Like the threat of heat lightning on a sultry summer
evening, a vapor of menace hovers over Kimberly Peirce’s
“Boys Don’t Cry” almost from the first frame. The movie, an
account of a real-life multiple murder, unfolds in such a
leisurely way that it seems like one long premonition:
Something very bad is going to happen to a character we’re
rapidly growing to care about, and our increasing feelings
of helplessness sweep the story forward, toward inevitable
tragedy. “Boys Don’t Cry” is gripping, and it’s moving, but
it isn’t particularly subtle. There’s a strong thread of
tabloid drama running through its core — but at least it’s
sensationalistic storytelling with a heart.
That may be the only honest approach, since Peirce is
dealing with such sensationalistic material: “Boys Don’t
Cry” tells the true story of Brandon Teena (played by
Hilary Swank), who was raped and murdered in a small
Nebraska town in 1993. Brandon’s secret was that he was, biologically, a woman
– an assigned role that had never felt right to him. Thus
Teena Brandon became Brandon Teena, dressing like a man,
cultivating male mannerisms and pursuing the attentions of
women. In other words, he lived his life as the man he
wanted to be.
The charismatic Brandon was hugely successful
with women — they seemed to have little trouble buying his
identity as a man — but he repeatedly found himself in
scrapes with the law, tangled up in crimes that included
forgery and auto theft. His murderers, ex-cons John Lotter
and Thomas Nissen (played by Peter Sarsgaard and
Brendan Sexton III), were two locals from Falls City, the
Nebraska town he’d drifted into. According to Peirce’s
telling of the story, they had become friends with Brandon,
and there was the additional complication that one of them
had long been obsessed with a young woman Brandon had fallen
in love with (Lana Tisdel, played by Chlok Sevigny). When
Lotter and Nissen discovered Brandon’s “real” sexual
identity, they brutally raped him. When Brandon went to the
authorities (who, apparently, were not particularly
sympathetic), Lotter and Nissen tracked him down and killed
him, along with several of his friends, in order to silence
him.
Peirce, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Andy Bienen,
covers an extraordinary amount of territory, not just in
terms of dealing with Brandon’s sexual-identity and
self-fulfillment issues, but also in trying to understand
the lives of those around him. She’s never condescending in
her view of small-town life — she doesn’t go out of her way
to make it look depressing and dismal, and with the reality
of Falls City, she doesn’t have to — but she’s also
clear-eyed about the fallacy that small towns are
necessarily sweet, safe little places somehow
less threatening than cities. Her vision of Brandon’s
Nebraska (the movie was shot in and around Dallas, as
Peirce discovered that Brandon Teena’s murder was still too
hot an issue in Falls City) takes the measure of roadhouses
where pals congregate at night, of highways that seem to
stretch into nowhere, of dingy
homes rendered bleakly cheerful by framed prints.
Occasionally, when one of the characters is confessing a
long-cherished dream, or making a hopeful assertion that the
world really is a beautiful place, Peirce cuts to an eerily
lit dream landscape that’s almost David Lynch-like in its
beauty, dotted with simple elements like water towers, naked
trees and low ceilings of clouds. It’s as if she and
cinematographer Jim Denault (who also shot the starkly
evocative 1996 “illtown”) want to assert that there can be beauty
in bleakness, and vice versa. The landscape around Brandon
– changeable at any given minute but mostly stuck somewhere
between stark ugliness and naked splendor — acts as a kind
of mirror for the dueling elements of his own identity. The
movie’s surface is charged with tension; Hilary Swank’s
Brandon, with his gently curved cheekbones and smooth skin,
is all about tension lurking just beneath the surface.
There are times when Peirce’s instincts as a storyteller
fail her: The rape scene is so brutally realistic that it
verges on being voyeuristic, and I don’t think Peirce would
have sacrificed any of its power by relying more on
suggestion than on savage details. But wherever Peirce
falters, her ensemble of actors effortlessly picks up the
slack. Brendan Sexton (as Nissen) and particularly Peter
Sarsgaard (as Lotter) pull off the difficult feat of making
you feel some measure of sympathy for two men who are
essentially cold-blooded killers. You’re never ready to
excuse their behavior, but it’s impossible not to see them
as flesh-and-blood characters instead of symbols. Their
brutality toward Brandon, once they discover his secret, is
obviously a product of confusion. He was someone they liked
and trusted. With their obviously limited understanding of
women (Lotter makes direct references to the stupidity of
his estranged girlfriend, the mother of his young child),
they just aren’t equipped to handle Brandon’s double
betrayal. Not only had he duped them about such an integral
component of his identity, he was also an official member of
the gender they not-so-secretly despised.
