A Queer Definition of Art, Underground, and Cult Cinema

Paper by Gabriella Guillen. Viewed on DVD.

Since the advent of film, filmmakers have always been pushing the boundary on the films they make. Even during the years of the production code, they used their creativity and worked between the lines to keep cinema alive. Through this creativity, different genres were established, which defined the diverse cultures in America more specifically and heartfelt than before. The New Queer Cinema movement was a tremendously influential part of American Cinema in the 1990s. It helped non-white non-heteronormative films become highly acknowledged in mainstream society due to the fact that these films, specifically Gregg Araki’s Totally F***ed Up and Gus Van Sant’s My Own Private Idaho, were personal, exceedingly unique, and used art, underground, and cult cinema as distinctive styles and genres that make them irreplaceable and important to American Cinema today.

There is no doubt that the New Queer Cinema played a role in the advent of the American independent film movement. Being part of the independent film movement, these films launched the careers of filmmakers and actors that later defined a generation. These films represented 90s American teens differently, without the “Brat Pack” ideology of 80s mainstream Hollywood. The ideas of these films were to shock and confront the western world with their parody of mainstream imagery, and to defy the very nature of homosexuality of Hollywood and independent films (Queer Images, Benshoff and Griffin 221). Gregg Araki’s Totally F***ed Up is a look into a group of gay teenagers’ lives that redefined teenage films. What the film manages to do is break away from flamboyant gay stereotypes and specifically focuses on a subculture within a subculture creating an extremely personal film yet dealing with very real subjects. The film has a diverse range of characters that can be found even outside the gay community making them relatable to any audience with an open mind. This audience connection allowed more of these films to be made in America and for these characters to have the dignity of their own lives outside the gay stereotype. Gus Van Sant’s My Own Private Idaho on the other hand has a completely different story and characters, and influences American cinema differently. The film is about male prostitutes. It follows specifically one who is narcoleptic and in love with his best friend. What allowed this film to be unique in American cinema are the complex relationships this damaged young man has with his brother, his father, his lovers, and his best friend. As the character drifts from place to place, so does the audience. The film evokes a range of emotions and is only fully appreciated once you allow yourself to be immersed with these emotions. The ambiguous end also adds to the drifting feeling because no one knows who picks the main character up during his narcoleptic episode on the side of the road. This is different from average Hollywood films, which was the reason it did well and was accepted by a larger audience. These two films were a breath of fresh air to American Cinema. Of course the styles the films were shot in greatly improved the stories they were telling.
What defines an art house film is the style it represents. It allows film to be art and be an unconventional form of art. These films tend to be auteur driven and have a style that focus on the thoughts and dreams of characters more than straightforward action cause films. These films are aimed for smaller audiences, which is why the independent film movement was so keen to them and why they had such success in the New Queer Cinema Movement. Gus Van Sant’s My Own Private Idaho was released in 1991 after the success of his film Drugstore Cowboy in 1989. Although the film has a bigger budget than other films in the independent movement, it does not stray from the roots of an art film. The films’ artistic appeal comes in the relationship the character has with others, specifically the sexual encounters, and the portrayal of the theme of love occurs during his narcoleptic episodes.

This film makes sex an art. There are only two real sex scenes in the film and they’re both very close to each other. They’re filmed like close up pictures of bodies in low-key lighting with deep shadows. Each shot lasting about a second, they are mirroring erotic paintings. The first being with three men, the director add a red silk cloth to Mike, the main character of the film, differentiating him between the two other men, that constructs each shot look like a Caravaggio painting of a interpretation of Greek stories about lovers. The way the shots are framed represents the act as a routine; sex is no longer love, it’s just awkward. Low classical music plays in the background signifying a link to the classical world and upper class society. A society Scott, Mike’s best friend, is part of and will be part of by the end of the film. It is a link between the two worlds that is inevitable between these two young men because they lived in opposite ends of the spectrum. This represents the separation of an individualistic society and the yearning 90s youth wanted for connection and meaning in their lives. The only other sex scene in the film is between Scott and Carmella, an Italian woman Mike’s mother tutored. This again like the one before is filmed with many quick, stylized framed shots. It is a lot brighter because they are right next to a window that is letting a lot of light in, just as it’s symbolically letting love begin. These shots are longer and focus more on skin contact opposed to the scene before. They are more sensual and it solidifies Scotts’ belief that two men cannot love each other. In a way these scenes artistically represent that sex is the same for everyone and doesn’t always have to mean anything. These scenes are quick yet offer a lot of information on the characters ideologies and personalities yet without words and the conventional classical Hollywood storytelling. Although the film is about male prostitutes there is more to it than that, the theme’s represented in the film are complex and told metaphorically through the techniques of art cinema.

