THE MISANDRISTS proves a step backward (or, rather, a return to form) for Bruce LaBruce

With Gerontophilia (back in 2013), GLBT director Bruce LaBruce (shown below) proved at last that he could make a movie and tell a story that resonated politically, philosophically, culturally, socially, and emotionally while holding it all together. Up until then, while he'd done each of those things at some point along the way via various films, he usually did this rather clunkily so that plot and politics, humor and emotion (very little of the latter, as I recall) stood apart from each other, never really melding fluently into the whole. Characters would often spout some philosophy before going back "into" character to further the plot.

This was often done humorously (at least I suspect that was B laB's reasoning) but it grew tiresome quickly. With his latest film (made in Germany), THE MISANDRISTS, he's back into this stand-apart format during which the audience is treated to political/gender philosophizing that, despite its being so important to the tale the filmmaker is telling, is still handled clunkily enough to keep getting in the way of his story and its very real and could-have-been-major entertainment value.

I had to look up the word misandrist, and the very idea that I had to do this intrigued me. We're much more familiar with the words misogynist (one who dislikes women) and misanthrope (one who dislikes the human race in general), yet we almost never see or hear misandrist written or spoken -- so unusual is its use in our society, culture and media for us to even be aware of the possibility of singling out the male as the dislikeable object. Mr. LaBruce, no doubt, is more than aware of this. Consequently the patriarchy takes quite a deserved drubbing in his film.

The tale the filmmaker tells takes place in 1999 (for whatever reason -- pre 9-11-2001? -- I'm not sure) in the German countryside in a supposed school for wayward girls, supposedly run by a group of nuns. In reality (or what passes for same in a B laB film), this school's actually a training ground for the Female Liberation Army, which is planning to take over the state, if not the world, by virtue of a secret scheme which we eventually learn at film's finale, and which seems about as goofy and and nonsensical as all else we've seen.

One day, as two of the girls from this school frolic sexually in a field nearby the woods, they encounter a young man -- an out-of-favor leftist -- injured and on-the-run from the authorities. One of the girls decides to rescue him, hiding him in the basement of the school. A few complications ensue. And that's pretty much the entire plot.

Along the way we're treated to the usual philosophizing (sort of), satire (sort of), humor (sort of) and very camp sensibility, the special combination of which is the hallmark of B laB. There are oddball moments of fun (a sudden Charleston done by one of the nuns), lots of sex (mostly lesbian but a little homo, via some gay pornography the girls are made to watch as one of the plot points here), and the filmmaker's penchant for overkill (a pillow fight among the girls that goes on ad infinitum).

LaBruce's goal, it seems, is to convince the world that boundaries -- sexual, gender, political, philosophical -- are all somehow nonsensical. While I can understand and somewhat identify with this idea, he is neither a witty enough writer nor a good enough filmmaker to make his case with any great success. Maybe B sees his role as mostly that of prankster, in which case, he succeeds. Somewhat, at least. Why introduce a "mystery" character peering out of the school's attic window early on and seen periodically along the way, and then never explain her existence in your film -- unless pranking -- and/or upending expectations -- is your main concern?

Performances by the oddball assemble cast are OK overall (they get the job done), but the actor who best exemplifies the B laB style is his semi-regular, Susanne Sachße (shown below), who plays the school's "commandant" with the proper style, subtlety and wit.

If you're already a major fan of B laB's work (outside of Gerontophilia, which is probably way too "mainstream" for his heavy-duty fans), you will probably embrace The Misandrists with much more zest and enjoyment than could I.

You'll get your chance when the movie -- from Cartilage Films and running 91 minutes -- opens this Friday, May 25, in New York City at the Village East Cinema, and the following Friday, June 1, in Los Angeles at the Landmark NuArt. 

Alanté Kavaïté's THE SUMMER OF SANGAILE: Lithuania's entry into this year's Oscar sweeps

TrustMovies can't quite imagine what some of the older members of the Academy will make of the hot lesbian love scenes in THE SUM-MER OF SANGAILE, the official Lithuanian entry into the upcoming Best Foreign Language Film contention. Whatever reaction those scenes produce, I can't help but think that members will be greatly impressed with the cinematic beauty and quiet, tender artfulness of this unusual movie. Its plot may be a mere wisp, involving the coming-of-age of its fragile heroine, yet the film's visuals -- beginning to end -- prove stunning.

That the film, written and directed by Alanté Kavaïté (shown at right), won the Sundance Film festival award for directing (world cinema -- dramatic) should give some indication of how surprising those visuals are. Beginning with our heroine, Sangaile (the lovely Julija Steponaityte, below), entranced by the amazing-if-frightening work of a local stunt pilot during his air show, the film almost immediately cuts to our other protagonist, Auste (Aiste Dirziute), also a looker but one whose true beauty emerges more slowly as the film progresses.

