Satya Dusaugey | Tapette (The Mousetrap, aka Michael’s Mouse) / 2016

other possibilities of what to do with a mouse

by Douglas Messerli

 

Satya Dusaugey and Julien Guetta (screenplay), Satya Dusaugey (director) Tapette (The Mousetrap, aka Michael’s Mouse) / 2016 [25 minutes]

 

Satya Dusaugey is a one-man orchestra of writer, director, and actor in this comic delight about a heterosexual who wonders if he might actually be gay, as if it suddenly were a decision one made, instead of an irresistible aspect of sexual behavior.

     We forgive Dusaugey and Guetta for their character’s false presumption, however, given the joy the chunky mason gives us in his sudden curiosity about all things gay. And we recognize that given the current familiarity that most of society now has with LGBTQ figures that they might indeed truly wonder about the alternative world about them and its availability to their own lives.

     In some respects, I have argued about this alternative possibility as being one that attracted straight directors to gay characters and situations, despite of the restrictions barring them, throughout cinema history. So I am not going to dish a film that allows its macho straight figures to wonder aloud and even explore the possibilities. And Dusaugey, moreover, has directed several gay films.

      Although Dusaugey’ character Michel seems to wonder about the possibilities on the very slight evidence that he is afraid of mice—refusing to destroy the mouse that interrupts his sexual pleasures with his girlfriend Charlotte (Caroline Anglade)—that he is interested he how he dresses and looks, and that he has more than some hesitation about permitting a woman to move fully into his life. In fact, so he discovers, some of his male friends have been joking, given his lack of female commitment, whether he might not indeed be a “fag.”

      Such a comment even further troubles the constantly-thinking friend, who now suddenly wonders if he isn’t, in fact, attracted to his working partner, Thierry (Karim Saidi); and for a few moments as Theirry goes for an after-work bath, Michel conjures up an appreciation for Thierry’s body and approaches him for a “partnership” that results in them, imaginatively, romping about the fields not unlike the two cowboys of Brokeback Mountain’s antics in the wilderness.

      His attempted discussion of the matter with Charlotte only ends in further frustration as she declares it’s all a fantasy he has created because of his fears of committal just as she is about to move in with him, assuring him that it has nothing to do with a mouse or even the fact that he high school he dated a girl whom he looked a bit like Leonardo DiCaprio. In the middle of the argument, during which he stands naked, she leaves in anger, he following her into the street to declare that he is gay.

      Obviously, he has to follow his suspicions up with a visit to a local gay bar, where he sits in terror that someone may approach him, while yet pretending that he is ready to get up and dance with the first man who approaches. Ultimately a letter-jacketed Asian boy (François-Xavier Phan) does take notice of Michel’s construction-worker looks, and attempts, despite a language difference, to determine whether or not he’s ready to go home with him.

       In horror, Michel hurries off, winding up, quite ridiculously, on a turning carousel bed sitting near another prone couple making use of it. The Asians boy meets up with him again, challenging him whether or not he is straight. To save face he has to admit that he must be gay, the young Asian man taking his hand and leading him to Michel’s apartment.

      Charlotte returns, presumably to make peace or gather up her possessions, only to find the Asian boy ardently fucking her boyfriend! She passes out.

       As she awakens with a fully dressed Michel beside her trying to make sure she’s all right, even wonder whether what we have just witnessed was another fantasy of Michel’s. But we soon see a hand move out of nearby closet and realize that this time it was sex for real. Perhaps Michael truly is gay; at least he’s been sport enough to try anal sex and seemed to be enjoying it. The Asian man is simply searching for his jeans, but once Charlotte sees him again, everything comes back to her and she leaves the pleading and confused Michel and the Asian boy to themselves in her exit. Michel seems too confused to even help find the boy’s jeans, and then, of course, the mouse reappears as the half-naked boy finally gives up and exits.

      He attempts to drop objects upon it without success, even a huge potted plant missing its mark.

Finally, the picks up the cute mouse, who seems to find pleasure in his hands. Tentatively, Michel pets it and realizes he’s not afraid of the mouse, but now very fond of it. He calls out for Charlotte for confirmation, but of course she’s gone for good.

