Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters: Know Your LGBT History

Friday, October 01, 2010

Know Your LGBT History - Beautiful Thing

It's been a sad time for the lgbt community, particularly our children. We fight so much for equality that sometimes we forget that there are other things we need to be concerned with such as self esteem and peer respect, as well as hope for the future. Those are the two things that our lgbt children need.

With that in mind, I want to feature one of the best movies that deals with lgbt youth.

Beautiful Thing (1996) is a simple movie of two young teens who fall in love in London. From Wikipedia:

Jamie (Glen Berry), a teen who is infatuated with his classmate, Ste (Scott Neal), has to deal with his single mother Sandra (Linda Henry), who is pre-occupied with ambitious plans to run her own pub and with an ever-changing string of lovers, the latest of whom is Tony (Ben Daniels), a neo-hippie. Sandra finds herself at odds with Leah (Tameka Empson), a sassy and rude neighbour who has been expelled from school, does several drugs, and constantly listens and sings along to her mother's Mama Cass records. While Jamie's homosexuality remains concealed, his introvert nature and dislike of football are reason enough for his classmates to bully him at every opportunity.

Needless to say, the two boys do fall in love and have to navigate a relationship throughout all of the mess.

And let me apologize for those who hate spoilers, but this movie has a happy ending which the following clip shows. Why am I revealing this? Because there is nothing wrong knowing that happy endings exist, whether in movies or real life:

7 comments:

Inspector13 said...: best part of the movie is where he asks his friend who is constantly beaten if it is okay to touch him. as one who was abused severly at both home and away i burst into tears. nobody ever asks us if it is okay to touch us. they just do. and it always hurt. i am a 52 year old autistic and love your blog.; 3:20 PM
BlackTsunami said...: thank you inspector ;p; 3:21 PM
Jon said...: I absolutely adore this movie. Teen love and Mama Cass. What's not to love?; 6:18 PM
Anonymous said...: Great movie. The British did make some very inspiring films that portrayed gay youth as normal.

Another fave, Get Real. When the mom told the boys she'd have their balls as earrings I thought it was great.; 6:26 PM
Inspector13 said...: i like to watch old movies and spot the characters that read as gay. there seem to be a lot of them in the low budget flicks of poverty row.

one of my all time favorites is the ghost walks. it has a character who they describe as a pansy and a creampuff and nothing bad happens to him. he isn't ridiculed except by his boss who fires him every other minute. and he gets all the best funny lines in response. i found it quite refreshing. you can get it for free at the internet archive .org in the motion picture section.; 7:58 PM
Bill S said...: That final dance scene is truly sweet.
Incidently, Ben Daniels, the actor who played Sandra's boyfriend, is openly gay.; 5:39 AM
Timtheskeptic said...: i absolutely loved this film, i even bought it on Amazon (Because i think they don't sell it here in Arizona.) plus with the subtitles, i could understand better what they're saying. I'm not sure if you saw "just a question of love" a french gay film or "shelter."; 7:21 PM