Big Gay Love Collector’s Set + Big Lesbian Love Collector’s Set (Wolfe DVD)/Dinah East (1971/VCI DVD)/Out Late (2008/First Run DVD)/Trigger (2011/Wolfe DVD)

 

Picture: C (Lesbian: C+)     Sound: C+     Extras: C+/C/C-/C     Films: C+

 

 

What follows are a selection of both gay and lesbian films, most of which are not very challenging, yet show the state of post-Gay New Wave cinema and show what has become lost in the shuffle to be more commercial.

 

 

First we have two sets of four films each in packaged reissues of recent Wolfe DVD releases we never saw.  Big Gay Love Collector’s Set offers the only so impressive East Side Story is not a spoof of the musical, but a simple love triangle tale that is too distracted by trying to make the main actors appealing without writing any kind of script that would make it memorable.  Lightweight and average, extras include Deleted Scenes, trailer and two feature length audio commentary track.  Things get a little more interesting in Hollywood, Je t’aime as a French guy arrives in the moviemaking capitol of the world and tries to integrate into the gay culture, but this does not always work out for him.  This is at its best when it is on location, but never really takes off.  Extras include trailer, web extras, a Making Of featurette and Deleted Scenes.  Mr. Right is about British gay men and also has a few good moments, but also gets sidetracked and seems pale as compared to the original U.K. version of Queer As Folk, reviewed elsewhere on this site, yet it might be the best film in the set.  Extras include a Making Of featurette and trailer.  Finally we have the interestingly titled Were The World Mine is actually a semi-musical about a gay guy going after his fantasy choice of a rugby player.  The music is not memorable and the results are mixed overall, but it has a few amusing moments.  Extras include trailer and feature length audio commentary track.  Overall, this was pretty unchallenging work.

 

The same can be said for the Big Lesbian Love Collector’s Set (Wolfe DVD) which also has four tales to take or leave.  The Four-Faced Liar is would-be romantic comedy about a lesbian falling for a straight gal, but can she get her and do we care?  Mixed results with a few smart moments, yet they could have done so much more.  Extras include trailer and feature length audio commentary track.  I also found the title Itty Bitty Titty Committee amusing, but this comedy about lesbian feminists, a gang of them and sex (I guess with some inferiority complexes) is too comic to really work, but is from the director of the hit But I’m A Cheerleader making it a curio.  Extras include Deleted Scenes, a Making Of featurette and Deleted Scenes.  My Normal is a comedy about a dominatrix that is never funny, has a lead that looks like she wants to be Shirley Manson of the great band Garbage and gets too over-accessorized in all kinds of ways to work.  Yawn.  Extras include a trailer and 3 Making Of featurettes.  Finally we have Then Came Lola about a San Francisco photographer trying to make her life work and sex, money and romance become issues.  This is one of the more ambitious works in both sets, but even it falls short.  Extras include a trailer, Behind The Scenes featurette and NCLR At 30 short.

 

 

Gene Nash’s Dinah East (1971) is by far the oldest entry here but it is the smartest as it subtly spoofs old melodramas, romance films, has gay themes throughout and a man (Jeremy Stockwell) as the title woman.  Andy Warhol alum Ultra Violet turns up, as well as character actor Reid Smith, but this works best the more you know about older melodramas.  When the story does not work, it plays like a time capsule that even non-gays will find interesting.  This edition is uncut and includes a trailer for this and three other sex-oriented campy films.

 

 

The one documentary on the list is Out Late (2008) but this is not about partying and one-night stands.  Instead, Beatrice Alda and Jennifer Brooke tell us a story of many persons who only just decide to enter the gay lifestyle near senior citizen age which is obviously a painful set of untold stories and contradict the idea that people “make up their minds” or the pressure stereotype that people have to “choose” anything because a society says so.  It is an interesting chapter of gay life never discussed or hear about, but here it is and it is a key one worth having a record of.  Extras include text bios, Resources and text director’s statement.

 

 

Finally we have the drama Trigger (2011) from Bruce McDonald about two female friends reuniting after ugly things have happened between them, but it goes beyond that because long ago, they were part of a popular rock band that people still talk about.  This is intended as a character study and again, has some good moments, but it also stops short of being more than a mumblecore-type independent that is satisfied with stopping short.  Molly Parker and Tracy Wright help make this work and are totally convincing in their roles, with one of them passing away after production.  Extras include actor table readings and a trailer.

 

 

All the DVDs here are anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 presentations, but tend to be generally as soft as the letterboxed 1.66 X 1 image on Dinah when they should look better being 40 years newer!  Lola and Bitty tend to look the best of all, though Out Late is going to look rough as it is a documentary.  Trigger has both Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo and Dolby Digital 5.1 mixes, but they are not wildly different and no better than the Dolby 2.0 on the rest of the DVDs.  Save Dinah, the newer productions are all hampered by low budgets, but that is no excuse for other issues I had with most of them.  Maybe the next batch we see will work better.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo