lesbians

Three Films I’d Watch (if anybody made them)

Here are three ideas I’ve had for movies recently. If only the movie studios would stop making pap like Dredd 3D (or as I call it, Judge Dreddful) and take on some of my ideas, perhaps I’d find myself at the cinema more often.

So here are my three pitches:

Knights of the Living Dead

A twist on the Arthurian legends. With zombies.

King Arthur’s trusted White Knight (Lancelot) on a “routine” quest to oust Brandin, a corrupt ruler of a nearby township, who is accused of evil sorcery. Lancelot rallies the townpeople but Brandin escapes to his lair in a cursed cemetery. Lancelot slays Brandin, but – an an effort to decode a riddle Brandin made about the source of his power – lifts an enormous metal plate over a mysterious tomb, exposing the world to a dangerous plague that turns those affected into monstrous zombies.

Under instruction from the Church, Arthur and his knights set out to find the Holy Grail, which has the power to defeat the curse, questing through zombie-infected lands. There’s lots of hacking and slashing and eating of brains, Lancelot shags Guinevere, Arthur dies a heroic death to let the others escape (hinting at the time that he knows about the affair and wants them to be happy together), and ultimately the knights use the Grail to save the world from the zombie plague.

My Daughter’s Hand

A tale of love, homophobia, and the meaning of family, inspired by a true story.

In the news this week, a Hong Kong businessman has offered the equivalent of £40M to the man who can woo and marry his daughter. The problem? She’s a lesbian, and is already married (although same-sex unions are not recognised in Hong Kong) to her girlfriend of many years.

My first thought when I heard this news story was that she should find a man who’s willing to “marry” her, and split the money between the two of them. Hell: for £20M, I’d fly to Hong Kong and marry her for a fortnight. Where’s my plane ticket.

Hong Kong corporation heiress Gigi Chao (right) with her wife Sean Eav.

But then I thought of an even better variant on the story. In my version, a (disowned, unless she recants and marries a man) lesbian daughter has her partner dress as a man and pretend to be a suitor. There are slight overtones of the story of Hua Mulan, a legendary Chinese heroine who pretended to be a man in order to take her aged father’s place in the army, during a conscription drive.

In any case, the partner, disguised as a man, succeeds in impressing the father, and the father eventually comes to admire this young “man” and gives his blessing to marry his daugher. But as the wedding approaches, their secret is exposed when they’re caught having sex. However: after much soul-searching the father sees that he liked his daughter’s partner as a person when he believed that she was a man, and so he agrees to accept her into his family as a woman, too.

It’s a story about combating homophobia with deception, I guess.

The Bone Wars

Back when Richard Owen and Gideon Mantell and were rocking up the early British palæontology scene, in the late 19th Century, their USA contemporaries Edward Cope and Othniel Marsh were embroiled in a bitter rivalry of dinosaur proportions.

These gentlemen were in such a rush to get the fame of collecting the most dinosaur bones, that they resorted to ludicrous (and somewhat shocking) measures: using dynamite to blow away hillsides (probably destroying many fossils as they went), spying on one another (to such an extent that they would sometimes operate through fake companies to try to evade each other’s spies), and bribing people to keep quiet about the locations of big finds.

Their rushed efforts led to some ludicrous mistakes. Cope – a neo-Lamarckist – famously assembled his Elasmosaurus skeleton backwards, with the head on the “tail” end, among other mistakes (Wikipedia even has a tag to label naive Victorian-era drawings of dinosaurs, I recently discovered).

I have a vision for a film in the style of A Dangerous Method, which I enjoyed earlier this year, telling the dramatised story of these men and their rivalry. There’s already been a comic book and even a board game about them: isn’t it time for a movie, too?

What do you think? Would you watch these movies?

The L-Word

I just thought I’d put some feelers out not for the first time, but for the first time online, to see if my theory is true that I am only only man in the known universe who enjoys the (now-finished) Showtime drama series The L-Word. If I’m not, will somebody let me know!

I have an ongoing experience when I tell people about the series. I explain what it is and why I like it. Evidently my enthusiasm is sufficient to grab the interest of whoever I’m speaking to, because many of them will then go and watch it. What happens then divides strictly down gender lines. Virtually every woman I’ve introduced to the show goes on to watch and enjoy it, and virtually every man – except me – goes on to watch it and hates it. What gives?

I’ve jokingly said before that among my male friends, the gay ones don’t like it because there’s too much lesbian sex, and the straight ones don’t like it because there’s too little. That’s pretty cynical, I know, and I’m not convinced it’s true: after all, if this was genuinely among the major criteria for favouring or disfavouring a drama series, well, then most of my male friends wouldn’t watch any at all, and that certainly isn’t the case.

Maybe I’m just mis-selling it. I’m pretty much following the TV guide description when I tell folk about it: it’s a show about a group of (mostly lesbian) friends in LA – major themes are relationships, sex, sexuality, discrimination, social class, career, and art. That pretty much covers it. It’s compelling and intricate, and I’m honestly at a loss to explain the clear gender boundary between those who do and those who don’t enjoy it.

Ruth proposed to me that it could be to do with the way that women communicate: much of the impact of the show comes from the way that the characters share their feelings – more in subtle ways like choice of language and body language than in the actual face-value dialogue. Her thinking here is that (whether because of our biology or our upbringing), us gents aren’t as capable of picking up on these cues, which form a baseline of the action in the series. It’s possible, I suppose: most of the show’s producers and many of the scriptwriters, as well as most of the cast, are female and so would be expected to have this mysterious superpower. But it fails to explain how the show appeals to me… and to whichever other men enjoy it: I’m hoping that if I hear a positive response back from any, that we might be able to work it out together.

In any case, it’s a conundrum: if you’ve got any ideas, let me know. And if you haven’t, go watch the show and see if you can work it out. Careful with the spoilers, if you’re ahead of me (I’m half-way through season 3, with its fabulous guest star Alan Cumming).

This blog post has nothing to do with my earlier post, Women In Movies, although if you enjoyed this one you might like that one, too.

Amateur Lesbians

I’ve recently reformatted and reinstalled, and that means that – briefly – I ended up seeing advertisements on the Internet again, until I had my ad-blocker reinstalled. And so I came to see an advertisement that promised to let me see “amateur lesbians”.

Now you and I both know perfectly well what they mean, but I’ve always been amused by the term. It somehow carries the implication that there are “professional lesbians”, who aren’t just hobbyists or weekend-homosexuals. I get the image of a conversation along these lines:

A: “So, what do you do for a living?”

B: “Oh, I’m a lesbian.”

If there is such a thing as a professional lesbian, I wonder if it’s one of those careers that is protected from gender discrimination laws, so that it’s allowed to disallow men from applying. And I wonder if you can get a vocational qualification in the field: you know, a BTEC in Lesbianism or something. I also wonder if there are any perks to the job – I mean apart from the obvious: do you get a company car? Do you have to pay for your own uniform?

I wonder, sometimes, if I wonder about things a little too much.

Quickly, Before They Turn The Glass Into Lesbians!

So, what have I been up to this weekend, you ask. Well…

“Cover The Mirrors” Launch Party

On Friday I took the train up to Preston. The train I was on broke down at Machynlleth when they linked it up to the carriages that had come down the Pwllheli line, and the repairs set me back by almost an hour, but it turns out that the rest of the rail network was running behind schedule that day, too, and so I didn’t miss any important connections. I arrived in time for a quick “birthday tea” with my family (for my dad’s birthday) before rushing off to the Waterstones for the launch party for my friend Faye‘s first published novel, Cover The Mirrors.

