Love, Simon: at last Hollywood is sayg ‘I’m gay’ | Love, Simon | The Guardian

Contents:

• 'LOVE, SIMON' ACTOR OUT AS GAY
• LOVE, SIMON: AT LAST HOLLYWOOD IS SAYG ‘I’M GAY’
• LOVE, SIMON IS A GROUNDBREAKG GAY MOVIE. BUT DO TODAY'S TEENS ACTUALLY NEED IT?
• GAY THERAPIST DISCS “LOVE, SIMON” OM A GAY MEN’S MENTAL HEALTH PERSPECTIVE

'LOVE, SIMON' ACTOR OUT AS GAY

Bram realiz that Victor is feelg overwhelmed by the experience, wh him emg "too gay" and cis to take him to a basketball league, where they play, Bram then reveals that is a gay league, he wanted Victor to see that there is no one way to be gay. Love, Simon is breakg barriers as the first major stud movie about a gay kid, and along wh that distctn, is also jt a really sweet, funny, and heartfelt high school rom-. In Love, Simon, Simon Spier velops an timate email-based relatnship wh a fellow closeted gay kid at his high school, who sends him msag unr the alias Blue.

The Homo Sapiens Agenda — on which Love, Simon is based — Simon also ends up wh Bram, but that party make-out scene is not a part of the story. "Pollari, who has played a gay character once before TV seri Amerin Crime, said he stggled wh a sense of shame before g out.

Lookg at the advanc civil rights, would seem that the liv of gays and lbians have much improved.

LOVE, SIMON: AT LAST HOLLYWOOD IS SAYG ‘I’M GAY’

It is media reprentatns of gay men that the new “stealth homophobia” most clearly shows s face.

Gay men are out and proud on some TV shows — the new rnatn of Queer Eye for stance. But Queer Eye still offers effemate gay men who make lgh when they remend sk products or drs hair. This year’s Osr wner for bt movie, The Shape of Water, portrayed a sympathetic olr gay iend (played by Richard Jenks) who is gentle, effemate, and of urse, sad — an archetype that has domated Amerin cema sce Sal Meo’s Plato Rebel Whout a Cse.

The theatre was filled wh llege-aged stunts who mostly seemed to sympathize wh the leadg character — a gay, closeted, high school stunt. ‘Love, Simon’ is nsired to be the first mastream teen romantic edy wh a gay lead character (played by Nick Robson, send om left).

LOVE, SIMON IS A GROUNDBREAKG GAY MOVIE. BUT DO TODAY'S TEENS ACTUALLY NEED IT?

The Guardian recently reported that “mastream cema has begun to treat gay love stori like any other romance.

There is no nudy, no sex and very ltle physil proximy between the gay characters what purports to be a gay romance. Of urse all gay men are not effemate, but Wtern culture, male on male sire is evably associated wh effemacy bee sex between men volv one man submtg himself to another. Guy Hocquenghem, one of the first queer theorists, wrote about this his 1972 book, Homosexual Dire.

To be sure, we have ma civil rights advanc gay rights sce those days, and rapidly sce 1969. In this file photo, a member of the gay muny wearg a swastika and a sign statg ‘Fascism is alive and well and breedg Toronto’ walks past a police officer as he leav a police missn hearg, Toronto, Ont., Feb.

GAY THERAPIST DISCS “LOVE, SIMON” OM A GAY MEN’S MENTAL HEALTH PERSPECTIVE

The Cy of Toronto officially regnized Pri Day Toronto around 1981 — the same time that the police Bath Hoe Raids Toronto galvanized support for the gay and lbian muny.

Gay men blamed homophobic lawmakers for their lack of support for rearch and treatment. And fally, imag of gay and lbian upl are everywhere the days — or at least seems that way. TD Bank has featured lovg gay and lbian upl s advertisg mpaigns — along wh Ti, Red Rose Tea and McDonald’s.

A gay movie, Call Me By Your Name, recently took home an Osr this year, followg the tradn set by Moonlight last year. Dpe this progrs and the legalizatn of gay marriage many untri, toleratn of diverse sexuali is pretty much nfed to large wtern ci. That’s jt Ontar; try beg openly gay or lbian Jamai, Rsia, Uganda, Lhuania or Zanzibar.

But as cril theorist David Halper remds , si the morn associatn of homosexualy wh femy we n see “the force wh which earlier pre-homosexual sexual tegori ntue to exert their thory. It also happens to be the first feature film wh a gay lead, somethg Aptaker and Berger were drawn to after readg Becky Albertalli‘s 2015 YA novel, Simon vs. What really put over the top was when they told that there had never been a major stud movie about a gay kid.

Given that this is the first stud feature wh a gay lead, what sort of not did you get along the way? And he’s also amazg bee he’s a gay guy, and he had this personal experience to draw om that we did not of g out and what that’s like. One of the book-to-movie chang is the character of Ethan (Clark Moore), the only other openly gay kid at Simon’s school who isn’t the source material.

Ethan was a great addn bee you also get that amazg scene where ’s two gay guys stg next to each other who uld not be more different and ’s a remr that Simon is jt one particular story of g out, and this movie is jt one particular movie about .

Berger: It was important to all of to show that there isn’t one type of gay person, jt like there’s no one type of any kd of person. Aptaker: In the moment where Tony Hale (who plays the vice prcipal) discipl the two jerks, he jumps straight to assumg Simon and Ethan mt be boyiends bee they’re the only two out gay guys at this school.

I love that bee there is this well meang ignorance a lot, and, “Oh, they’re the two gay guys, so they mt be together. Bee of lgerg homophobia across the world, did you feel you had to tone anythg down?

1 prry was to give gay teenagers the classic, chey-at-tim rom- experience that straight people of all ag have taken for granted their entire liv bee they’ve always had . ) tak Simon out to a gay bar after he out and before he go back to school for his first day. Wh the rporate clout of 20th Century Fox behd , Love, Simon is the first gay teen movie om a major stud.

Tolerance has s mercial benefs; a gay film need no longer appeal exclively to small or specialised when Betiful Thg opened 1996, the UK age of nsent for gay men had only recently been lowered om 21 to 18 (still two years higher than the heterosexual one). Lbians and gay men were banned om servg the armed forc, the sid Sectn 28 was seven years away om beg repealed while phras like “civil partnership” and “marriage equaly” were as unfaiar then as “social media” and “trigger warng” Get Real, a Brish g-out movie that followed two years after Betiful Thg, feel-good material still had to acknowledge the possibily of vlence and homophobia.

Photograph: RONALD GRANTThe -stigmatisatn of homosexualy has removed om drama one of s olst standbys: the threat of ostracisatn and social . Audienc the 1960s uld well prehend the distrs of the barrister, played by Dirk Bogar, who is blackmailed over his sexualy Victim, jt as their 1980s unterparts appreciated the sndal of a married man wh a gay lover Makg Love. The ultimate spiratn among gay teachers, however, mt be Mart Donovan the 1998 edy The Oppose of Sex.

“I don’t want to be jt theoretilly gay, ” he says, sportg a rabow neckerchief and a much younger boyiend. She wants to play footsie, he wants to watch most strikg achievement of Love, Simon is s promotn of a gay character om sassy sikick to thentic hero. In makg gayns s subject, while treatg as no big al, Love, Simon pulls off a rare njurg trick wh s hero’s sexualy.