Straightman – 10th Anniversary Edition + XX –
Where The Heart Should Be (2010/Water Bearer DVDs)
Picture: C+/C Sound: C+ Extras: B-/C- Features: C+/C-
And now
for our first look in a while at any material with a gay discourse…
Straightman – 10th
Anniversary Edition
(2000) is actually an upgrade of the same film we covered from Water Bearer
years ago at this link:
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/2748/Straightman
This
version is miscredited as being in the “widescreen format” but it is a
noticeable upgrade from the older DVD which made the whole film look like it
was shot on video. Turns out it was shot
on film (16mm?) and color and depth are improved, but this is foiled by
aliasing errors, ghosting and other detail issues. The Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono is a little
cleaner than the older DVD, but the improvement only shows the age and limits
of the low budget they had for audio.
Extras are expanded, reincluding the HateMan short, original trailer and original feature length audio
commentary, then adding a deleted scene with commentary, new reissue trailer
and making of featurette In The Company Of Ben. Funny title and though the film did not stay
with me, at least it gets upgraded treatment here and this is the way you
should see it until a Blu-ray rolls around.
Newer is
Todd Verow’s XX – Where The Heart Should
Be (2010) is more a collection of 20 shorts than a coherent feature, though
they are loosely connected by a theme of nihilism and gay sex. Graphic at times, silly and unintentionally
funny (dark as it gets and think it gets) at others, the celebration of “end
times” includes a few group sex scenes that have voice-over narration by
unidentified & unhappy gay men, a recurring older female character made up
to be un attractive, ill, clown-like and miserable, some shorts have distorted
images throughout and there are even moments of sex where the participants are
knowingly transmitting AIDS/HIV and using objects (including razorblades?!?)
for the supposed sense of doom.
Unfortunately,
the shorts never synergize into anything, no big statement is made, this is
often predictable as anything, it is also boring and plays like a bad porno
where the makers have run out of ideas.
There is also strobing in scenes and visual tricks like that (among
other more degraded images) seem an excuse for Verow to hide behind style
instead of delivering something that adds up to anything. We even get tired shaky camerawork, but this
is trying to be titillating and clever, but it all backfires and slowly
implodes in its flashiness. I even got
the impression he was ripping off Kubrick, but this project does not begin to
be honest about human sexuality of any kind.
The
anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 image is made up of several types of video
clips as noted, but we get plenty of distorted, noisy or static nonsense shots,
along with aliasing errors and more than a few shots of digital macroblocking
that is plain sloppy throughout. The
Dolby Digital 2.0 sound has stereo music (albeit very repetitious and 1970s
porno-like), but other audio (like people talking on location) has audio drop
outs, a lack of fidelity and other sonic issues. Voiceovers are made to sound distorted to the
point of self-satire (a sort of talk/moan combo) that is supposedly exposing
lust, but is just plain dumb. Extras include
several trailers and a few thankfully Deleted Scenes.
Yawn!
- Nicholas Sheffo