As Brandon, Hilary Swank gives a performance that’s a
continual revelation. With his cropped, farmer-boy haircut
and a padded tube sock stuffed down his jeans, Swank’s
Brandon passes for a man easily enough. In preparation for
the role, Swank spent time in public dressed as a man, and
whether her choices are intuitive or intentional, they work
as a marvelous subterfuge for a character who’s striving
(against the cruelty of nature, unfortunately) for
acceptance. Brandon’s swagger seems to spring straight from
his joints. His full lips are always just a little cracked
and chapped (few women willingly allow this to happen). You
don’t actually ever forget that you’re watching a woman –
but that’s exactly the point. Brandon conveys his
uncertainty and vulnerability in small, subtle ways, in the
way he avoids a direct glance, or smiles too broadly and
eagerly when he’s trying to make friends. Conventionally
speaking, those are “womanly” screens often used to hide
insecurity; it’s heartrending to see Brandon succeed so
completely in filling the role of a man — only to give
himself away to us in these tiny, barely perceptible ways.
It’s love at first sight when Brandon sees Chloë Sevigny’s
Lana, and that goes for us, too. Sevigny seems to end up
being the heart of just about every movie she appears in
(from the abominable “Kids” to the soggy
“The Last Days of Disco”), and “Boys Don’t Cry” is no exception. With her
sleepy lizard eyes and her slow, secret smile, she at first
seems a little inscrutable as Lana, a 19-year-old who
sleep-works through the night shift in a spinach-packing
factory, but who pours every essence of her being into her
karaoke singing. Sevigny is the kind of actress who
never gives it all away at once. We see her slowly
becoming more and more comfortable with Brandon, and
simultaneously, we warm up to her too. When the two of them
find themselves in her darkened backyard, playing around
with a Polaroid camera, we get the first clue that she
really, really likes him. She swings away from him, glancing
back slyly, her beguiling smile an unspoken invitation.
As an actress, Sevigny’s transformative power translates not
just to people (we really start loving Brandon when
she does) but also to things. Her Lana is a tough,
townie girl in beat-up leather, but when she oohs and ahhs
over a selection of cheap silver rings at a
convenience-store checkout, you don’t feel pity for the poor
soul because that’s all she can afford. You think, “Yes, one
of those would look pretty on her.” You want every
good thing for her character, which makes it all the more
wrenching to know that there’s trouble ahead. When Brandon
dies, “Boys Don’t Cry” reaches an emotional intensity that’s
almost operatic. The saddest thing, though, is seeing
Sevigny’s Lana crumpled over his corpse — the way she plays
it, you know that when Brandon went, he took a part of her
with him, too.
TOKYO, Japan — In one respect, the decision by Tokyo Disneyland to allow a gay couple to hold their “wedding” at the theme park is a sign of progress in a country that has, until recently, largely ignored the issue of same-sex unions.
But some campaigners have argued that leaving it to Mickey Mouse to give his blessing to Koyuki Higashi and her partner, Hiroko Masuhara — in a strictly symbolic ceremony — is also a mark of how far Japan has to go before it affords the same rights to the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community as it does to heterosexual couples.
Tokyo Disneyland condoned this and all future same-sex ceremonies after receiving an inquiry from Higashi. Cue a confused response from a subsidiary, Oriental Land Company, which licenses the name and characters from Disney in the United States.
Higashi, 27, and her partner could “marry” at the park, they were told, but only if they dressed “like a man and a woman.” Park officials were worried that other visitors might be offended by the sight of two women in wedding dresses or morning suits.
The park relented on the dress code after a storm of protest on Twitter and other social media networks — it had all been a misunderstanding by an individual employee, it said — but the couple will not be allowed to exchange vows in the park’s chapel due to “Christian teachings.”