I drank as much wine as the store were willing to give me and bought myself a signed copy of the book. I even managed to get the photo, above, under the proviso that it’s only allowed to appear on the internet thanks to the fact that I’m holding a carrier bag in front of Faye’s face (she’s more than a little camera-shy). I haven’t started reading Cover The Mirrors yet, because I’m virtually at the end of The Night Watch by Sergei Lukyanenko, and I’d like to finish that first, but little doubt you’ll hear about it here in due course.

Dad’s Birthday

After the book launch, my sisters and I took my dad out for a few drinks to celebrate his 51st birthday. It turns out that, in my absence, Preston’s nightclub scene has really taken off. We started out in an 80s-themed bar which is part of a chain called Reflex. It’s so 80s it’s unreal: all 80s hits playing, David Hasselhoff and Mr. T decorating every wall, glitter balls and spots and mirrors everywhere… deely-boppers available at the bar… and so on. Really quite a fantastic theme venue. Then, under my sister Sarah’s recommendation, we tootled up the street and into a cafe/club called Manyana, where my dad got hit on by somebody young enough to be his daughter.

I snatched this picture. I’ve no idea who she is – we didn’t get her name – but she seemed genuinely surprised to hear my dad’s age. So I had the DJ announce it, just to make sure there was no doubt in anybody’s mind that there was an old person on the dancefloor.

This influx of Preston nightclubs is making them all remarkably competitive with their drinks prices, too. I bought a few rounds for the four of us and none of them ever came to over a tenner, and one – thanks to the “buy one get one free” policy at Manyana – came to under £6, which is quite remarkable for a city nightclub on a Friday night for four people!

Back To Aberystwyth

On Saturday I had brunch with my sister Becky, my mum, and her boyfriend and then got back onto the trains to head back to Aberystwyth. Owing to line maintenance, the stretch of track between Crewe and Preston is unusable every weekend within sight, and so I was re-directed via Manchester Piccadilly. Yet again, my train ran late, and I found myself sprinting across Piccadilly station, trying to find a train that was heading Shrewsbury-way…

…meanwhile, my friend Katie, having slept through her stop, woke up in Manchester Piccadilly and, not quite awake, clambered off her train in an attempt to find a connection. I’d apparently featured in her dream, and so she was quite surprised (and not quite sure if she was seeing things) when I sprinted past her. She sent a text (which I chose to ignore: my pocket beeped but I was too busy looking for a train to take the time to get my phone out) and then phoned me before she was able to confirm that yes, it really was me.

As we were headed the same way, she joined me on my train for one stop, which was a nice surprise for what was a long and overcomplicated train journey. A few folks have suggested that this might not be a coincidence, and that she might be stalking me, but I’m yet to be convinced.

In any case, I don’t have a picture to go with this part of the story. Sorry.

Jimmy, Beth, and Troma Night

YATN. If you were there, you know how it went. Big thanks to Jimmy and Beth for coming along.

Lloyd Kaufman’s Visit

In case you’ve not been anywhere that I can pounce on you and go “squee!” recently, here’s what you missed out on. You’ll remember that last week I mentioned that Poultrygeist – Troma‘s new movie – was coming to Aberystwyth. Well, it did. And it rocked…

…and better yet, Ruth, Claire, JTA, Paul and I got to hang out with Lloyd Kaufman, president of Troma Studios and producer of The Toxic Avenger, for a couple of pints and to share a bowl of nachos. The guy’s fabulously chatty and friendly, and if it weren’t for the awestruck feeling of “wow, we’re just sat here chatting with Lloyd Kaufman in Lord Beechings” we’d have probably been more interesting company.

Dan, Claire, !!!LLOYD KAUFMAN!!!, JTA, and Ruth

When he said goodbye, kissing the cheeks of each of the girls, I genuinely thought that they were in danger of exploding with excitement. Thankfully they didn’t, because I’d already bought them tickets to see Poultrygeist later on.

