back into the closet
by Douglas Messerli
Amara Cash (director) Out
of the Closet / 2014 [5 minutes]
Damien Diaz and Daniele La Leggia are the arguing
gay couple in this truly amateurish short film by Amara Cash.
But today
on Damien’s visit, Daniele evidently has not time for him. Evidently he doesn’t
feel the freedom to openly come out since he’s Italian and he lives 20 minutes
away from the Vatican. Moreover, he’s about to get a leg up Hollywood through a
new script he’s written, and he’s not going let Damien fuck it up.
Finally,
he has forgotten to tell Damien: he has a new fiancée, Victoria, who will be
visiting him at any moment. Desperate to silence his suddenly ex-boyfriend, he
shoves Damien into the closet of his bedroom and locks the door.
In short,
no one is out of the closet in this work. Even if Damien has fought his
own father for his freedom, he has now been recloseted by his boyfriend, now clearly
former boyfriend. And by film’s end he can’t even open the bedroom door to
escape.
Poundingly bad music is used to create a sense of drama since neither of
these young men can act and the dialogue, moreover, presumably written by Cash
(no screenwriter is listed) is so embarrassing that it’s no surprise when at
one point in the YouTube version online the sound goes mute. No need to explain
what’s going on. That was established in the very first few minutes. This is a
toxic situation that Damien should have immediately run from just as the viewer
should have turned away from the screen.
But
then, given the political situation these days, perhaps this little vignette,
no matter ineffectual, has shown us the future of the queer world.
Los Angeles, September 17, 2025
Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog
(September 2025).
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