Those restrictions go to the heart of the flimsy protection offered to the rights of LGBT people in Japan, say campaigners. Homosexuality is not illegal, but same-sex marriages are not legally recognized.
“There needs to be more pressure for legal unions between gay people in Japan,” said Taiga Ishikawa, one of only a handful of openly gay politicians in the country. “This is only a guess, but I’d say there are more people now who are in long-term relationships and want that to be recognized in the form of a civil partnership.”
The 37-year-old, who won a seat on the Toshima Ward assembly in Tokyo last year, is campaigning to introduce an ordinance in the area to offer some form of marital recognition and to increase the number of administrative rights and services afforded to same-sex couples. But he admits that it’s “some way off.”
If Disneyland was being held up as an agent of progress, one of Japan’s most popular celebrities popped up to demonstrate that, in some quarters, ignorance reigns.
Commenting on TV on President Barack Obama’s recent declaration of support for gay marriages in the US, the film director and comedian Takeshi Kitano told a fellow guest: “Obama supports gay marriage. You would support marriage between humanoid and animals eventually, then,” before questioning the ability of gay couples to raise children.
Kitano has since tried to explain his outburst: “I was only talking about people who love their pets so much that they may think of marrying them,” AFP reported him as saying. “There is no way I look at gay people in the same way as I do animals, let alone implying sexual relations with animals.”
His were not the first comments with homophobic overtones to be made by a high-profile public figure in Japan. In late 2010, Shintaro Ishihara, the outspoken governor of Tokyo, suggested gay people were “deficient” after watching same-sex couples take part in a parade in San Francisco. “We have even got homosexuals casually appearing on television,” he said. “Japan has become far too untamed.”
Yuji Kitamaru, a journalist who writes about LGBT issues, said he was “very disappointed” by Kitano’s remarks, particularly as he has spoken up for minorities, including transgender people, in the past. “I felt it was a big betrayal not only to us and the audience, but also to himself. Public figures like Kitano can easily indulge in that kind of bigotry because Japanese people in general haven’t considered the difference between public discourse and private gossip.”
Yet Kitamaru, who has written on LGBT issues in Japan for two decades, believes social media has quickly become the forum for a more open discussion about sexuality, citing Twitter’s role in the Disneyland decision and a meeting held in Ni-chome, a gay neighborhood of Tokyo, to thank Obama for his support.
Higashi and her partner, meanwhile, have visited Disneyland to break their good news to Mickey Mouse. They have yet to set a date for the wedding, and there are reports that their inquiries were intended only to test the theme park’s commitment to equality.
Ishikawa welcomed Disneyland’s decision, which apparently came after officials in Tokyo contacted the company’s US headquarters. “I wrote 10 years ago that I looked forward to the day when gay and lesbian couples could hold hands and go to Tokyo Disneyland, so I’m very happy,” he said. “But we’re still not at the point where a man or woman can tell people, especially co-workers, that they have a same-sex partner.”
Tyler Clementi’s mother calls his actions “evil and malicious.” His father says they were “the cold-hearted violations” of his son, who committed suicide in September 2010. And a young man known only as “M.B.” said in a written statement that he “caused me a great deal of pain.” So, does Dharun Ravi’s punishment — 30 days jail time, 300 hours of community service, three years’ probation, and $11,900 total in fines — fit the crimes of which he’s been found guilty?
In March, Ravi was convicted of charges of bias and intimidation stemming from the death of Clementi, his Rutgers roommate, whom he had secretly filmed, in Ravi’s words, “making out with a dude.” It was a story that reverberated around the world, and helped invigorate the anti-bullying movement. As Judge Glenn Berman handed down the sentence Monday afternoon, calling Ravi’s actions “offensive and unconscionable,” he said that he would not recommend deportation. But the judge did pointedly tell Ravi, “I haven’t heard you apologize once” for his callous behavior. And he said he made “no comment” regarding any further civil actions the Clementis might take.