Which was, as I’ve said before, fantastic. It’s even better seen with a nice, energised audience, and better still when the director and several other people who worked on the film are hanging around afterwards to answer questions, chat, autograph things and so on. There are apparently 15 prints of Poultrygeist and the capacity to make more on demand, so if you want to see it and can’t wait for the DVD release, go speak to your local cinema now and ask if they’ll show Poultrygeist, even if only for a week (as Lloyd himself said, it’s better than showing Transformers on all 24 screens of some soulless megaplex). And hell, with Troma’s current financial situation, they could probably do with a helping hand with getting into as many projection booths as possible!

The title of this post – Quickly, Before They Turn The Glass Into Lesbians! – is a reference to one of my favourite lines in the film.

Paul might have bitten off more than he can chew, though, as he hinted on his blog. After some discussion with Lloyd, Paul is likely to be responsible for:

Re-establishing the UK division of the Troma fan club.
Acting as president of the above, for the forseeable future.
Investigating UK distribution of Troma films.
Oh, and making an official DVD subtitle track for Poultrygeist: Night Of The Chicken Dead, which describes the Troma Night drinking rules and reminds you when you should be drinking. He’s got a few ideas about things that should be in such a subtitle track, too, and if you’re familiar with the rules you’ll probably be able to guess what he’s thinking about.

I’ll leave it to him to go into detail, if he wishes.

Matt In Hospital

Between places, we also joined a growing crowd at the foot of Matt‘s bed in Bronglais Hospital. His operation was a success, but he’s reacted unusually to the general anaesthetic and they’re likely to keep him in for observation for another few days. If you haven’t had a chance to visit him already, he’d probably appreciate the company (although Sarah seems to have barely left his side): visiting hours are 3pm-5pm, 6pm-8pm: just ask if you need to know what ward he’s in and how to get there. If you’re feeling particularly cruel, mock him by talking about how well your bodily excretions are working, or swap his drip with his catheter bag while he’s not looking.

But seriously: I’m sure we all wish him well.

Curry!

Finally – as if we weren’t full enough from a large Sunday lunch – after leaving the cinema, Gareth, Penny, Amy, ~~Ruth, JTA~~, Rory, Paul, Claire and I slipped down for a late-night curry at the Spice of Bengal. Which was delicious, although there was a little much food for those of us who were already quite full.

Nonetheless, a fantastic end to a fantastic weekend! I’m sure everybody else will have a different story to tell (Paul spent longer with Lloyd and went to more films; Claire and Jimmy got horribly drunk together on Friday night after she, Ruth and JTA failed to see a Meatloaf concert; Matt’ll have his own morphine-fuelled tale to spin, and so on), because it’s been a rich, full couple of days for many of us abnibbers.

Cool Thing Of The Day

Content Warning

This archived blog post has been flagged as containing content that treats or depicts people negatively based on their appearance or identity. This wasn't okay at the time and it isn't okay now.

I don't believe it's acceptable to pretend I didn't write them by removing them from the Internet - insofar as such a thing is even possible. However, I also don't want to give them any more visibility than they already have.

Cool And Interesting Thing Of The Day To Do At The University Of Wales, Aberystwyth, #54:

In a club, on a social gathering, be getting along really well with a young lady there. The fact that you’ve drunk, over the course of the evening, a number of double-vodka-and-lemonades that is rapidally approaching double figures, is irrelevent. It also seems somewhat irrelevant to you, when she asks you if this is your first time in a gay bar. Casually inform her that, no, it isn’t, and, when you notice (as the money runs out and the alcohol-damaged vision returns) that her arm is round her female friend, ask “I guess there’s no point in me trying to chat you up?” Sadly, be informed, that no, there is no point whatsoever in trying to chat her up. Ah well…
Why are the most attractive women *always* either lesbians or actually men? Seems unfair, really.

The ‘cool and interesting things’ were originally published to a location at which my “friends back home” could read them, during the first few months of my time at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth, which I started in September 1999. It proved to be particularly popular, and so now it is immortalised through the medium of my weblog.