      Perhaps he may discover he’s really fond of gay sex as well. Surely, if Charlotte is a gossip, Michel will now have a difficult time in attracting a new girl. But least he’s got a new friend.

 

Los Angeles, September 18, 2022

Reprinted from World Cinema Review (September 2022). 

 

Tobias Martin and Rodney Sewell | 41 Sekunden (41 Seconds) / 2006

call it a match

by Douglas Messerli

 

Rodney Sewell (screenplay), Tobias Martin and Rodney Sewell (directors) 41 Sekunden (41 Seconds) / 2006 [4 minutes]

 

A young man (Alexander Kaffl) is having difficulties with his girlfriend. He calls up his best friend (Amir Arul), who previously dated his girlfriend to tell him that she keeps reporting negative things. The friend tells him that the young man and she make a perfect couple and they should stay together.

    But among the things the first boy’s girlfriend keeps telling him is that his friend kissed better than he does. The friend grins broadly, to which the first young man orders him to stop. “Don’t get upset,” responds the friend, “she’s just being honest.”

    The young man insists that he kisses 100% better than his friend, and the friend argues back that he’s fooling himself.

     To prove it, the first young man steps out of the frame and kisses his friend, the friend eagerly returning his kiss. For 41 seconds the two engage in a hot, tongue-filled fest of deeply passionate busses that given this film is only 4 minutes in length seems like to might never end.

     As he steps back into the frame, the young man reminds him that they had planned to watch football together that evening. “We’ll watch it together…won’t we?”

     “Sure,” the friend eagerly responds.

     I’d suggest that the young man’s girlfriend may never be heard from again, but that lies outside the movie, just like the evening of football and possible love-making does.

     German directors Tobias Martin and Rodney Sewell have created a lovely gay fairy tale in their 41 Seconds.

 

Los Angeles, September 8, 2025

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog (September 2025).

George Bamber | The Good Waiter / 2016

dying to get a job

by Douglas Messerli

 

Matthew Ludwinski and Kevin Grant Spencer (screenplay), George Bamber (director) The Good Waiter / 2016 [16 minutes]

 

Kevin (Kevin Grant Spencer), a would-be actor, is practicing his lines on the tennis court, in the dressing room, in his car. He doesn’t have a particularly good memory, it appears, and he (the character) isn’t a very good actor. He is, however, a very good waiter. And despite his request to leave his job early for an audition, his manager Kim (Michelle Grisaffi) insists that he stay on to train another new waiter. He’s tired of “newbies,” but when she points out the victim, Kevin changes his mind. Drew (Matthew Ludwinski), a “wide-eyed Midwest transplant” (as the IMDb plot summary describes him) is a beautiful piece of flesh.

    Kevin engages quickly, accordingly, with this innocent “newbie,” who seems almost to nervously gush under the gaze of his new trainer. And within moments they’re in the bathroom together, soon after planning for another session—a hike on the very next day.

    Drew, unfortunately, is a clumsy waiter, unable to figure out even how the soda hose works, let alone how to ring up dinners on the digital register. He’s awkward with the guests, spending far too much time at the tables telling corny jokes, unable to remember their orders, and prone to breaking plates. By the end of the day, Kevin has no other alternative but to suggest to Kim that he needs to be fired. Did she actually interview him, he asks.

     Kim’s managerial method, it appears, is simply to let the trainee continue without finally assigning him real work hours: “Eventually they catch on.” But Kevin feels her method is cruel, and besides this rookie kid is so naïve that it’s doubtful he’ll even know what’s happening. The job to tell the cute boy that he’s fired falls to his fellow waiter. And the most convenient time to tell him is during their hike in the wilderness (Los Angeles’ Griffith Park) the following day.

     Out of doors, Drew seems to be even more addle-brained than he is an in-doors server. He alternates his conversation with his expressions of excitement for having found the job of his dreams—he wants a career in “hospitality”—and his total adulation of Kevin, at one point removing his own shirt to display his stunningly developed torso at the very moment Kevin is attempting to mention that he might not be suited for working in a restaurant.

     The two engage in a kind cat-and-mouse conversation wherein Drew keeps expressing his delight in having landed in such a perfect place in his life, while Kevin attempts to bring him down to earth through vague philosophically-inspired language. Every time Kevin edges closer to expressing the truth, Drew climbs out upon a new limb of possibilities—quite literally, in fact, when we see him suddenly standing in the hollow of a tree at the very edge of a cliff overlooking the San Fernando Valley. When Kevin joins him, Drew finally moves in for a kiss, pulling back as, just as suddenly, he falls, it appears, to his death.