Though Berman said he believed the sentence “disenchanted both sides,” it’s one that shows respect for the law as it stands in New Jersey. It also offers what Berman calls the “hopeful” possibility that Ravi — and others who have so cavalierly shamed and exploited people — might learn something about the quality of mercy. Maybe all those hours of service can teach Ravi something he, as an 18-year-old college freshman, was so devastatingly lacking.
In her remarks to the court Monday, Clementi’s mother tearfully said that a piece of her died when her child killed himself. And M.B., the anonymous young man whom Ravi secretly recorded with Clementi in September 2010, said in a statement to the court that while he bore Ravi no malice, he “just wanted him to acknowledge that he had done wrong and take responsibility for his conduct.” That atonement isn’t something a judge can impose. And it’s a statement Ravi has yet to make.
There are two ways to bring about positive, long-term social change: the fast one and the slow one. In the first version, statues are toppled, walls are torn down, laws are dramatically enacted. There is, forever, a clear before and after. It’s days like July 24, 2011, when New York state approved same-sex marriage. Or May 9, 2012, when Barack Obama became the first president to announce his support for the issue — an occasion that prompted incoming Human Rights Campaign president Chad Griffin to remark, “You will not forget where you were when you saw the president deliver those remarks.”
Then there’s the subtler version. The kind where you look around one day and suddenly realize that gay people have been building families and creating homes together this whole time. They’re your neighbors. They’re your fellow parents on the PTA. And they are totally the couple building an amazing new deck this weekend. For 18 years now, HGTV has been a steadfast force for exactly that kind of tolerance, simply by advancing the radical notion that homosexuals are out there in the world obtaining mortgages and painting their interiors just like straight people.
It’s not that LGBT-friendly content doesn’t exist elsewhere on television. I mean, Christ, have you ever seen Bravo? We could start with Andy Cohen and not even get around to “Project Runway” for days. There are entire gay-oriented networks, like Logo. But what distinguishes HGTV is both its durability and its ordinariness.
HGTV doesn’t trade in drama or high camp; it doesn’t offer “Wig Parties and Threesomes” stereotypes. Sure, one might suggest that the network’s high population of flamboyant gay designers panders to a different kind of typecasting. But the presence of hosts like David Bromstad and the married, father of two Vern Yip seems more like a logical, ordinary reflection of the makeup of the field. It’s also likely why there are so many gay contestants on its competitions as well. Just look at last year’s “Design Star” combatants, which included the lesbian former Dallas Cowboys cheerleader (and mother of four) Leslie Ezelle, and “average gay dad” Tyler Wisler.
More significant than its regular on-air talent pool, however, is the network’s consistent depiction of America’s gay and lesbian population as normal, carpooling, Home Depot-shopping folks whose agenda includes upgrading the kitchen backsplash. Far from the cavalcade of dysfunction on networks like TLC, the network regularly presents typical families of different ages and ethnicities — some of whom happen to be same-sex — on shows like “Property Virgins” and “House Hunters,” where the most shocking element of an odyssey is likely to be the property’s price tag.
That a network built around design would position itself as gay-friendly might seem like a no-brainer. But it’s also a network that still has an overwhelmingly female core audience that isn’t necessarily going to identify with male same-sex couples. But by depicting a variety of couples and families, the Scripps-owned empire is broadening its base and appealing to a wider demographic. It’s also reflecting the reality of contemporary America. As “Property Virgins” casting director Michael Barrick said when he put out the call for Atlanta-area LGBT parents last month, “I do prefer to see as diverse a population featured on television as possible. People like to watch a show that they can relate with, be it black, white, Asian, interracial, gay and straight. If they don’t see that representation, they are more likely to change the channel – and that is something as a casting director, that I just don’t want to see.”
There are still plenty of people out there stuck with antiquated ideals. Some of them are even running for president. But the fact that the American family doesn’t always resemble an Eisenhower-era sitcom is something more and more of us accept. It’s been a long time coming and it’s still a work in progress, but our American image of home and family is, in the words of the president, evolving. It evolves when a law is changed or a leader speaks out. And it evolves when two guys buy a house together on basic cable, and then another two, and another two, and the two ladies. Suddenly it’s not weird or unique or groundbreaking at all. It’s improvement. One home at a time.
