Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters: The Best of Know Your LGBT History

Happy Memorial Day Weekend! I thought I would create a special edition of Know Your LGBT History which will look at the best (and the worst) clips from the 100+ episodes of this segment which analyzes portrayals of the lgbt community on movies and television

Let's look at the worst:

From Cruising (1980), an awful movie starring Al Pacino as a New York City police officer who infiltrates the so-called sadomaschistic world of homosexuality in order to find a serial killer of gay men. And this serial killer doesn't just kill gay men, he butchers them slowly and painfully (a point driven unnecessarily by the first murder scene.) There are no redeeming qualities to this movie. The gay characters are from the pit of a joint fantasy by Peter LaBarbera, Lou Sheldon, Matt Barber, and Donald Wildmon. They are pathetic individuals who, when not being murdered, are either immersing themselves in vile festishes or being intimidated into having sex with police officers. And yes the lgbt community protested like hell when this movie came out:

To the episode of the 1970s television series Police Woman. This episode, Flowers of Evil, dealt with three lesbians (named The Butch, The Bitch, and the Femme by the media) running a retirement home, stealing money from their residents, drugging them, and then gruesomely murdering them. This episode was awful. It was so bad that when the lgbt community protested, it was never shown on television again. However it is available on the Police Woman dvd and as you can see, as an abridged version online:

To I Got The Hook Up (1998), just a plain hot mess which should have NEVER been made. For the purpose of this site, the offensive part starts at 2:39:

But there have been some really good portrayals.

Like this episode of The Jeffersons which looked at how main character George Jefferson dealt with learning that his navy buddy has transitioned to a woman. It was an episode ahead of its time:

And then there's Maude, another show ahead of its time when it comes to lgbt issues:

And then there is my personal favorite, the ending of the British movie Beautiful Thing (1996), a story about first love. If anyone ever asks what being an lgbt is all about, show them this scene. It's about love, honey.And I especially love the way the mother dances too in order to show support and protection to her son and his boyfriend:

1 comment:

Alan E.4:20 PM
My husband and I have been watching Wings on Netflix, and there was an episode where Roy's son, RJ, came out to him (S2E10 "There's Always Room For Cello" http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0749340/). I really liked Roy's progression from unaccepting to accepting after his son (played by Abraham Benrubi who also played Jerry on ER) showed that he was still the same person he had always been. Plus, RJ wasn't a campy character at all. He was a big guy who played sports, but also had an interest in learning to play the cello. Great episode for 1990.

I wasn't too keen on some of the other characters' reactions, but they didn't come off as homophobic. They just wanted to see how Roy reacted when RJ came out because they thought it would break Roy's heart. Very positive message in the end without using a stereotype.

Friday, May 27, 2011

The Best of Know Your LGBT History

1 comment: