The history of horror is gay | What to Watch

Contents:

• THE NIGHTMARE BEHD THE GAYT HORROR FILM EVER MA
• THE 5 MOST UNTENTNALLY GAY HORROR MOVI
• HORROR MOVI WH GAY SUBTEXT
• THE HISTORY OF HORROR IS GAY
• “HE’S SI ME, AND HE WANTS TO TAKE ME AGA!” HOMOSEXUALY AND GAY FANDOM A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET: FREDDY’S REVENGE

THE NIGHTMARE BEHD THE GAYT HORROR FILM EVER MA

While some earlier films do clu overtly gay them, thgs went unrground durg the Hays Co era, and the reverberatns of that subversive queerns rema uful to this day.

THE 5 MOST UNTENTNALLY GAY HORROR MOVI

But as wh so much of Hchck, ’s hard to say that this is an outright homophobic visn, pecially when the script has the souciance of Osr Wil: “Before this day is out I fear we’ll hear that terribly old-fashned but que exprsive term ‘foul play, ’” Sanrs says, all while munchg on a chicken leg. ” The remarkable thg about all this is that Hchck mak you intify wh Perks (who was gay and closeted real life) as much as he did Marn Crane herself, to the pot that, as Hchck often did at his perverse bt, you’re kda rootg for him. A prolific and succsful horror fictn wrer who began directg to adapt his work himself, out gay filmmaker Clive Barker is rponsible for two of the films on this list, “Nightbreed” and “Hellraiser.

Takg the token gay iend to his rightfully sensual ends, her roommate Adrien luxuriat his sexualy, brgg boys home and flntg the pleasur of the flh that seem so out of reach to the raveno Jte. For 2019’s “Midnight Kiss, ” a sexy gay slasher set amongst a group of LA gay iends on New Year’s Eve, Blumhoe tapped out gay talent — wrer Erlgur Thoroddsen and director Carter Smh, who also hired all queer actors for the queer rol. Freddy and Jse were timate — they seemed to share a secret — and the subtext of that relatnship gave Freddy’s Revenge a homoerotic unrcurrent that eventually ma a cult classic.

”However much Englund held back, the damage was done: That scene helps tablish the lible imprsn of Freddy’s Revenge as the gayt slasher film ever ma.

HORROR MOVI WH GAY SUBTEXT

Screenwrer David Chask spent years refg to acknowledge any tentnal subtext his script — a posn he has sce reversed — and director Jack Sholr claimed not to have noticed the movie’s gayns durg filmg.

Watchg Freddy’s Revenge now, ’s hard to prehend that there was ever a bate over the film’s subtext, which be jt pla text the more blatantly homoerotic scen. And even though Patton has embraced his “scream queen” stat — he had jt e om signg tographs and panel appearanc at San Diego Comic-Con this July afternoon — he remas driven by a need to set the rerd straight about the film that has hnted him for the past 30 Patton, whose only major film role before he played Jse was as a gay teenager later revealed to be a trans woman (played by Karen Black) Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean, the persistent cricism of Freddy’s Revenge was s own kd of nightmare: His sexual inty was exriated for g the film — and wh , his reer. At the same time, even as the AIDS crisis cimated the gay muny, Patton was forced to stay the closet, rtricted by a bs he eventually chose to leave the stigmatizatn of queer reprentatn over the last 30 years, perceptn of Freddy’s Revenge has shifted: The heavily d queerns that was once a mark agast has bee a charmgly dated relic of another time, and a sellg pot for cult nnoissrs.

THE HISTORY OF HORROR IS GAY

Inial reviews, though largely negative, did not pot out the film’s homoerotic slant, although Variety lled Patton’s Jse “strange enough to nstute an outsir prence, ” a scriptor that certaly signifi is some bate over where the first direct mentn of the film’s gay subtext appeared.

While there’s no doubtg the opprsive homophobia of 1980s Hollywood, the specific circumstanc surroundg the film are often a matter of "he said, he said.

“HE’S SI ME, AND HE WANTS TO TAKE ME AGA!” HOMOSEXUALY AND GAY FANDOM A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET: FREDDY’S REVENGE

”By ntrast, Patton sists that Chask, stead of merely stayg quiet, repeatedly placed the blame for the queer terpretatn of the film on Patton’s “too gay” performance, rather than on the script. “I don’t rell any terview where I would have ed the words ‘too gay’ but if I implied somethg like that and/or said anythg to e Mark grief, I certaly apologize, ” he wrote. Deliberately or otherwise, Patton’s associatn wh what me to be known as the “gayt horror film ever ma” — while he was beg told to keep his sexualy a secret — left lastg srs.

It had always been a fe le to walk: While gog to gay bars wasn’t somethg you had to hi 1970s New York, “you didn’t go to an dn and talk to the stg director about beg gay, ” he Patton ma his 1982 Broadway but Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean — playg the same queer character he would play the film adaptatn later that year — The Advote requted an terview wh him. ’” It’s possible that some of the addns to the film that Patton terpreted as homoerotic — and that the movie’s large queer fanbase has e to accept as such — were not directly tend to be. ”“I mean, clearly [there’s] the gay S&M bar, and the ass-whippg and all of the other stuff, and some of the l that people have picked up on, like, ‘He’s si me, ’” Sholr said.

“This is all kd of hdsight, but may be that the fact Mark was a closeted gay at that pot, or at least as far as the film bs went, that that was part of what was g through there, ” Sholr suggted of why Freddy’s Revenge read as queer.