Schadenfreude

From AfterElton: "Bruno, the movie that everyone has an opinion about, is tanking at the box office...Ever since the movie opened on July 10th with a very healthy one-day take of $14.4 million, the film's box office news has gone from bad to worse."

Distürbed

Remember how we said we were going to see Brüno? Alex insisted on going, not for entertainment, but for research. The marketing smacks of a minstrel show in pink-face, but you can't judge a movie without seeing it, right?

Oh, yeah, you can.

Get this (and spoiler alert, if you care): word is coming out that the ending was changed before release. The original ending featured a "violent gay-bashing." Comedy gold! And so clever, too. In a version of the film screened in February, Brüno, the gay, scantily clad, sexually inappropriate, ridiculously coiffed, borderline-retarded Austrian entertainment reporter played by Sacha Baron Cohen (Borat), faces his lovesick assistant in a cage match before a crowd of Arkansas wrestling fans. Instead of fighting, though, they make out, and are attacked by the crowd. The scene cuts to a press conference where Brüno announces their intent to marry, but, according to Richard Day, who attended the screening, "the boyfriend is now drooling, seemingly brain-damaged, and in a wheelchair, played for laughs.”

Day, a writer, director and producer (Arrested Development, Ellen) and actor Jack Plotnick were the only two openly gay people at the February screening. Day says they both voiced their concerns to the other industry types present, but "by the time I got to the bashing, the audience started defending the movie. They were annoyed with us for ruining the party."

Where to start with this? We wanted to see this movie to determine first-hand who Cohen is mocking, gay people, or homophobes? We could possibly look past the offensive stereotyping, if there was some hint of a redeeming message underneath it. Maybe Cohen's formula of kamikazi-interviews and staged spectacles before hostile crowds would evoke some new understanding of homophobia, exposing an unexpecting audience to an ultimately gay-positive image.

Well, forget that. Cohen crafted the whole scene as a prank, of course, according to a report on the Smoking Gun from last year. Locals were lured by Craigslist ads promoting "Blue Collar Brawling," and the promise of $1 beers and "hot chicks." What they got instead was two men playing homosexuals, with the intent to incite the crowd, all to complete a joke where the punchline is a gay man beaten to within an inch of his life.

Where's the message in that? What IS the message? Is it "beating up gay people is funny?" Or is it "gay bashers are funny?"

Because neither is funny to us. Call us humorless, but this is just beyond defense, and it hints at a bigger problem of tone that won't be fixed by simply changing the ending (it's now a scene of domestic bliss). The idea that this film was ever intended to target homophobia, and not gay people, is now proven false. It's one thing to sterotype speech or mannerisms or even sexual proclivities for laughs, but to make light of the brutal hatred and violence inflicted on gay people by bashers is just too much. It's just not funny. It's cruel, and vicious, and hateful. If you laugh at this, you have a problem.

Richard Day has an interesting take on it. He met with Cohen and director Larry Charles before shooting started, when all they had was an outline. Charles had told him they wanted "a gay voice" involved in the project, but after he gave his two cents, he never heard from them again until the screening. Day's take on that first peek at Cohen's vision for Brüno? "It read like it was written by people who didn’t know much about actual gay life."

Sounds like they still don't.

We're not wasting our money on this one.

The Things We Do For Love

Actual conversation last night at the Double-A Ranch:

"Andy?"

"Yes, Alex?"

"Can I ask a favor?"

"Yes."

"Will you go with me to see Brüno?"

"Are you fucking kidding me?"

Let me start by explaining it's usually Andy who has the bad taste in movies. I know that's mean, but he's made me watch Tremors more than once. If gay divorce were legal, I think that would be grounds for it. Also, I don't really want to see Brüno for entertainment value. We know he's supposed to be "edgy", but neither of us is a Sacha Baron Cohen fan. You may consider me unspeakably square, but his humor makes me feel queasy. I just want to see it for research. I'm intrigued by accusations that this Brüno character is a minstrel show of faggotry, even though many defend his humor for pointing out the homophobia rampant in certain segments of society. Fine, but does he have to do that in hotpants? I need to sit in a theater with whoever the intended audience is for this shitfest to really judge how I feel about it, and I'd prefer company. Or backup.

Once I explained, Andy agreed, and that's when I asked a second favor: let's go to the National Equality March in Washington on October 11. Of course he agreed to that (always lead with the worse proposition), and we're extending the invitation to everyone who reads Alex and Andy: come march with us! We know this protest is getting some flak for being a bit rushed and disorganized, and some are questioning the effectiveness of a march on Washington at this point, but we're on board. It's not a march for any one issue, but a march for gay equality across the board: marriage, military, job protection, all of it, everywhere, in all 50 states. Will it ever happen in our lifetimes? Not if we sit on our butts! There is power in numbers, and we still believe things like this can send a message. And how much fun will this be?

More fun than seeing Brüno, I suspect.