Auste (below), hugely attracted to Sangaile, sets about meeting and seducing the slightly younger girl, and she make no bones about any of this. A bright, creative young woman, gifted in fashion and photography (both the clothes and the photographs seen here are good enough to turn the heads of titans in both industries), Auste uses these skills to draw Sangaile -- who early on in the film has a clearly unsatisfying sexual encounter with a young man from Auste's group -- close, closer, then whew!

All the while, Ms Kavaïté's concern for the environment in which these girls exist -- the incredibly verdant countryside, the spacious sky, the local lake, the very different homes in which the two girls live -- into which come the almost profound art that Auste produces with the visual help of Sangaile combine to create a memorable fragment of a movie. (The outstanding cinematography is by Dominique Colin.)

Sangaile has health problems -- diabetes, perhaps, and vertigo that keeps her from pursuing her dream of flying -- and she also has a somewhat distant mother, a former ballerina who appears to have had some trouble honing her parenting skills.

For her part, Auste seems surprisingly competent as both an artist and autonomous person. She "manages" the relationship as best she can, while helping Sangaile toward her own autonomy. The movie, however, is finally more a visual feast than any deep exploration of character or relationship.

But as that, The Summer of Sangaile is well worth seeing as it gently yet luxuriously probes the place of family, friendship, sexuality, creativity and challenge in the lives of the young.

From Strand Releasing, in Lithuanian with English subtitles and running 97 minutes, this Lithuania/France/Netherlands co-production opens in New York City at the IFC Center this Friday, November 20, and in Los Angeles at the Sundance Sunset Cinema on December 4.

A most unlikely-but-likable hero is the subject of Dan Hunt's marvelous, moving doc, MR. ANGEL

Not much of a porn viewer, TrustMovies knew nothing about the subject of Dan Hunt's excellent documentary, MR. ANGEL, that tracks the career of one, Buck Angel, an exceedingly muscular, butch-looking fellow with a high-pitched voice, a successful career in the porn business, and a vagina -- which he displays and evidently uses for both fun and profit. Not a hermaphrodite (he has no penis) and born a girl, Buck is set on sharing his "being" and his experience with as much of the world as will have him.

After seeing this fine documentary in which Mr. Hunt (shown at right) tracks Angel's history, family and career, I suspect that -- against all odds -- he's going to convert a lot of people. And I don't mean convert them to doing or being what he himself is doing and being, but rather converting them to a kind of understanding and appreciation of just how "other" a person can be and still be a person you might like to meet, get to know, learn from, and, yes, even get intimate with.  What is most surprising about Mr. Angel -- the man and the movie -- is how they both manage to appear absolutely one-of-a-kind and yet utterly approachable and comprehensible.

The filmmaker lets us into the history of this girl/guy (that's she, above, as a cute, freckle-faced kid), meet his family (mom and dad are shown below) and even wrestle, as his parents do, with who and what their daughter has become -- and why. The relationship between Buck and his father seems the most tenuous -- "Dad did hit us; I think he crossed a line there," Buck relates in passing -- yet both men are in there pitching, trying hard for some kind of intimacy.

We meet Buck's significant other, Elayne (below, left), and when she tells us how and why she fell in love with the guy, it all seems more than a little possible. And when we finally experience Buck's need for and receipt of a hysterectomy due to all that testosterone ("They never told me that the walls of my uterus could atrophy...."), there is no longer any room for doubt about his commitment.

We also go to Adult Entertainment Expos, watch Buck interact with other porn stars (below), learn that he's been nominated for both Transsexual of the Year and for the most outrageous sex scenes (he wins the former). For all the film's "honesty," I wish it had gone a little deeper into Buck's sex life. Since he has a vagina, one might assume he can climax by being sucked, fucked or fingered. Does it matter whether the perp is a woman wearing a dildo or a man using his own penis? But we don't go there, and that's a shame, really. (Buck does tell us that he quickly rejected the idea of having any kind of penis "installed," as this would have given him something unreal.)

One of the most fascinating sections of the film involves Buck's time as a high-paid, high-fashion model when he was still in his feminine form. She was quite exotic and beautiful, so it is little wonder friends and family expected her to easily settle for that glamorous life. (Why didn't s/he? Drugs and alcohol abuse, for starters.) The photo below offers an interim young man, post-modeling but prior to losing her breasts.

