The Ledge - Another Gay Movie

Todd Stephens' latest release:

http://filmcritic.com/misc/emporium....f?OpenDocument

Another Gay Movie

If one must find something nice to say about Todd Stephens’ Another Gay Movie, then it could be that at the very least this is a film that shows gay teens not suffering through identity crises or worrying about coming out but constantly angling for and talking about sex with the same concentration and lack of shame that hetero teens are always depicted. It’s a step in the right direction and a sign that, very slowly, films are finally losing the stigma against showing gay characters who are this at peace with who they are. Of course, the film itself is a shockingly incompetent piece of crap, but at least it got one thing right.

After the banal disaster that was his Gypsy 83 – a road movie whose low point where Stevie Nicks-obsessive Sara Rue falls in love with an Amish guy at a rest stop – it’s truly mystifying as to how Stephens was able to pull another movie together. And yet, here it is. Since audiences have already suffered through not just one but two grim sequels to American Pie (not to mention the straight-to-video Band Camp), Stephens must have thought there was room for one more; albeit unofficial, and gay.

The story follows Pie pretty much note for note. There’s the group of four best friends getting ready to graduate and head off for college who decide that they need to have a pact that they’re going to lose their virginity before the end of the summer. The Stiffler stand-in is a hefty, beer-chugging lesbian named Muffler (Ashlie Atkinson), while the Eugene Levy role of dad who’s way too communicative about sex is here played by Scott Thompson, a long way from his Kids in the Hall days. To complete the pilfering (sorry, satirizing), Stephens provides embarrassing moments displayed on a website, a hook-up for one of the boys with a substantially older guy, and quiche lorraine instead of warm apple pie. Stephens has no feel for comedy, sadly, and can’t even find a way to get some laughs from his many gross-out situations. The humor starts with sex toys and ends with flatulence; against all this unimaginative bottom-feeding, casting Survivor’s Richard Hatch as himself for a grim cameo stands out, if only because it’s something different.

Stephens’ style is over-bright and cheaply cartoonish, located somewhere just south of high-budget porn, which is about the level at which his dull and unfunny script stands. The whole enterprise is really just lazy, whether Stephens is having drag legend Lypsinka do her well-honed Joan Crawford impersonation, or naming the high school Santorum. Another Gay Movie is the kind of film where when one sees an Asian woman, you know it’s only a matter of time before she says, “Me love you long time.” And if that ain’t humor, then what is?

Reviewed at the 2006 Tribeca Film Festival.