     Kevin is so stunned and horrified by what has just happened that he doesn’t even think rationally, does not call the police or even look down into the vast plain below to see if he might spot the body. And when two previously unseen observers comment on what has just happened, he runs.

     At work, he is now as confused and ineffectual as Drew was the day before, walking around as if in a daze, forgetting orders, at one point even delivering up a plate of food to the chest of a guest—who just happens to be a “Secret Shopper.” Kim, knowing that the owners will demand it, has no choice but to fire him, offering him a small “parting” reparation.

     It appears that, without a job and surely unable to find a gig in acting, Kevin is now in the situation that faces so many young men and women who flock to Los Angeles with hopes of “making it” either in the movies or in one of LA’s numerous other fields of commerce. He is now the “newbie” terrified that might not even be able to pay the rent. As he drives by his old place of employment—we could see this coming—he spots Drew serving up tables quite competently.

     Writer / actors Ludwinski and Spencer’s film may not be quite unbelievable, but given its fairly high production values, the handsome duo at the center of the tale, and its black comic overtones, The Good Waiter is a fairly enjoyable short LGBTQ flick.

      I can’t imagine what the writers and director did to warrant the plethora of highly negative comments of viewers on IMDb and Letterboxd. I’ve seen far better audience comments for absolutely embarrassing student films. The Good Waiter is certainly not profound fare, but it’s successful as an ironic journeyman work in the mode of Robert Altman’s The Player and Joe Orton before him. And Spencer has gone on to act in several other films I’ve reviewed, including Bamber’s Kept Boy (2017) and Reid Watterer’s The Unsure Masseur (2021). Ludwinski had appeared in several films previous to this one, including Going Down in LA-LA Land (2011).

 

Los Angeles, March 7, 2023

Reprinted from World Cinema Review (March 2023).

Dominic Poliquin | Forces / 2016

staying on

by Douglas Messerli

 

Dominic Poliquin (screenwriter and director) Forces / 2016 [TV film] [8 minutes]

 

Military (Benoit Gauvin), the name given to the young man who volunteers to join the army, and Patrick (Nicola Tomassini) have been “across the river” neighbors since childhood. Military describes Pat as a sexual frustrated pyromaniac, a boy who preferred even as a child to playing with gasoline instead of Military’s toys.

     As the film begins Military has evidently returned from a stint in Afghanistan which has strongly affected him, the film demonstrating that he suffers some of the post-traumatic stress disorders of battle; but he’s simply on leave and will soon be sent away once again.

      Pat is also described as a brute, being suspended from his high school football team for beating up one of the players from the other team.

      These two violent men, who were once good friends, are now dropped into the world they knew as children and young men, attempting to rebuild whatever it was that they had. For Pat, Military’s choice is summarized in one harsh and simple sentence: “You fucked up.”

      Afraid that he will die in Afghanistan, Military asks Pat to drive over his leg, rendering him unfit to return to service. But at the last moment, Pat refuses, simply stating “I’m leaving.”

      A fight follows, ending in Pat attempting to move in on a kiss at least twice, with Military rejecting him and consequently falling into the river below their properties, accidently accomplishing his military severance.

      Pat saves him from drowning, providing him with artificial respiration, but a rock has provided the leg fracture. Military declares that he is “absolutely straight” and that he sees himself marrying and moving into his parent’s house with his wife someday. But as we observe right after the accident, the love Pat still feels for him as he holds and rocks his friend into consciousness, and given the open smile the later recovering Military gives Pat across the stream, we wonder whether Pat might not come see his life has changed in more ways that simply being freed from military duty, that he has come home to a deeper relationship that his bland heteronormative imagination might have imagined.

      If nothing else, Pat has saved his life in more ways than one.

      Along with the effective jumpy cuts of Christian Rivera’s cinematography, Canadian director Dominic Poliquin’s short film is quite powerful. But it might have been even more so if instead of relying on the perceptions and observations voiced by Military for his narrative, he had also further explored the mysterious clashing emotions of Pat. We sense Pat’s conflicts without quite being able comprehend why he has developed these extreme pushes of violence and deep passion. And since he seems to be the narrative focus of the work, we need to better understand why he might deserve Military’s understandably reluctant love.

 

Los Angeles, June 8, 2023

Reprinted from World Cinema Review (June 2023).

Kristen Bjørn | Trouser Bar / 2016

on and off panting

by Douglas Messerli

 

John Gielgud (screenwriter), Kristen Bjørn (director) Trouser Bar / 2016 [20 minutes]

 

This campy and charming short film has a script (purposely uncredited by the filmmakers) by the towering actor Sir John Gielgud, and was originally intended to be directed by Peter de Rome, a gay director of early porn films who Gielgud very much admired. According to producer David McGillivray, de Rome died before being able to complete the project which then fell into his hands. 

      He chose the pseudonymous Kristen Bjørn to direct, which he does very much in the manner of de Rome. But McGillivray could not get permission from the Gielgud Trust to release the film. Finally, after years of correspondence back and forth, the Trust claimed that there was no such script by Gielgud, and that the film could only be released if all mention and associations with the actor were removed from the work and its promotion.

    So they were, the film itself suggesting the issue only tangentially by calling the menswear shop in which the trousers are sold, Sir John’s, which in a preface comment we are told to ignore.

     But McGillivray nonetheless had written about the film and his difficulties, and there is evidence that Gielgud, himself having a sort of fetish for corduroy, did indeed approach de Rome with the script. In any event, the film is certainly worth a peek, which is very much what Trouser Bar is all about, promoting delightful voyeurism of its audience on the film’s fictional British street.

     Two men arrive early to the shop, watching the employees carefully unclothe and re-attire the mannequins in the window. It is hard to know whether they find the boys, the mannequins, or the cloths the most appetizing, but at any rate, they scurry into the shop the moment it opens, tactilely feeling the fabrics they are about to purchase.

     The shop evidently permits only a few clients each day, since the attention provided to them is quite spectacular. Not only do the shop employees   provide curtained booths in which they engage their customers in a complete fitting, but also offer a total massage of all body parts, resulting of course in sexual engagement, which is expected to be viewed by the other customers and employees through the curtains who, in turn, are also nicely serviced.   

     The figures involved read almost like one of de Rome’s titles: Bobby (Denhom Spurr), David (Ashley Ryder), Larry (Zac Renfree), Joe (Craig Daniel).

     Eventually when a third customer, Lee (Hans Berlin) enters seeking horseback riding attire, complete with leather gloves and riding whip, he is offered a special room decked out in S&M accoutrements, and is soon joined by all the other customers and employees for an orgiastic romp.

     The curtains, left just slightly ajar, also bring out a large contingent of streetside onlookers, peering through the shop windows as the action gradually gets hotter and hotter, all very much in the manner of other Peter de Rome films.

     When the blonde employee finally comes to pull down the shades, the streetside voyeurs have already grown so excited that, totally disappointed by the end of their remarkable sexual entertainment, they begin kissing one another in broad daylight.

      The 1970s costumes of garish checks and stripes, the hairdos and sideburns of the period, and the bright pastels of the film all call up de Rome’s works perfectly. Both de Rome and Sir John, I suspect, would have highly approved.

 

Los Angeles, March 8, 2023

Reprinted from World Cinema Review (March 2023).

 

Robert Guthrie | Easy / 2016 || Kyle Jackson | Never Too Late / 2016

how to make films without really trying

by Douglas Messerli

 

Robert Guthrie (screenwriter and director) Easy / 2016 [4 minutes]

Kyle Jackson (screenwriter and director) Never Too Late / 2016 [6 minutes]

 

I imagine that I might be able to write a long essay on short films that fall under the category of “How to Make Films without Really Trying,” but I’ll just discuss two works here that represent to me young filmmakers, obviously with some talent, refusing to truly engage the medium in which they have claimed an interest. Both the 2016 4-minute short by US filmmaker Robert Guthrie and the 6-minute work by another US young would-be director Kye Jackson “set up” situations that are never developed, as if further narrative exploration of were of no matter.

