| Fictional films on the AIDS epidemic are seldom timely enough for us to fully appreciate them.
A vast majority of AIDS films (and plays, for that matter) pre-date medications that are now extending life for those with HIV. Characters are usually portrayed as gay victims dropping like flies, or crying beside hospital beds as that black cloud descends.
Until the mid-90s, this was, of course, the reality. Now, revisiting movies like Philadelphia, Longtime Companions, It’s My Party and An Early Frost is sort of like watching old hygiene films.
As AIDS Awareness Week concludes with World AIDS Day on December 1, two recently released DVDs examine AIDS by using artistic and retrospective undertones, and, in the process, present a more timely account of both HIV and the gay male point of view.
David Drake’s The Night Larry Kramer Kissed Me debuted off-Broadway in 1993 and, after being performed the world over, became the longest-running solo show in New York theatre history. The title refers to New York’s most vocal AIDS activist, Larry Kramer, whose outrage over AIDS led to the creation of America’s biggest AIDS activist group, ACT UP, at a time when AIDS was still being called "GRID" (Gay-Related Immune Deficiency). A playwright, Kramer called the government on its negligence, criticized gay men for not being vocal and pleaded for action.
The catalyst for Drake’s one-man show is Kramer’s celebrated 1985 play, The Normal Heart – Drake is metaphorically "kissed" into naive self-awareness after seeing a performance. The day after, he recoils with the first news of AIDS. "I ran for days to escape the invisible, unprintable killer," he tells us. "I ran for a fantasy. I ran for a fix. I ran for 42nd Street: The Musical."
Now on DVD and video under the direction of Tim Kirkman, The Night Larry Kramer Kissed Me is a well-shot and well-performed collection of Drake’s monologues. The film begins with childhood and ends in 2012, when the census report finally includes a "sexual orientation" column, Siskel and Ebert finally come out, and Madonna is shooting her latest sex video with a Kabuki fan "that spins into a dental dam."
Drake is an extremely versatile performer, with a quick wit and angry sense of urgency that helped him command the stage for years in this role. Having performed the play endlessly, his collaboration with Kirkman on the film was well established in advance, and the result is a good marriage of the two mediums. Featuring monologues like the intro "The Birthday Triptych," the two-part "Owed to the Village People" and the hysterical "Why I Go to the Gym," the film is just as infused with social action and anger as Kramer himself, while satirizing the often ridiculous behaviour of gay men.
Drake’s AIDS tribute, "A Thousand Points of Light," is perhaps the darkest and most moving element of his performance. As the actor lights one candle after another for family and friends lost to AIDS-related illnesses, the script’s humour easily transforms itself into the justification for its anger. "The truth will set you free," says Drake. "But first, it will piss you off." Look for a few bonuses on the DVD, like alternate endings and the original workshop of the off-Broadway play.
Another film targets a more specific time in the 25-year history of AIDS. Alive and Kicking is produced by Channel Four, a sort of HBO for Britain that churns out quality, uncensored films like the original Queer As Folk. The film takes place in 1995, when an HIV positive, narcissistic ballet dancer named Tonio (Jason Flemyng) struggles with the loss of his partner, his mentor (Anthony Higgins) and members of his ballet company before falling for Jack (Anthony Sher), the therapist that treated his deceased spouse.
Alive and Kicking was written by Martin Sherman, author of the hit play-turned-mediocre-film Bent. Sherman is no beginner at writing clever material, particularly when it comes to gay romance, and here the romance dominates the film’s other epidemiological topics. Director Nancy Meckler, who scored with Sister My Sister, is clearly driven by the actors. Fortunately, Sherman’s script takes us in some rare directions and stays sharp enough without feeling the need to go overboard with bitchy dialogue.
Flemyng (Rob Roy, Stealing Beauty) creates some likeable pathos as Tonio, in a very unlikable role of a perfectionist determined to create a masterpiece before he falls ill. As Jack, Sher turns in an equally good performance, and if you can get over the stereotypes, so does the rest of the supporting cast (check out Dorothy Tutin as the hilarious cardboard cutout of a choreographer). Not unlike other films about AIDS, a good ensemble is crucial if the characters are to band together in the face of crisis. In Alive and Kicking, they do just that, rendering the film a little better than average fare.
Even after seven years, Alive and Kicking may not appeal to our current battle with AIDS, but it certainly takes us there by beginning in death and moving towards life, not vice versa. After all, in a new era of pharmaceuticals, extending life is still too little, but it’s certainly an edge in the battle for a cure. |
