Patrick Lang | One Man’s Treasure / 2005

a few kinks

by Douglas Messerli

 

Patrick Lang (screenplay and director) One Man’s Treasure / 2005 [5 minutes]

 

This little-known Australian treat of a film in black-and-white, One Man’s Treasure directed by Patrick Lang in 2005, begins with a before dinner cocktail discussion in the living with two friendly apparently heterosexual couples, David and Angela (David Adams and Tamara Lee) and Roger and Elaine (Alirio Zavarce and Caroline Mann).

     After Roger ends his conversation about having to fire an employee, he asks David if he’s still planning to join him on his sailing expedition over the weekend, David almost joyfully responding positively. Elaine says it will be a treat to have the men out of the out of the house so she can go shopping, but David’s wife Angela seems to be angry about something, commenting to her husband “You have such fair skin, don’t forget your make up…I mean sunscreen.”

    

     Soon after, she makes another such insinuation. David finally inquiring whether something is wrong, she reluctantly shares the fact that when she visited the shed the other day looking for a power tool, she accidently came upon an old chest filled with sparkling dresses and tarted-up shoes that she certainly didn’t remember tossing out, realizing moreover that she never wore shoes size 11.

     There is a pause as the room assimilates the fact that David has evidently been dressing up occasionally in drag. Elaine quickly breaks the silence by saying that actually Roger, every once in a while, also dresses up in drag, and she kind of likes it. She has at least gotten used to him putting on the old nylons. Elaine concludes, “I was a bit worried when he started all this business, but I love it now. It really turns me on.”

     “Well, there’s nothing wrong with it,” adds Roger, Elaine adding “he doesn’t drink, smoke, or fool around. He’s a good boy. Just with a few kinks.”

     “I think it’s all about exploring your identity,” Roger concludes. It makes him feel “very virile.”

     Taken aback, Angela summarizes the situation: “So you Roger like to dress up like a woman?”

      “Yes, you could say that, but…generally speaking, well, in technical terms I’m actually a woman.

      Angela literally spells it out: “Let me get this straight. You’re a woman who likes to dress up under the pretense of being a man actually dressing up and pretending to be a woman.”

      Roger concurs, but Elaine quickly intrudes with the words: “But we’re not gay.”

      “I can’t believe this. I simply can’t believe this,” stutters Angela.

      “O darling,” David finally speaks up, “it’s not that shocking. I mean, you weren’t exactly a woman when I married you.”

       “David!”

       “Well, it’s true!”

      “But you’re not gay are you?

      “Oh no!” as all four take up their glasses almost in a toast.

     So if David and Roger, who seem to be looking forward to their upcoming weekend, engage in illicit sex, will their relationship be gay or “technically” heterosexual?

      Lang’s short film deals openly with transgender relationships and the slippery territory of self-designation of sexuality at a time before such issues were generally discussed, finding the humor in—while expressing the joy of—the entire situation.

 

Los Angeles, October 23, 2022

Reprinted from World Cinema Review (October 2022).