When living in the U.S. became too tricky (he and Elayne were formerly located in New Orleans), the couple relocated to Mexico. Now the guy has joined the "lecture circuit," making public appearances across the U.S. and internationally. "My mission, and I know it sounds cheesy," he explains, "is to change the world."

And yet, on some small level, that is exactly what Mr. Angel is doing, and what he is doing is definitely worthwhile. Stretching boundaries, forcing us to understand "the other" a little better, Buck is certainly some kind of hero, and Mr. Angel is one of the best documentaries about that "other" that I have seen in quite some time. It probes, explores, and takes in other people's views (one of the highlights is Dan Savage's remarks on how our society handles pornography). It's a fine place to start for any folk who feel "different," as well as for their families, friends and co-workers.

Shot over a period of six years, Mr. Angel, from Breaking Glass Pictures and running just 68 minutes, made its premier at this year's SXSW film festival and is available on DVD now. Click here to order. (I hope it will also be available soon on various streaming sites.)

An appropriate viewing for this Turkey Day: Jamie Babbit's oddball BREAKING THE GIRLS

Over the past few Thanksgivings, TrustMovies has tried to pick an appropriate "turkey" of a movie about which to warn his readers. But since he has already covered The Counselor, he had to look elsewhere this year. Fortunately Netflix has recently unveiled, via the company's streaming service, a very odd new addition to the turkey farm. BREAKING THE GIRLS is a sort-of lesbian-themed, sort-of thriller, sort-of psychological mystery, sort-of sister act, sort-of college-girl-caper and all-over-ridiculous movie (but still rather fun, if you find yourself watching it while in an especially forgiving mood). It almost-but-doesn't-quite rise to the level of unintentional camp.

Plus, it offers Agnes Bruckner, shown below, an actress many of us have enjoyed ever since her breakout role more than a decade ago in Blue Car. Co-written, and pretty badly -- the characterization barely reaches rote level, but then, with all the last-minute twists and turns the script demands, this is not surprising -- by Mark Distefano and Guinevere Turner, the movie is directed by Jamie Babbit (shown at right), a filmmaker I have been rooting for since But I'm a Cheerleader, though she has yet to deliver a follow-up worth this impressive debut film. (The Quiet probably comes closest but doesn't, finally, make it.)

Breaking the Girls, tells the sad tale of a young, pretty and smart law student (Bruckner), scraping by on a scholarship, who one night during her job as a bartender, places money that should go into the till into her tip jar. She is seen by a nasty co-student (Shanna Collins, shown at bottom, left, with Tiya Sircar), and her actions are reported to her boss. She's then fired from her job and has her scholarship taken away, to boot.

Coincidentally (coincidence is rife in this movie), a pretty and sleazy femme fatale (Madeline Zima, above) happens to be sitting at the bar one night, makes friends with our heroine, and before you can say red-hot lesbian sex scene, they are having exactly that. Actually, first, as I recall, they have a semi-hot/almost-threesome in the pool, with Shawn Ashmore (below, center, who plays the cute FBI kid -- or is it CIA -- on The Following), who here plays the boyfriend of that nasty co-student, except that he really likes Ms Bruckner's character best and also, if we read the cast list during the end credits, turns out to be the son of her law professor, though that fact seems to have gone missing from the movie itself. During a sensuous, sleepy post-coital maneuver, Ms Fatale suggests to our heroine that, because Fatale hates her stepmother and heroine hates that nasty tattle-tale, the two girls should team up to kill both of them, with one killing the other's nemesis, since of course she will not be suspected of the crime. This is dumb, but at least our trio of filmmakers gets credit for having seen Strangers on a Train.

Things go from dumb to dumber, with little concern for any kind of remote believability. This is so the film can, in its relatively short running time, reach the point where surprise after surprise kicks in. By then you'll have kicked the movie itself -- unless you find, as I did, that screwy can move to nutty and end up being actually rather ridiculous fun.

Also involved is that supposedly wicked stepmother, a not-so-sterling stepfather, a kindly police officer, an aging relative (played by Melanie Mayron) and a few other characters, none of whom do much except push the silly plot along. But, as I say, if you find yourself in a forgiving mood, this kind of nonsense -- given its glossy surface, some very nice clothes and sets and an attractive cast and a particularly beautiful house which lends itself to this kind of  film -- you might find this year's turkey at least a bit tasty in certain regards.

If you, at the end of Breaking the Girls, think back on the film from its beginning, it makes just about zero sense. As  though anybody on this earth could exert that much control over those around them. But that, I guess, is part of its lame-brained charm. The movie, running 86 minutes, is available now on Netflix streaming, Amazon Instant Video & DVD.