This movie was kind of important for me
I was 13-14 when it came out and knew I was gay and it was difficult. I remember I was able to see it a few years later on cable and finally felt like I got a glimpse of a person on film who was like me.
shareI remember seeing it in a country town here in Australia when I was on tour with a theatre company. It was a small production, so there were only about nine of us in the cast (and we were all our own stage crew), and all but one of the blokes in the show just happened to be gay. So we all rocked up as a group to see this thing, and there were only four other people in the cinema -- two hetero couples, all in their 60s, who looked quite shocked to see us rock in, like they didn't quite know why we were there or what we might get up to.
Afterwards we all walked outside to the parking lot, and I remember we all just stood around for a few minutes, wordless, quietly smiling at each other and looking a bit goofy. I don't think any of us at the time ever expected to see ourselves represented on-screen so acceptingly. In hindsight, the film may not be everything any of us might have wished, but it was still a pivotal moment in my life.
Kinda makes me shake my head when, twenty-five years later, we still see ignorant self-centred little heteros on these threads getting spun out and angry whenever someone suggests a character in a movie might be gay -- or better still, a pair of characters ! -- and whining out things like "why do we need to see that anyway?"
Honey, you've got no idea how important it can be ...