High Contrast

For some reason, I remember the late 90s as being a really great era for movies. I think it's just that I went to the cinema more often back then than I do now. It was also a pivotal time for me: young adulthood, life in a new country and discovering my identity as a queer person.  Of course, that meant that I watched nearly every queer themed film that came out in  theatres in at the time.

High Art portrays a relationship between Syd, a young photo editor and Lucy, a reclusive former photographer who happen to live in the same building. Both women are already in relationships, the former with a boyfriend, the latter with a girlfriend. Long story short, the two characters engage in a  romantic and sexual affair. Complicating matters is that Syd's magazine wants her to convince the photographer to shoot for them after years of obscurity. Working so closely together both intensifies and threatens their relationship.

If I remember correctly, this was a comeback for Ally Sheedy, known for being in the John Hughes classic The Breakfast Club. She joins a great cast including Radha Mitchell as the younger love-interest, Patricia Clarkson as a delightful German heroin addict and Gabriel Mann as Syd's cuckold. Even though this film came out over a decade and a half ago, everyone looks mostly the same now as they did then.

The relationship between the two leads is one of contrasts: blonde/brunette, mature/youthful, artist/editor, sober/addicted. These differences draw them to one another. Suffice it to say the relationship has a few obstacles, namely that one of them is a heroin addict and both of them are already spoken for. It is to this film's credit that the affair doesn't feel doomed. From the outset the association between the two women feels  finite. Sheedy and Mitchell seem to insert that awareness into their characters. Another thing I appreciated was that no excuses are made for their infidelity and most important of all, the people being cheated on are not villainized in the process.

It is impossible to discuss High Art without including its third protagonist: heroin. The stuff is everywhere. The 'high'of the title takes on several meanings: aesthetic judgement, opiate-induced euphoria and the limerence of new love. It's difficult to separate the three. The various party scenes in Lucy's apartment are weighed down with lethargy, her circle of hangers-on seem as if they are in slow-motion. Lucy herself often seems mesmerized by everything she encounters. Both Gretta (Lucy's lover) and James (Syd's boyfriend) question Syd's interst in Lucy. I'm fairly certain that we're supposed to see the relationship as an epic romance that liberated both characters. It comes across more ambiguously because of the performances of Gabriel Mann and Patricia Clarkson. Rather than jealous bitter losers or rejects, they each invest their criticisms of Syd with a calm perceptiveness as if they really are seeing red flags rather than grasping at straws.

I like that the Syd's bisexuality is not portrayed as inherently problematic. Having said that, her relationship with her boyfriend is presented as boring and staid yet stable compared to the creatively stimulating yet volatile relationship between her and the photographer. Overall, this is  lovely example of Queer Independent Cinema from the 90s.

"...to live or die by your sword and your wits.", Phantasy Star III

Generations of Doom:

When I was a kid, I owned a Sega Megadrive console and only owned a few games. One in particular became my obsession. I played it through over and over again without ever getting sick of it.  

As an adult, when I started to look this game up online, I was somewhat taken aback by how unpopular it seemed to be. Ultimately I figured that it was because I'd never played the other games in the series, to which this game has an only indirect connection. 

I loved it for its complex narrative, its character design and its well-realized milieu. The main conceit of the game is that it plays out over three generations, each one having a slightly different story play out as a result. Only two games can be saved at a time, so one has to replay the game from the beginning at least once.

I find that having your own head-cannon is necessary for Phantasy Star III (PS3) since the script is, to put it mildly, somewhat underwritten. That wasn't a problem for me because the story gave my imagination enough to chew on. I won't lie to you, there are a few problems and the game takes forever to get you from point A to point B. But I personally feel that the good outweighs the bad.

One of those good things is the soundtrack. There are a few duds here and there that get old after the second time you hear them (like some of the fight scene music). But a lot of the music in this game is awesome especially considering that this is a 16-bit console game form the 90's.

The real draw here is the generational gimmick. At the end of the first and second generations the protagonist has to choose between two women. The protagonist of the next generation will resemble his mother and carry on with the story.  PS3's overarching plot is mostly the same story from different angles building up to a confrontation with the same main villain. The coda is different for each of the four end-game protagonists. I especially love the 'road not taken' aspect of this game and if a bit more care had been taken with it's development it might have a better reputation. 

A wonderful site devoted to this underrated classic can be found here.

Equilateral: Love Triangles Done Properly (Spoiler-free)

I adore Macross.

Like many all over the world,  I've watched Anime to one degree or another my whole life. However none, and I mean none, have taken hold of me the way the Macross franchise did. That said, if you're reading this blog you can fully expect a lot of gushing about Macross and how amazing it is.

One especially amazing thing about the original TV series, Super Dimensional Fortress Macross (SDFM), is the love triangle between the three leads. Over 36 episodes, the whole narrative is executed so perfectly, I literally cannot stomach most of what passes for a love triangle on most media nowadays.

The characterization is handled  very, very well. SDFM's narrative allows us to see where each of its triad is coming from and why they make the choices that they do. By series' end, the three of them have been established within an inch of their lives and their actions make perfect sense. If someone doesn't know where they stand or if a misunderstanding happens, it's never out of character.

Another refreshing aspect of SDFM's triangle is that there is no cat-fighting. The two women are rivals, yes, in the sense that they are romantically linked to the same man. But the conflict isn't between them. The conflict is within the guy who's torn between them. His indecisiveness is the problem. They have their own lives to live given that there's an interplanetary war going on. That right there sets SDFM's triangle apart from that of so many movies and TV series.

The Feature film Macross: Do You Remember Love? takes a slightly different route. Everything I said before about the female characters' dignity and lack of cat-fighting still applies. The same level of characterisation unfortunately isn't possible in 2 hours versus 13 hours. What we do get is a more explicit undercutting of the traditional rivalry. The two female protagonists, Misa Hayase and Lynn Minmei actually save the day. Their cooperation provides the key to defeating the movie's villain.

The nice thing about how this all ends is that the male lead, Hikaru, makes his choice based on his own character arc and not because of some flaw in the woman he doesn't chose. Meanwhile, the woman he doesn't choose maintains her dignity. She doesn't lose it and become a villain. She doesn't hop into another relationship right away. She just accepts the decision and moves on.

As a pop-culture portrayal of romance, that seems pretty healthy to me. None of that "I can't live without you/love me forever" nonsense. Relationships end, so it's best to take it like a Macross girl.