Jul. 07, 2002 - 6:01 pm
this is a documentary i saw a preview for last week at the beginning of another film i was watching. i'm not sure which one it was on, but it looked really good. basically it's a documentary about the history of how homosexuality has been portrayed in Hollywood. it shows a lot of film clips and has a lot of actors and screenwriters commenting on the material.
it was very interesting to watch scenes from some of the scenes from films that i had seen with "new eyes." like i never considered that the two murderers from Alfred Hitchcock's Rope (1948) were gay. nor Mrs. Danvers from Rebecca (1940). also Sal Mineo's character Plato from Rebel Without a Cause (1955). i guess they all make sense though when you think about it.
i thought they sort of overemphasized the Tom Hanks movie Philadelphia (1993). it seemed like the filmmakers thought that that was the best film featuring gay people that had ever been made. i might agree actually, but we sure did see a lot more of Philadelphia than any other movie. i guess it's because of the time at which this documentary came out. everyone was still raving about it.
it took me a while to figure out what they meant by the "celluloid" closet. i kept thinking of the word cellulite. that made no sense to me. celluloid is what film is made of. i knew that, but couldn't get cellulite out of my head for some reason. i'm retarded.
look for another review before the night is out.