Gay Kiss ‘Bloody Sunday’ Broke Rul: The Raer File - Bloomberg

Contents:

• HOLLYWOOD FIRST GAY KISS: SCHLGER’S SUNDAY BLOODY SUNDAY, STARRG PETER FCH, GLENDA JACKSON, AND MURRAY HEAD AS THE GUY THEY BOTH LOVE
• SUNDAY, BLOODY SUNDAY (1971): SCHLGER’S ROMANTIC TRIANGLE, GAY MAN (FCH), STRAIGHT WOMAN (JACKSON) AND GAY MAN BOTH LOVE
• 10 GREAT BRISH GAY FILMS
• GAY KISS ‘BLOODY SUNDAY’ BROKE RUL: THE RAER FILE
• ELRGAYS TELL ME ABOUT FILM "SUNDAY, BLOODY SUNDAY"

HOLLYWOOD FIRST GAY KISS: SCHLGER’S SUNDAY BLOODY SUNDAY, STARRG PETER FCH, GLENDA JACKSON, AND MURRAY HEAD AS THE GUY THEY BOTH LOVE

Based on Penelope Gilliatt’s sharply observed screenplay, the movie holds an important place film history, offerg the first posive image of a homosexual character (and a Jewish one at that) a lead role a mastream movie. Schlger, the late Jewish, openly gay filmmaker, is better-known for his Osr-wng picture, Midnight Cowboy (1969). That movie, starrg Dt Hoffman and Jon Voight, also had gay subtext the relatnship between s two loser-protagonists.

Daniel Hirsch (Peter Fch), a gay Jewish doctor his forti, and Alex Gerville (Glenda Jackson), a reer unselor her thirti, are both love wh Bob Elk (Murray Head), a boyish, succsful sculptor who sually divis his time and affectns between them. Hirsch is somethg of a first–a homosexual who is not pathetic, grotque, or pathologil–a man wh self-teem and digny.

In July 1971, when Sunday Bloody Sunday me out, viewers–pecially gay men–uld ga solace om the passnate film. The film reprents a happy nouement for a gay character whose rignatn is not a product of his sexual orientatn. ” The speech has ltle to do wh homosexualy, suggtg that gay relatnships, even fleetg on, are “somethg.

SUNDAY, BLOODY SUNDAY (1971): SCHLGER’S ROMANTIC TRIANGLE, GAY MAN (FCH), STRAIGHT WOMAN (JACKSON) AND GAY MAN BOTH LOVE

Schlger shows a remarkable gift for brgg together all the elements of moviemakg: The movie has been nsistently ced as one of the first “posive” gay films. Unfortunately, this mature drama never found s dience and s box-office failure was ed by Hollywood as “proof” that gay ntents was not a money-makg proposn. It would take at least two more s for Hollywood to fally regnizg the artistic–and mercial value–of posive or at least nonjudgmental gay-oriented entertament.

Unlike most films at the time, Sunday Bloody Sunday took for granted the protagonists’ sexualy–somethg that gay and lbian activists have been askg for generatns. That kd of rponse revealed once more the latent homophobia that prevailed not only among mastream dienc but also among some crics. ’s Sexual Offenc Act of 1967, which crimalized “homosexual acts private between nsentg adults, ” two landmark Brish films centralizg the experienc of gay male characters celebrate signifint anniversari this year.

10 GREAT BRISH GAY FILMS

Part of s director’s valuable n of “social problem” pictur, Victim is a tt, clenched thriller which criqu the then-current law that ma gay men easy targets for blackmail. You and I are both gay male films crics, simultaneoly of highly varied cultural backgrounds and of unnny affy of taste.