Updated below
Let’s get something straight, so to speak, right off the bat. There’s no disputing that Manny Pacquiao is not the most enlightened guy to ever put on gloves and fight for a belt. In a story for Examiner.com this past weekend, blogger Granville Ampong wrote of how the boxing champ takes issue with Barack Obama’s recent groundbreaking declaration of support for same-sex unions. “God’s words first … obey God’s law first before considering the laws of man,” Pacquiao told Ampong, in what the writer described as “an exclusive interview.” Pacquiao was further quoted explaining that “God only expects man and woman to be together and to be legally married, only if they so are in love with each other… It should not be of the same sex so as to adulterate the altar of matrimony, like in the days of Sodom and Gomorrah of Old.”
OK, it’s generally accepted that invoking Sodom and Gomorrah in general — and Sodom and Gomorrah of Old, in particular — is not going to win anybody a seat at the GLAAD awards. Sure enough, Pacquiao’s statements quickly set off a chain of angry and just plain disappointed responses from across the Net, where Pacquiao has been celebrated as a Filipino icon, and beloved for his humanitarian works. On Tuesday evening, the Los Angeles shopping center the Grove, where Pacquiao was to be interviewed for “Extra,” called off the event. “Based on news reports of statements made by Mr. Pacquiao,” read a statement from the center’s spokesman Bill Reich, “we have made it be known that he is not welcome at the Grove and will not be interviewed here now or in the future. The Grove is a gathering place for all Angelenos and not a place for intolerance.”
It’s a relatively free country, which means that the Catholic Pacquiao is welcome to express his views, even views many of us find backward and exclusionary. In return, a business like a shopping mall may choose to decline his patronage. What is not OK is what happened along the way.
You see, within the original Examiner.com piece, Ampong went off on a bit of biblical tangent. “Pacquiao’s directive for Obama calls societies to fear God and not to promote sin, inclusive of same-sex marriage and cohabitation,” he wrote, “notwithstanding what Leviticus 20:13 has been pointing all along: ‘If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.’”
That’s Ampong. Quoting Leviticus. You could go ahead and infer that this is what Pacquiao was alluding to in his remarks, and you definitely could say that’s some convoluted writing there. But Pacquiao himself clearly didn’t issue the quote. But let’s not let the barest understanding of attribution get in the way of a sensational headline, shall we? Before you could say gross perversion of the facts, Change.org was running a petition asking Nike to drop “homophobic boxer Manny Pacquiao,” declaring, “In an interview published Tuesday, March 15th with the conservative Examiner newspaper, the world-famous boxer and Los Angeles resident quoted Leviticus…” And except for the fact that Pacquiao didn’t quote Leviticus, Examiner.com is not a conservative newspaper, and the interview didn’t run on Tuesday, sure.
The confusion stems largely from a Tuesday L.A. Weekly blog post by Simone Wilson, in which she wrote, “Pacquiao told the National Conservative Examiner over the weekend that gay men should be ‘put to death’ for their sexual crimes.” She then backpedaled a tad by noting “Yes, he was quoting Leviticus 20:13, but he hasn’t backed down from his harsh stance.” She continued further in the piece to invoke “what Pacquiao said” and ponder that “For the sports star to announce that he thinks thousands of gay Angelenos should be ‘put to death’ for loving a same-sex partner should hugely alienate him to the locals,” adding that “Because … uh … ‘put to death’? You just don’t say that kind of thing in 21st century America.” Maybe that’s why he didn’t. And by the way, calling the source “the National Conservative Examiner” greatly glorifies Examiner.com, a site anybody with an Internet connection and rudimentary typing ability can write for, “even if you’re not a professional writer.” It’s a site with all the journalistic credibility of, oh, L.A. Weekly.
But what kind of commitment to facts could we have expected from Simone Wilson? This is the person who, when real journalist Lara Logan was attacked in Egypt last year, hastily banged out a grotesquely offensive fantasy version of events, writing, “In a rush of frenzied excitement, some Egyptian protestors apparently consummated their newfound independence by sexually assaulting the blonde reporter.”
