a drug without a name
by Douglas Messerli
Guillem Morales (screenwriter and director) Back
Room / 1999
The short 14-minute premiere film, Back
Room. is an odd one for Spanish director Guillem Morales, who went on to
direct mostly heterosexually-based psychological, mystery, and horror-related
tales such as Upside Down (2002), The Uninvited Guest (2004), and
Julia’s Eyes (2010).
Back
Room takes us into a world that few other than gay men might have even
imagined existed, the back room (actually upstairs in this instance) of a gay
club in Barcelona where men seek out public sex with one another.
What isn’t openly expressed is that the process is so exceedingly
difficult simply because of the wide range of desires each of these males have:
while some want sexy younger boys; others look for brutal-looking older or
middle-aged men. Some desire leather, others seek the school-boy or collegiate
types. If some wait to be sucked off, others seek out the opportunity to
perform fellatio. Some want to be fucked, others want to do the fucking. Some
are turned off by any kind of small talk, others seek verbal communication.
Some, as this film suggests, live under the illusion of finding anybody in this
hellish environment who might join them outside for a longer relationship;
others imagine killing of their temporary lover and leaving the body behind. No
one wants an old queen unless he happens to participate in a secondary manner
while they are having sex with someone else. A bit like an American
supermarket, the choices are so diverse they appear to be limitless. The
list of desires goes on so indefinitely that it is almost a miracle when two
men actually meet up to perform the sexual act.
The two major figures of this scene are a young boy, perhaps a neophyte
to the place, Iván (Juan Jaimez), and a nerdy, not particularly good-looking
but friendly older boy, Álex (Oriol Serra). Through
a voice-over of their inner thoughts, we know that both young men are leery of
even being where they are, and are constantly considering their exit, uneasy
with their surroundings and uncertain about protocol. Both attempt to imagine
opening phrases, the standard for even heterosexuals, “You gotta light?” and
“It’s hot isn’t it?” Apparently these introduction courtesies aren’t well
received by the locals. Showing too much passion, as we observe, is a turn-off
to many, particularly when Álex attempts to kiss and lick the earlobes of a
slightly older leather-like figure, who appears to be more attracted to the new
kid, Iván.
At
one point, when he is about to leave but is drawn back into the maze of halls
by his hopes of finding some sexual satisfaction, Iván meets up with a handsome
black man with peroxided-spiked hair, who literally accosts him, shoving his
hand into the good-looking boy’s pants while kissing him. A moment later he has
pulled down Iván’s pants while an older unattractive queen, whom others
have previously rejected, begins to rub across the boy’s backside. It continues
for a few moments until the leather number, who Iván believes looks like his
acquaintance Hector, passes by, breaking up the group, the newcomer somewhat
happily escaping their clutches.
Again Iván contemplates leaving, given a little sense of competence by
his short encounter, yet fearing what else might lie ahead. Álex, similarly checking out the halls one more
time, determines to depart. But this time, when he encounters the school-boy,
his ploy of asking for a light works, as Iván takes out a book of matches and strikes
one to light Álex’s cigarette.
The two briefly begin to fondle one another before Iván
makes clear that he would enjoy being fucked. Putting on a condom, Álex
turns the boy around and proceeds, with others watching. If there is something
slightly titillating about this, it quickly loses most of its sexual allure in
the almost programmatic way the act occurs, as if, instead being an intimate
encounter between two men, it were a kind of performance. The narrow, darkened
stage of the “back room,” we realize, wipes away any visual sexual excitement
for the would-be voyeur, permitting pleasure only for those actually engaged in
the act.
When they are finished, both contemplate the possibility of continuing
their encounter outside of this lurid place with the potential of a possible
friendship. But for slightly different reasons and simply because of their
awkwardness, both, Álex in particular, pass up the opportunity. We suddenly
comprehend that this is not the way to meet a lover, not the way even to meet a
friend. Anyone met in the “back room” is simply another vessel of sexual
release, a thing not a human being to take home to wake up to in broad
daylight.
And yet, for all of the raw sensationalism of the place, a kind of
innocence exists in the heart of nearly all who enter: a hope of finding not
just someone for release, but someone who might offer the ineffable “other”
whom each of them seeks. And it is also, in some cases, a strange kind of
school for learning. As Iván turns to leave we hear his inner relief that the
sexual act in which he just participated didn’t hurt as much as he expected,
confirming what he first suspected. This is his very first time of engaging in
anal intercourse.
Finally, anyone who has entered similar winding, twisting rough-hewn
halls senses the smell not only of sweat and semen but an odd perfume of a drug
without a name that will draw the Álexes, Iváns, Victors, Miguels, Julios, and
Isaacs back night after night to get their fix.
This is not a film for everyone, particularly the meek or sanctimonious,
for this is the territory Jean Genet, not that sweet, happy gay and lesbian
couple residing down the street.
Los Angeles, Christmas Day, 2020
Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog and World Cinema Review (December 2020).
