Peter Michael | Bro / 2016

chemistry lesson no. 1

by Douglas Messerli

 

Peter Michael and Bailie Reichardt (screenwriters), Peter Michael (director) Bro / 2016 [21 minutes]

 

In this Australian film from 2016, Aaron (Riley McNamara) and Harris (Chris Charteris) are two very unlikely friends, the first boy a truly laid-back long-haired guy with fuzz under his chin who seems to have accidentally stumbled in from the early 1970s, and Harris, a studious, clean-cut young man who might have been at home in the early 1960s. These two have evidently been friends from childhood on, but what they see in one another is a mystery to both the viewer of Bro and seemingly to the characters themselves.

       Aaron, who believes he’s a ladies’ man, is constantly trying to get his friend Harris to join him in heterosexual party situations, which clearly disinterest and bore the good student. At these events it appears that Aaron does generally hook up with a girl, go to bed with her, and fall in love, only to be told the in the next day or two that the woman of his dreams is not at all interested in such a loser.

      Time after time, much to the increasing irritation of Harris, the same pattern is repeated, which ends with Harris having to restore Aaron’s sense of well-being. But once the depression is over he is on to the next brief encounter while trying to interest his friend to seek out girls as well. He even offers, as if it were some sacred gift, to be his “wing-man.”

       But Harris is finally fed up, and like so many of the girls Aaron meets tells him that he needs to grow up and seek something other than these endless lightweight situations which leave him stupidly devastated.

       This time, however, Aaron is tired of Harris’ refusal to participate in his world and more than a little irritated by his friend’s lack of support and lectures on how he should reform. Besides, why should he care if he seeks out women, one of his great joys in life, since Harris is obviously so shy that he won’t even try to find a date? What does Harris know about love?

        Inadvertently Harris blurts out that he’s truly irritated with Aaron and tired of trying to buoy him up since he himself is in love with him!

        Aaron simply cannot assimilate the news, and immediately leaves. The two do not see each other for several days, perhaps weeks, as Harris strangely seems to fall into a jumble of potato chip wrappers and frozen dinners which usually characterize Aaron’s apartment.

         Finally, Aaron appears with a speech rehearsed. He has indeed been startled by the revelation that his best friend was gay and, on top of it, startled to discover that he is in love with him. He admits it’s hard for him to understand since he is straight.

        Harris simply apologizes. He had not meant to say that to Aaron, not meant for the truth to have come out of his mouth.

        Yet Aaron continues, his speech saying that nonetheless he can’t imagine life without his best friend and is willing to try a relationship for some period of time. In short, he’s offering to date his friend as if they were both gay men just to see if it’s possible that love can bloom.

        It’s a funny and very strange turn of events. There are been numerous films where a straight learns to tolerate his best friend’s sudden announcement of being gay. But very few to my knowledge in which the straight guy is willing to convert to being gay just to remain with his best bro.

        Unfortunately, we don’t believe it. There is no way on earth that the inveterate chaser of girls is going to find happiness in gay sex, and as I suggest in my first paragraph, it is nearly impossible to comprehend how Harris could be in love with such a total loser. Certainly, they may truly care for each other, but love is a very different thing. And if you begin with types, opposite types at that, and expect to comprehend what else that stereotyped individual has to offer that the other stereotype finds worthy of great sacrifice and love, you don’t understand the literary phenomenon of character, which writer and direct Peter Michael appears to never have even questioned. Aaron is not liked by girls for the very same reason, I’m afraid, that why we wouldn’t be liked my most gay boys, particularly the straight-arrow type that Harris has been portrayed as being.

      Something in this film seems to be missing. It might be described as chemistry.

 

Los Angeles, October 6, 2022

Reprinted from World Cinema Review (October 2022).