews (you can also see some of the shit she had to put up with in this clip). Where you won’t see those qualities is in The Christine Jorgensen Story.
‘The Most Extraordinary Woman in the World’
There is no political correctness to be found in Myra Breckinridge, which not only treats the very concept of sexual reassignment surgery as a joke, but is peppered with casual homophobia and racism, and features a scene of female-on-male rape played for laughs. Even more horrifying, it not only includes Rex Reed (yes,the very same) in its cast, it features a scene of him masturbating. I’ll take the rape scene, thank you.
Gore Vidal's novel is great. Its film adaptation less so.
Before it became an infamous bomb, Myra Breckinridge was a bestselling novel by Gore Vidal. The book, about a trans woman who comes to Hollywood to challenge sexual and gender norms, isn’t politically correct, either, but then political correctness would rob the book of its bite. Also, it was published in the 1960s, when people didn’t worry about such things. What the book is, is riotously funny, and well worth reading (seriously, get yourselfa copy). And there was potential for the movie adaptation to be just as hilarious.
And then 20th Century Fox gave the job of writing and directing toMichael Sarne.
In Sarne’s hands, Myra Breckinridge went from being a biting satire on sexual mores to a mashup of the “hip” movies of the late ’60s with the comic sensibilities of the stupid softcore sex comedies found later in the ’70s (think I Love You, Alice B. Toklas crossed with Dagmar’s Hot Pants, Inc.) and edited by monkeys on Adderall. In short, it’s a hot mess (with an even messier production). Yet, despite Sarne’s best efforts to rob the film of any entertainment value whatsoever, there is still some fun to be had here.
At the film’s opening, film fanatic Myron Breckinridge (Reed) is about to undergo gender reassignment surgery, performed by a chain-smoking John Carradine in an operating theater that resembles a partially struck set from Barbarella. There’s also a seated audience and a young woman who spends the entire scene cracking a big, fat whip because…1960s wackiness? “You know, once we cut it off, it won’t grow back,” the doctor warns Myron. “How about circumcision? It’s cheaper.”
Nevertheless, Myron is transformed into Myra (Raquel Welch). Before you let out a sigh of relief that Rex Reed has been transformed into someone else, be warned that he pops up throughout the movie as Myra’s ghostly alter ego with whom she discusses her plans.
And sometimes Rex Reed is just there to masturbate while dreaming of a young Farrah Fawcett presenting a table full of food, a scene that will make no more sense when viewed in context.
Her primary agenda, Myra explains, is “the destruction of the American male in all of its particulars.” As grand as that goal is, her battlefront is the much more modest acting school owned and operated by her uncle, ex-movie cowboy Buck Loner (John Huston, in what would ordinarily be a Slim Pickens role). Myra shows up at the school claiming to be Myron’s widow, and as such, she wishes to claim Myron’s half of the school, or $500,000. Buck balks, but reluctantly gives her a teaching job at the academy while he investigates Myra’s claims.
Roger Herren as Rusty. No wonder Myra was smitten.
Uncle Buck isn’t the only man Myra hopes to destroy. “I was particularly struck by one of the students, a boy with a Polish name. From a certain unevenly rounded thickness in the crotch of his blue jeans it is safe to assume he’s marvelously hung,” Myra observes in a breathy V.O. The well-hung student in question is country bumpkin Rusty Godowski (Roger Herren, inadvertently killing his career), and he is quite intriguing indeed, though it should be noted that while Myra makes the observations about the bulge in his jeans Rusty is wearing slacks that do little to emphasize said bulge.
Myra’s goal of bringing down the American male also includes women, apparently. Viewing Rusty’s girlfriend Mary Ann (Fawcett) as an embodiment of traditional gender norms, Myra also seeks to seduce—and therefore “destroy”—her as well. However, Mary Ann is not as easily conquered as Myra first suspects. “I’m sorry, I just can’t. If only there was some man like you.”
Sorry, guys. No Raquel-on-Farrah action ever happens.
Then there is Hollywood agent Leticia Van Allen. In the book, Leticia is a brassy, horny older woman who joins forces with Myra. The producers of the movie were on the right track when they sought out a veteran of Golden Age Hollywood for the role, except Golden Age stars weren’t too eager to star in what was believed to be a dirty movie (Bette Davis was approached about the role and adamantly refused, and yet she agreed to star in Bunny O’Hare). Not Mae West, who was a spry 77 years old at the time. West hadn’t appeared in a film since 1943’s The Heat’s On, and it’s clear from her first appearance in Myra Breckinridge that she hadn’t updated her schtick in the intervening decades. “I don’t care about your credits as long as you’re oversexed,” she tells one young actor, played by a pre-fame Tom Selleck (“That’s one of my credits!” he gleefully replies). Another young hopeful tells Leticia that he’s 6'7". “Never mind about the six feet. Let’s talk about the seven inches.” It goes without saying that West wrote her own dialog.
So, is this a stand-in?
Though West’s performance makes for fascinating viewing, her casting reduces Leticia to a sideshow distraction rather than a character in the movie’s story. Case in point: West insisted on singing a few songs in the film, for no reason other than she is Mae West. So, apropos of nothing, we get a nightclub scene in which West, who even in her prime couldn’t really sing, warbles her way through a couple songs, including this onethat was covered far more successfully in 1990 by the Black Crowes. West complicated things further by refusing to share any scenes with Welch (according to Welch, the few scenes in which she and West appear to be interacting were shot separately and then spliced together*), which only serves to make character of Leticia more superfluous. Sarne could’ve just as well spliced in random scenes from She Done Him Wrong and My Little Chickadee as involve West herself.
Mae West and Raquel Welch, hiding their mutual hostility, though it appears only Mae is succeeding.
Speaking of scenes from old movies, they are used throughout Myra Breckinridge either as commentary, a gag, or to punctuate a scene in the movie proper, and often to the chagrin of their stars (Loretta Young sued; Shirley Temple, having served as a U.S. ambassador, got the White House involved). Sometimes the clips are used cleverly, but mostly they are overused. Like Mae West, they only serve to distract from an already fractured narrative. (For someone who reportedly once wasted several days filming a table of food for this movie [see above], Sarne can’t seem to stay with one scene long enough for anyone to figure out what the fuck is going on.)
Myra takes Rusty's temperature.
There’s no mistaking what’s going on when Myra, under the pretense of getting some medical data, dons a strap-on and rapes Rusty (though the movie initially received an X rating, the dildo is never once shown on camera). And this is in the name of comedy, no less, though most of the laughs come from the bizarre sight of Raquel Welch, one of the premier sex symbols of the 1960s, pegging a stunned stud. This rape scene is in the book as well, and there the humor is a bit meaner, and highlights how the character of Myra Breckinridge isn’t really a trans woman so much as she is a gay man who has gone to extremes to put cis-het men (and their girlfriends) in their place. (In the book, Myra is impressed by Rusty’s rectal hygiene, noting most straight men don’t clean their asses properly.) Back when I first read the book as a closeted teen-ager, I felt Myron had been surgically transformed into a beautiful woman for the same reason Charles Bronson got a gun in Death Wish: retribution. Though it would seem Rusty is hardly worthy a target for said vengeance, he represents, to borrow a line from the movie, “the last stronghold of masculinity in this Disneyland of perversion.” Consequently, Myra wants to destroy him as much as she wants to fuck him, so consider this scene as killing two birds with one dildo. Still, it might have worked better if Rusty were more of a toxic masc asshole instead of just kind of dumb.
Myra Breckinridge prepares to destroy Rusty (and dat ass).
Incidentally, critics at the time of the film’s release seemed more concerned with issues of taste than consent. They were also more than a little homophobic. Here’s a quote from Time magazine’s review, which is more upset about the tarnishing of the images of Laurel and Hardy and Marilyn Monroe than the actual rape: “Michael Same… deserves special discredit for the repulsive dildo rape scene and the obscene device of interspersing the film with clips from movies of favorite old stars. Thus, in the context of Myra, Laurel and Hardy are made to look like fags. Even more outrageous is the use of Marilyn Monroe sequences during the rape.” Gene Siskel’s review didn’t age much better, the late Chicago Tribune critic repeatedly referring to Myra as “she-he.”
A perplexed Raquel Welch tries to make sense of Myra Breckinridge.
Critics at the time also didn’t have kind things to say about the cast’s performances, especially Raquel Welch’s, yet I think her performance is one of the movie’s strengths. (Yes, a trans actress would make more sense for both Myra Breckinridge and The Christine Jorgensen Story, but that’s just expecting too much from 1970.) Welch’s range may have been limited—she certainly didn’t have the chops to play Myron (yikes!)—but she’s effective as Myra, a role that is as much a self-parody as it is a gay male avatar. Though she doesn’t grasp all her character’s nuances, she perfectly embodies the spirit of Myra, a spirit that’s on full display when Uncle Buck confronts her with the fact that there is no proof that she and Myron were ever married or that Myron ever died. “Uncle Buck, your fag nephew became your niece two years ago in Copenhagen,” she informs him, standing atop her uncle’s desk and removing her panties, “and now is free as a bird and happy in being the most extraordinary woman in the world!” That final announcement is punctuated by Myra hiking up her skirt to show off(-screen) the surgeon’s handiwork.
Presenting the most extraordinary woman in the world.
The Christine Jorgensen Story may be a better movie by comparison, but Myra Breckinridge, with its lead character written as a strong woman/fierce gay man rather than a self-loathing closet case/fragile wallflower, is more empowering (provided you don’t get too hung up on the rape scene, of course). It’s still a trainwreck, but that just makes it worth seeing all the more. You can do so here.
BONUS MATERIAL: People often have as much fun, if not more, discussing a notorious bomb than viewing it, especially when said bomb goes on to attain cult status. Consequently, there are an abundance of articles, reviews and think-pieces about Myra Breckinridge. Here are a few worth checking out:
Dreams Are What Le Cinema is For… has a very thorough review that includes all the gory details about Myra Breckinridge’s production, as well as much higher quality stills from the movie (that’s what I get for not investing in the DVD).
My Year of Flops Case File #19: Though I disagree with his assessment of Reed’s performance as an “unexpected highlight of the film” (it’s a not-terrible performance by an otherwise terrible person, and that’s the extent of praise I can allow), Nathan Rabin’s review of this film—indeed, the whole My Year/World of Flops series—is not only a fun read, but a reminder of how good the A.V. Club site used to be.
2012 Q&A with Raquel Welch:Though Welch initially tried to distance herself from this career disappointment, she eventually lightened up and laughed along with everyone else. In this Q&A with a starstruck Simon Doonan she talks about her experience in making the film, with a good portion spent dishing on Mae West. R.I.P., Raquel.
