Poster Boy

These days, with the popularity of You Tube and viral videos, anything said by a politician can spread quickly outside of news sources. George Allen, senator of Virginia, pointed out an Indian in the crowd and called him "macaca". As an insult, it was pretty obscure. Even so, the intent appeared to be an insult and that was enough. Still, it might not have been newsworthy. However, the scene was caught on video, and it started making the rounds, and became news anyway.

Poster Boy, a film that was made two years ago, is now being released. It tells the story of Henry Kray, the gay (but not out) son, of conservative, Jack Kray, running for re-election as senator. He wants to speak at Henry's college and wants Henry to introduce him.

The family's pretty dysfunctional. The wife (played by Karen Allen! I didn't even recognize her!) is a Southern belle who married Jack because he was on the political ladder. He doesn't care much for her opinions. She drinks and smokes and they bicker a lot.

When I first heard about the film, I thought the son would be this shy kid, just coming out, and there would be this rather predatory guy, working for some activist organization that seduces him, and then feels bad about the situation. Quite the contrary. The son's pretty indepedent, and knows what he is doing.

Half the time, I thought this was a disaster of a film, mostly because of its portrayal of Jack Kray. Politics is so divisive that liberals look at conservatives and imagine that they must be hate-mongers, hypocrites, and leading lives of lies. They can't imagine how conservatives can be earnest in what they believe in, since they clearly don't believe in it.

To this extent, The Birdcage, quite a different film, at least tried to show Gene Hackman's character as being somewhat earnest, if perhaps a bit simple-minded, about his conservatism. Even so, there is controversy in the film when a fellow conservative Congressman dies when he has, if memory serves, sex with an underaged black hooker. (That film's main flaw was it's sexless approach to an elderly gay couple. Even so, I did find it amusing).

Michael Lerner plays the irascible senator, whose only concerned with portraying the perfect family. We know this, of course, because of a second blunder in the film, which is a flash-forward, where Henry is talking to a reporter, dishing the dirt on his family. Henry is trying to be earnest, trying to tell the situation as he sees it, but in so doing, he falls for the classic screenwriter's crutch: the voiceover. Technically, it's not a voiceover, but it serves the same function.

At times, the film seems like Tucker, the film's director, tries to pull out all sorts of film tricks, quick cuts in time, hand-held photography (amazingly, didn't make me sick). You feel like he's trying to hard to look hip and naturalistic for a story that's not headed in that direction.

The film is two stories. The first is about Henry's dad and mom visiting him and wanting him to make a speech for his dad. He's really not eager, so his people talk to the president of the College Republicans, a guy resembling young Al Franken, to keep an eye on Henry to make sure he shows up.

The other story is a gay activist, who lives with a woman that has HIV, which she caught from her now-dead boyfriend. She's on anti-depressants and is generally leading a dead-end life working in a bookstore. Their lives seem more interesting if only because it's less predictable. Still, they seem like archetypes.

It takes a while before the two groups meet, and of course, they do it in the oddest way possible. He wants to have fun on a college campus and go to a party. He spots Henry and makes the moves. A guy gets interested in her, but she has all her issues she's dealing with and feels this is a relationship that won't be successful, so she might as well not get involved.

Despite some parts that seem heavy-handed, from the characterization of the senator and wife to the stereotyped activist club (why do these scenes always feel like they are modeled after events in the 60s, as if no one has done any research to see what modern activists are like), to the son that, of course, is not only gay, but basically is a male hooker.

And still, by the end, the film seemed to be working on me, because it was treading along the lines of, well, you're going to laugh. A romantic comedy. You want the two guys to get together. Hey, it's not exactly perfect, but maybe a happy ending is warranted. The split up is kinda silly (the activist supposedly wanted to "out" Henry, but he's having second thoughts, and Henry ends up outing himself---even so, Henry's pissed at this betrayal).

Still, the story doesn't stoop to easy conclusions. Recall that Dick Cheney has a lesbian daughter. Most people wouldn't care when voting for him (not that he's probably going to ever run for elected office). She was kept in the background for the most part, not fighting her dad. (The film's even a little prescient, as it makes references to JonBenet, two years before the incident would surface again).

Ultimately, I think the story's too tied to its political leanings. I think it could have softened his character, and explored a more subtle interaction. I'll give it credit for not being too blatant about what it could have done. I'd give them film about a "C" because I did warm to it at the end, and the acting was decent, and it went in directions that I didn't quite expect.