Wilson’s colleague Dennis Romero added more fuel to the mythic Pacquiao interview story Tuesday, in a piece headlined “Manny Pacquiao Says Gay Men Should Be ‘Put to Death.’” USA Today then jumped in, reporting that “Pacquiao also invoked Old Testament, and recited Leviticus 20:13, saying: “If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman.” And the Village Voice blog, for good measure, reported, “The Bible Via-Manny Pacquiao: Gays Shouldn’t Get Married, They Should Be ‘Put To Death.’” How ridiculous did the whole thing get? On Pacquiao’s own “official” website Tuesday, writer Keith Terceira said, “Manny Pacquiao was recently quoted in the USAToday as invoking the old testament.” [sic]
I get that nobody really pays attention to what anybody posts on Examiner.com, but seriously. If you’re going to quote someone, read the damn source material already. You need to have an eighth-grade reading proficiency level to get a driver’s license, yet apparently you can be functionally illiterate and work for L.A. Weekly and USA Today.
On Wednesday, Granville Ampong wrote a follow-up post on the matter, saying of the Leviticus quote, “Pacquiao never said nor recited, nor invoked and nor did he ever refer to such context.” And Pacquiao likewise issued a statement, saying, “I didn’t say that, that’s a lie… I didn’t know that quote from Leviticus because I haven’t read the Book of Leviticus yet,” and adding, “I’m not against gay people … I have a relative who is also gay. We can’t help it if they were born that way. What I’m critical off are actions that violate the word of God. I only gave out my opinion that same-sex marriage is against the law of God.”
Pacquiao inarguably has a long way to go in the tolerance department. And his remarks were ignorant, to be sure. But you can’t cure ignorant with stupid. And you can’t change minds with lies.
UPDATE: LA Weekly writer Simone Wilson called us Wednesday to clarify our assertion that she initiated the story that Pacquiao himself deployed the Leviticus quote, telling us that “USA Today, the Village Voice, and his own Web site had already reported it” by the time she wrote her piece. Though the misleading content of her story remains the same, her place in the fray was not first. For which we apologize — and offer the sincere hope that the story can’t get any more meta now.
When Barack Obama blew America’s mind by declaring his support for same-sex marriage Wednesday, he explained that his views on the subject had long been “evolving.” But while evolution is a process that can take millennia, social media moves with considerably more swiftness. However long it took the White House (nudged though it was by Joe Biden’s Sunday blurt that he was “absolutely comfortable” with marriage equality) to get to that place, it took no time at all for Obama’s sentiments to become a meme.
It’s no accident that the president’s change of heart happened to make for a perfect sound bite. Nearly as fast as Barack Obama, leader of the free world, could utter the words “Same-sex couples should be able to get married,” to ABC News correspondent Robin Roberts, @barackobama — the president’s not-nearly-as-popular-as@JustinBieber Twitter account — was announcing “Same-sex couples should be able to get married.” As of Thursday morning, it had been retweeted over 56,000 times and counting.
And just like that, what had been a fuzzy campaign issue for Obama just a week ago became a defiant stance – and an easily forwarded post. The president’s Twitter and Facebook accounts wasted no time issuing a photo of Obama with his statement, under the heading, “history.” The campaign’s main page itself immediately splashed up the quote, along with the ABC News clip and the invitation to “stand up with the president.” And the campaign’s colorful, friendly-looking poster stating that “Every single American/Gay Straight Lesbian Bisexual Transgender/Deserves to be treated equally in the eyes of the law and in the eyes of our society/It’s a pretty simple proposition” popped into a place of honor on the Obama Pinterest and Instagram pages.
Elections can turn on a few provocative words – from “Read my lips” to “It’s the economy, stupid” to, simply, “Hope.” But there’s never been a time when a single sentiment could be parroted across so many different platforms. The Obama campaign knows this, and has shrewdly seized upon the immediate, visceral reaction that one sentence can inspire with impressive immediacy. Watch and learn, Romney. Though we’ve yet to see how the president’s “evolved” stance will shake out into real votes in November, for now, it sure makes for a whole lot of likes and pins. Whatever happens next, Obama’s won Twitter.
(Credit: Cindy Hughes via Shutterstock) 
Dharun Ravi (Credit: AP/John Munson) 
(Credit: Karina Kononenko via Shutterstock) 
Manny Pacquiao (Credit: Reuters/Steve Marcus) 