As we follow Mike we start to learn that he yearns for love. The love he never had from a father, the love he once had from a mother, and the love he wants to have from a friend. The allegorical character for love in this film is his mother. This theme of love is artistically approached through flashbacks of home videos of his mother. Specifically the scene with Mike’s brother is the best representation of this yearning for love. As Mike and Scott travel to Idaho to visit Mike’s brother, Richard, to find his mother, they end up in a tiny trailer home where a life-changing secret is revealed. Scott goes into the bathroom to get away from the personal conversation the brothers are having, and in the other room hears Mike screaming “Dad” to Richard. He steps out to a heavy atmosphere and Mike having an episode. Richard offers Scott a drink and small talk while Mike starts to calm down. When Mike gets better he confronts his brother about his father. Richard lies to him, which causes flashbacks. These flashbacks are in low quality home video style and they’re quick. They are happy. They are a mother and her children, a family and their home. A picture perfect family with a secret bigger than anything shown in Hollywood films, one that mainstream would never confront. It’s subtle and only by watching the scene a few times can one understand Mike’s character. It’s covered up by simple happy home video spliced up with a brother protecting his family secret. This artistic style is the only way to confront this complex situation without putting off the audience, straying from the drifting state of mind the character has, and straying from the atmosphere of the film that is both serious yet not somber because of the colors and soundtrack. Both Mike and Richard are betrayed by the one they loved the most, and the one who loved them the most. We can assume his mother sexually molested him when he was a child because there would be no other way for Mike to know that Richard was his father unless their mother molested him or confessed to what she had done, but the later is very slim. His relationship to his mother is too close for her to have confessed. His quest for his mother is his quest for love with the only other person he loves, but when Scott betrays him to go back to his upper class life, Mike realizes that love is lost to him in the form of his lost mother. The last flashback of his mother is one of them together as the camera tracks back leaving them, as she and as love has left him. Of course the entire film is filled with artistic shots, lighting and themes that make it a prime example of art cinema in the 90s which makes it easy to differentiate from underground films like the ones from Gregg Araki.

Underground Cinema, although closely linked to art cinema, is a low budget, small, not technologically advanced and at times a sexually explicit tour de force that began in the 1960s and was represented again in films of the 90s independent film movement (Williams and Hammond, 62). Pioneers of the Queer underground American Cinema, which began in the 1960s and left a profound and lasting effect on many filmmakers including Martin Scorsese, were Kenneth Anger and Andy Warhol (Williams and Hammond, 66). These filmmakers influenced many of the filmmakers during the 1990s, which are clearly shown in Anger’s influence on Araki with his use of modern music, low budget techniques and subject matter, and Warhol’s influence on Van Sant with a more artistic approach to film yet its combination to mainstream Hollywood. Underground films were tremendously personal, they were political, radical and they were a sexual revolution (Williams and Hammond, 63). Gregg Araki’s film, Totally F***ed Up, encompasses all these traits.