     The glibbest of these is Guthrie’s Easy which appears to be almost delighted to say “nothing happening here dude, so don’t worry” in his tale of two biblical friends David and Jonathan. Ensconced in a seemingly perfect urban neighborhood, the two tall boys, David (Connor Gerton) and Jonathan (Zachery Prescott) get dressed in the morning—David, since he wears a small silver image of a Torah around his neck obviously Jewish, and Jonathan, who dons a small cross, evidently Christian—to go about their day. David, walking down the beautifully wooden stairway enters the bright daylight to make his way to work at a local coffee chop, while Jonathan, sliding down a pole near his family’s equally smart-looking stairwell, passes by his father (Barlow Adamson), who, reading his I-phone on the couch, seems a bit grumpy when his son announces, “See you late tonight.” Observing his somewhat disapproving demeanor, Jonathan suggests, “You know, you could be happy for me.” His father, still glowering a little, shoots back, “And you could be grateful for some tolerance.”

     End of story. Jonathan’s father is clearly not as easy about his son’s relationship with David—whose mother, we soon discover, has invited Jonathan over to the house for dinner that night—as is David’s family, the mother (Anne Gottlieb) telling Jonathan when she meets him outside her sons’ shop, how much they are looking forward to the dinner with them that evening.

    David finishes up work and heads off to the dinner appointment, meeting  Jonathan on his way home, the two holding hands as they walk off to a pleasurable event. It’s all just easy, I guess, if at the worst your parents “tolerate” your sexual differences and at best, as do David’s folks, they totally embrace them. But then we know parents like David’s and Jonathan’s are not evidently in the majority even today, although we might like to believe everything has changed. Moreover, not everyone lives in such upscale urban communities as do these two boys. And if the majority of parents suddenly grew to accept or, at worst, be benign critics of their son’s gay sexuality, would it be worth making a movie about it? Apparently, even in director Guthrie’s mind, it’s still unusual enough that the situation is worthy of being represented on film.

     One might almost imagine that this glib short work announces the end of, if not LGBTQ cinema making, the gay “coming out” film, since apparently there is no one left to “come out” to.

     Jackson’s University of Southern California filmmaking debut, Never Too Late is, in some respects, the opposite of Guthrie’s “easy” world. This film also is about the coming together of two young men, Charlie (Frederick Hoffman) and Roger (Daniel Bruington) who meet up by the Los Angeles beach where Charlie, alone on basketball court, is fruitlessly attempting to put the ball through the hoop. Roger, with his friendly dog, is passing by when the ball falls from the edge of the hoop in front of him. He stops, bringing the ball back to Charlie and apologetically makes a suggestion of where Charlie might hold his arms before shooting. It works, and Charlie makes the basket, the two introducing themselves to one another and making plans to meet.

     By the time they do meet on the Santa Monica beach we realize that Charlie is working at the basketball court to improve his stamina since he is apparently in ill health. Roger asks if Charlie has a girlfriend, to which the boy laughs, and “tagging” Roger goes on the run, making it clear that he is ready to play on the field of love with his new acquaintance as the film’s soundtrack blares out The Archies 1969 hit “Sugar Sugar.” The two romp for a while in the sand, ending up on the stairs of a lifeguard station for a quick kiss before Charlie pulls away, announcing from a safe distance “I’m HIV positive.”

       In the next very short sequence, Charlie is back on the basketball court, with Roger at his side suggesting how to keep his feet in position to make the basket.

       Obviously, Charlie’s announcement has not ended their potential relationship, but given the seriousness of the issue at hand, mightn’t we wish to explore, at least a little further, how these two might make plan to make a go of it as lovers, companions, or just friends? In Jackson’s anything but “easy” narrative, he has only announced the situation without exploring any of the consequences, which unlike Guthrie’s work, in this story there most certainly have to be.

       These two young filmmakers seem to have a flare for the visual, have chosen excellent actors, and in Jackson’s case even shown a talent for musical accompaniment. Now if only they had a story to tell, which—despite my disdain of traditional ideas of structure—admittedly does require some sort of conflict. For most directors of LGBTQ films that conflict is so apparent it drives the film from the moment the camera lens is uncapped, but these two directors seem to have simply turned off the camera off before they’ve even begun.

 

Los Angeles, July 3, 2021

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog and World Cinema Review (July 2021).

 

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).