Eli Rarey | The Famous Joe Project / 2007

acting life instead of living it

by Douglas Messerli

 

Eli Rarey (screenwriter and director) The Famous Joe Project / 2007 [16 minutes]

Joe (Duncan Ferguson), aka “Famous Joe,” is a lonely young man who has decided to record his life on a webcam and broadcast his raw encounters daily.

    At the earliest point in the film we watch a grainy tape of Joe getting fucked by an older man as he ponders his feelings with regard to his various encounters, unsure whether he’s become an actor or is representing his honest feelings.

    Soon after, he meets up with another older man (Randall Rapstine), who seems happy to be filmed, but when it comes to suggesting what he wants to do on film, can only suggest they try out some things he’s seen in a magazine, which seems mostly to involve him getting spanked.

    Despite the fact that Joe has just met him the unimaginative and truly unattractive individual, Joe suddenly declares he loves him despite the fact that they have just met.

    We next witness at interchange between Joe and his visiting sister (Kelly Parver) who is obviously take aback his nearly empty apartment, suggesting that Joe should call his mother since she has become more open…leaving the line open-ended, which hints to us as viewers, particular when Joe tells her he’s not yet ready to call, that his mother has perhaps kicked him out of their home upon hearing he was gay.

    In the next scene, Joe and a stoned-out girl (Siobhan Towey) are in the bathroom, she trying to arouse him in some vague manner without much success. They tongue-kiss for a few seconds before she stands, pulls up her tights and decides that there’s not hope for a sexual encounter, giggling and she offers one more gesture of love.

    Later we see Joe in bed with a heavily tattooed man, evidently after sex. Suddenly the man rises and begins to put on his clothes with the intention of leaving. Joe comments once again that he has so much love to give to others, suggesting that the problem is that others cannot fully accept it, when we now perceive that perhaps in giving it away to everyone, particularly the wrong people as those we have seen on his webcam sessions, he has not left any love for himself.

     When the man opens the motel door and exits, Joe begins to cry uncontrollably.

     In the final scene Joe stands on the sidewalk outside a house calling his sister Dana, the sounds of a party in the background. He reports to his sister that he has called his mother, which evidently she has not heard about, but is apparent unwilling to hear his side of the story. He soon after hangs up, immediately after approached by a young man (John Brently Reynolds), who recognizes him as “famous Joe.” “I really love your website, and I think it’s the best website I’ve every seen, and think it’s totally fucking raw…,” he gushes, “I love watching it.”

     Joe thanks him, and suddenly reveals that today is his birthday, perhaps just responding that at least someone has given him something, a few perhaps drunken comments at least.

     “Happy birthday,” responds the young man.

     Joe responds with thanks, offering up the news that he thinks that today will be his last entry.

     “Why, why is this going to be your last entry?”

     “Because I’m going to kill myself,” Joe deadpans.

     The kid is seriously taken aback. Shaking his head back and forth, he quietly says, “I hope that’s a joke. I had a friend who killed himself, and I think that’s the most fucked up thing a person can do.”

     Joe apologizes, assuring him that he isn’t really going to it, and he was just joking. But the boy is not totally at ease with him having even spoken those words.

     “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, but I don’t really like it when people joke about that at all.”

     “Don’t worry,” Joe assures him. “I’m not going to do it. I just like the idea of it.”

    “That would just fuck me up,” he answers, repeating the sentence before again expressing his love of Joe.

     Joe again apologizes for freaking him out, reiterating the fact that it’s time for him to go home now.

     Don’t go home, the kid pleads, it’s your birthday, and “I love you…”

     Joe begins to snigger, perceiving the boy as simply repeating his own empty self-help sounding phrases from his broadcasts.

     Yet it’s clear the boy really means it as he pushes forward and kisses Joe deeply on the lips.

    Joe pulls away, saying he really does have to go home now, the kid sort of breaking down as he believes that he “fucked up” in demonstrating his love. He feels now that he’s scared Joe away, Joe again promising that he’s not going to kill himself.

      “It’s okay. We love each other, and, and you can always catch me through my website,” Joe wanly assures him.

      The boy’s hero walks away, the kid bowing his head slightly down obviously trying to hold the tears back before he looks up smiling, shouting after the figure that has finally disappeared from the screen: “I love you famous Joe!”

      But when the film goes black, we can only fear that Joe has left behind someone just as sad as he is, but who might have truly offered Joe the leave he is seeking; and we are not at all sure that Joe wasn’t being serious about “his last entry.”

      This short film could be far more profound if it simply had a better script and filled in more history about it’s central figure. Why has Joe reached this situation in his life? What is he attempting to do by creating such a website? And why has his chosen such losers upon which to pour out his love? As it is, we can only conclude that Joe has transferred his mother’s rejection into a great deal of self-hate that he plays out in a public promiscuousness that challenges those like his mom. Yet, it would help to know our character better to help us more fully empathize with his self-destructive decisions. Why does Joe feel he is different from hundreds of other boys, like himself, who lose their familiar love by simply admitting who they are.

      I gather that the author/director Eli Rarey perceived some of the same problems since he turned this work into a feature film in 2012. Stay tuned.

 

Los Angeles, October 25, 2025

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog (October 2025).