To my young, pre-g-out self, this was the most strikg film how sually and matter-of-factly prented a gay male relatnship. Alex Ramon: Growg up and realizg my sexualy, I was attuned to disverg work focg on gay characters, and certa early and mid-Neti films, whether firmly mastream like Jonathan Demme’s Philalphia (1993) or fiantly not like Gregg Araki’s The Livg End (1992) (the latter taped om TV and watched secret), were important to me. It would have been around that same perd of the mid-Neti that I first heard about Sunday Bloody Sunday, and for sure I was immediately trigued by the ia of this queer pneer—an early Seventi Brish film prentg gay and bisexual characters.

GAY KISS ‘BLOODY SUNDAY’ BROKE RUL: THE RAER FILE

In The Sat and the Artist, his book about Iris Murdoch’s fictn, Peter Conradi wr that “part of Murdoch’s unsung urage [is] that she als always wh homosexualy as an unremarkable, general feature of the human scene. The prentatn of Peter Fch’s Daniel as an telligent, profsnal, fully human protagonist, neher lghable nor piable, seems a world away om the gay reprentatns domatg Brish screens (and beyond) then, and enpsulated ic stereotyp like the ever-mcg Mr. However, whereas Rsell’s film set my teenage gay self on fire wh the famo nu wrtlg sequence (I wish to go on rerd as sayg that I fd Oliver Reed and Alan Bat the sexit pairg the history of film), the Schlger film took me by surprise.

Still, many ways, Sunday Bloody Sunday was the film that not only helped shape my notn of what a gay life may have store for me—more profoundly, also formed my ia of adulthood self, as a state of nstant flux, imperfect cisns, and pursu of elive satisfactn. In his jt-published book Shootg Midnight Cowboy [see review the Summer 2021 prt issue of Ceaste], which offers a lot of pellg sight to Schlger’s posn as a gay director, Glenn Frankel not that Midnight Cowboy out of the “brief but fertile terregnum between the eclipse of the old stud system and the rise of a new one, a time when origal, risk-takg movi flourished, old l were shattered and a new breed of film-makers took on adult them and characters that had never been seen mastream movi before. It’s que clear that if hadn’t been for the Amy Awards and the box-office succs of Midnight Cowboy—sentially a gay-tted buddy movie explog the geo squalor of late-1960s Tim Square— Schlger wouldn’t have worked on Sunday wh the amount of eedom that he enjoyed.

We n e back to the qutn of the film’s polics later, but how do you feel Sunday Bloody Sunday stands up next to other gay-themed films of that pivotal perd, such as Stairse (1969) that also attempts a prentatn of the domtic life of a male uple, or The Boys the Band (1970), which Schlger apparently hated “for s perpetuatn of self-loathg stereotyp, ” which he viewed as “the exceptn, not the le”? I happen to like The Boys the Band for s sheer boldns of immersg an dience an exclively gay world for two hours—a feat that Stairse attempted, but turned to an abrasive vville of Rex Harrison and Richard Burton thrashg about offensive posturg. On the other hand, n be argued that Schlger oms any real engagement wh the gay culture of his day Sunday—there are no clubs, no gay iends of Daniel, no gtur of fiance towards straight culture at all.

ELRGAYS TELL ME ABOUT FILM "SUNDAY, BLOODY SUNDAY"

For sure, I n’t image Daniel out on a Gay Lib march, and viewers who see a certa kd of activism as a prerequise for gay cema are ed likely to be dissatisfied wh the picture. ” However, beyond the Amerin ronanc, for me ’s also very important to place Sunday Bloody Sunday a ntuum of gay Brish cema which, om Dearn’s Victim onward, often seemed far ahead of s U. ) There’s such a signifint, diverse history of gay work Bra om A Taste of Honey (1961) and The Leather Boys (1964) to Derek Jarman’s cema to My Betiful Lndrette (1985), Betiful Thg (1996), the llected work of Terence Davi, or Nigel Fch’s wonrful, sadly “lost” The Lost Language of Cran (1991) which Schlger himself appears a small but signifint role as a gay thor, adoptive parent and mentor figure: his stg there nstut a lovely, affectnate nod to a forebear.