The very low budget aspect of Totally F***ed Up adds to the appeal and style that makes it a prime example of underground American cinema. Half narrative half mockumentary, the film is shot on two cameras. The low quality documentary style, like someone filmed the images from a TV so there are the horizontal lines across the screen, the film starts off with is a reminder of the classical underground films of Kenneth Anger. The film begins with the main character, Andy, speaking to the camera about himself, then as the rest of the character introduce themselves they appear in the narrative of the film. As the film goes on, it’s intercut with text, spliced with bad quality TV, and interview of the characters about subject like AIDS, love, and their futures. Through these interviews it’s clearly shown how diverse this group of friends are. As they talk about different subject, the film intercuts with different TV images, of politics and pornography, and interviews. This unique filming technique is what makes the film part of underground cinema. The bohemian avant garde experimental story disregards conventions of teenagers in Hollywood and creates an exaggeration of what the director experienced living in southern California. “Araki poses his main characters as west coast-cool…” that complements the serious issues of the film, regarding homophobia, gay bashing, and their struggle to find themselves, by using their cool, witty and edgy ideology (America On Film, Benshoff and Griffin 399). Another aspect of what makes the film underground is it’s political statement. The characters are constantly talking about serial killers, suicide pacts, and conspiracy theories. This coupled with the film’s spoofs of the idea that the world is going crazy brings up a camp element that is found in many cult films. This is shown by the fact that whenever the characters are outside hanging out, there is always someone doing something strange, like a dominatrix walking a woman instead of a dog, a woman screaming in front of a billboard, a man walking around in a chicken outfit, and a woman running away from the hospital as doctors chase her down. These are created to not only lift the mood by adding comical relief but are there as an exaggeration of how the main character feels like he doesn’t belong. This unconventional mode of storytelling is what makes the film part of underground cinema yet the film is much more than that, like My Own Private Idaho the film has artistic elements in the framing of shots but the films have more elements that are shared in common.

Cult films by definition are films that have a devoted following. My Own Private Idaho and Totally F***ed Up represent two different aspects of cult cinema. My Own Private Idaho represents a cult following due to its artistic appeal and River Phoenix excellent performance. A particular scene that has not only defined the film, but also stood out to its followers in the queer community is the campfire scene. In this scene Mike bears his heart out to Scott and confesses his feelings. This scene, in so many ways, represents anyone that has ever been in love with their best friend and is not limited to those who are gay, which is why it has such a universal appeal. The film may end where it began but the appeal of drifting along with the character defined what 90s teenagers were feeling. Totally F***ed Up was the first film that was part of the Teenage Apocalypse Trilogy. These films focused on teenagers that were the unconventional in Hollywood and therefore gained unconventional teenage followers. There are many teenagers in the Queer community that know of his films and many who enjoy Araki’s brash and strange writing. This film in way defines cult because the characters are into cult things themselves. They listen to underground music, read obscure books, enjoy a good conspiracy theory or two and enjoy classic B-Movies. Like My Own Private Idaho, it represented the youth of an era between major events. The world was changing even outside film, which is why film changed in the first place. Because of this change, teenagers didn’t know what to do with their lives, represented by Andy who doesn’t know if he wants to go to college or what he would study. This idea of loss individuality along with the underground and artistic value of the film created its cult following. The films of the 80s no longer represented society and much like the shift of American Blockbusters to Independent films, the generation was in a shift of complexities that confused and delayed their appeal to the world. Cult films defined the 90s as much as they did in the 60s and 70s. There will always be the need for cult films to represent the alienated society in America.

As shown, the New Queer Cinema has been influential to American society, who which in turn creates American Cinema. It’s disregard for heteronormative themes in mainstream Hollywood has lead it to encompass and define a variety of genres including art, underground, and cult cinema to represent an era of that was once unheard. Gregg Araki’s Totally F***ed Up and Gus Van Sant’s My Own Private Idaho are key examples for distinguishing the three genres and American Cinema. The New Queer Cinema movement has opened the doors for American queer filmmakers today to create films that were unimaginable thirty years ago. This innovation will lead to the continuation of making imaginative and important films in contemporary American cinema.

Work Cited

Williams, Linda Ruth., and Michael Hammond. Contemporary American Cinema. London: Open UP, 2006. Print.
Benshoff, Harry M., and Sean Griffin. America on Film: Representing Race, Class, Gender, and Sexuality at the Movies. Malden, MA, USA: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009. Print.
Benshoff, Harry M., and Sean Griffin. Queer Images: A History of Gay and Lesbian Film inAmerica. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield