Good Romance: Emotional Depth vs. Literal Depiction (Patreon)

I was watching Jane Campion’s Power of The Dog the other night - a film I ultimately have some complex opinions about, specifically regarding a couple of tropes - but there is no denying that there were so many incredible moments where something would be communicated just with a look. These looks would open an entire well of emotion and context, often feeding into the story that had been developing. Even with all the distance between the characters, with all the walls they had put up, and all the fear they held inside… These moments created a space of intense, even transformative intimacy on screen.

And I can’t think about how much this feels lacking in mainstream cinema.

Truth is that I’ve been thinking a lot lately about romance / attraction on screen, particularly when it comes to my own history with queer depictions in media. That’s because I keep realizing that I’m *still* nervous to talk about this stuff, even when I know I’m not trying to speak for anyone else at all. Some of it is this unshakable feeling you don’t have the right to say anything because you came out late in life / bisexuality has so much privilege / etc. etc. No, it doesn’t matter how many men you’ve dated at this point, there’s this part of you waiting for the world to go “oh, it’s okay to talk about how queer depictions make you feel now!” Which is, of course, ridiculous. Our experiences are our experiences and it’s okay to parse them out. But I’m realizing it’s all part of how I’ve been made to feel afraid of this space for my whole life. Not just because I grew up in a suffocating time and place that was entrenched in homophobia, but because of the entire media landscape. I grew up on this steady media diet of hyper-masculine movies I had consumed (and ironically will be watching more of on twitch this Friday). The kinds of films where even sweet boys like Bill & Ted drop gay panic F-Bombs. Thus, fear ruled the roost.

But there were always these faint, important glimmers. Not just with the filmmakers who bravely went forward to created queer media in times where it felt impossible, but those who, perhaps incidentally, created these images and moments between characters that felt burned into my brain and I didn’t understand why. Often it was these intimate, vulnerable spaces with groups of men on screen. And I certainly remember these European art films, these images of Alain Delon naked in Shock Treatment (ironically for me, he’s now a massive homophobe) that all had this deep, transformative underbelly to them. I didn’t realize why at the time. Maybe they only make much more sense now. But within them, there is something so important because it gets at the heart of what *actually* engages people on the romantic / attraction / sexual level - perhaps even when it comes to things that have nothing to do with sexuality at all.

I feel like Hollywood’s thinking about this, too.

Chiefly because there’s been these efforts of streamers to build a diverse offering of content for viewers and their interests (this piece on why streamers are like “manic buffets” has been burned into my brain). But that means delivering queer-friendly content that isn’t just representative of, but engaging to that audience. Sadly, it’s unfamiliar territory for the most part. Megacorps have mostly gotten by on avoiding the demographic and lately some genial lip-service alone. Heck, big storytelling enterprises like the MCU have spent over a decade avoiding it and now playing coy about relationships (like Carol and Maria). I mean, you can’t say it out loud! It’s wink wink, nudge nudge! They think this will do, of course. Which is why, even now Q gets to say he’s having a man over in the new Bond film, but we still never actually see them. And the thing that’s so clearly missing from all this is, you know, literal depiction. That simple act which will break down the barriers, right? Well, even as those moments now come to mainstream popcorn fare, there’s an obvious issue...

I was watching Eternals and (character-detail spoilers I guess?) there is a moment where an expressly gay character, who is in a loving relationship, kisses his partner on screen. On paper, it’s everything that audiences have supposedly been clamoring for, right? But the truth is that I’m sitting there and thinking: “I literally just met this guy.” In other words, I don’t care about this relationship on a dramatic level. Probably because there’s no story to it all. Instead, it is the very essence of “demonstration.” This character solely exists for us to know details about this other character and then it moves on. Now, is it important to demonstrate? Yeah, of course. Particularly when you know that actor Haaz Sleiman is out and proud and you can lay this IRL meta narrative to what we’re seeing. But when I think about what becomes meaningful in that emotional sense of connective destire? We want something different. To put it crassly, are people going to be putting up pictures of this Eternal and his husband on their walls? Yes, I get it’s not really designed to do that, but I think it’s unsurprising that the most meaningful queer relationship - at least according to a decade of tumblr art - is one that’s not expressly coded as queer. Which brings us to a key question at the heart of this discussion:

Why do Bucky and Cap make people so enthralled?

Yeah, yeah, obviously they are two outrageously hot guys. But the whole key to why people connect to it is because there is a genuine intimacy to the initial story of their relationship. Because there’s a deep friendship and sense of loyalty. There’s ups and downs in their power dynamic. There’s also a central tension to their story, along with the notion of them often trying to save one from the other. But there’s also a different kind of tension in their dynamic, because they’re very different people. Cap is the loyal labrador and Bucky is the tortured emo soul, but they both inspire a little bit in the other. I know I’ve often joked that I can’t believe Bucky was somehow the Helen of Troy of the MCU, but that more had to do with the fact his story had largely been dropped / scooched to the side in a lot of the later period films. But there was no doubting the power of that initial relationship development which provided the core. Note how everything I just described goes so far beyond mere allusion (Carol Danvers), or flirting (Bruce / Nat), or even demonstration (Phastos). They created a REAL sense of intimacy that people could latch onto and project into.

The emotional depth of things is always what seems to speak the loudest. If you talk about movies that inspired various awakenings in people, it never seems like it was the ones that literally depicted X or Y. But instead it seems like the fare that characterized more intimate relationships. A loose sampling from friends bears mention of characters like Jess and Juliette from Bend It Like Beckham, Sherlock and Watson, Finn and Poe, and a surprising amount of people talking about Kim Possible and Shego??? I had to google that one, but I realized a lot of people used them in in the Tik Tok trend of “me at 11 years old” sexual awakening videos where the bridge from Taylor Swift’s “wildest dreams” kicks in (also, you’ll notice I’m linking a lot of tik toks lately cause it’s been a refuge from hellfire of twitter). None of these duos are overt, but they all feature a relationship that’s full not only of kinship, but clear dynamics and tension and so much that makes for both engaging drama and engaging intimacy. That being said, I don’t want this to imply that demonstration is worthless and we never have to be overt.

Ideally, you can do both.

I’ve talked before about how a movie called Taxi Zum Klo changed my life. Frank Ripploh’s deeply personal film is 1) a beautifully told story about queer relationships that 2) just so happens to feature a lot of hardcore gay sex. No, it wasn’t the film that started the awakening, but it was absolutely the film that came along later and clarified it. The film broke down so many walls I had learned to build up. That enlivened, provoked, and really got me to start examining my real feelings on every level (even though it would still take years more to realize it). Now, of course I’m not saying every film has to go that hard (heh). But the recent success of films like Call Me By Your Name, Carol and Portrait of Lady On Fire speak to the power of making films that aren’t just overtly queer, but feature such depth of intimacy. There’s just so much about their personalities, their dynamics, their wants, and their dreams, and yes, the limits of the world around and how being queer impacts how they move through the world (but crucially, it’s never about that). They’re the kinds of films where both furtive looks AND ecstatic kisses can elicit emotion from us in equal measure (often because they are dramatized into set-up and punchline). And in the end, there is nothing stopping mainstream films from doing the same. It’s just a question of understanding what we really value, which means understanding what we give actual story real estate to. So yeah, it’s good that popcorn films are finally learning to demonstrate, but there’s just as much to be gained from looking at the intimacy of the non-overt they’ve created before. In the end, we all deserve it.

No one more than the characters themselves.

<3HULK