Religion as the "closet" in Jennifer Gerber's interesting gay melodrama, THE REVIVIAL

The gay closet, as it turns out, can take a number of forms with which we might not immediately associate it. One of these is religion, particularly when the gay in question happens to be a preacher of it. Such a fellow is our non-hero, Eli, who has taken over his little town's church (Baptist, I think) from his late father, who was -- from all we hear -- much more popular, offering up the fire-and-brimstone kind of sermon our country's Southern folk love to hear. Eli, who is married to a wife who is soon to be a mother, prefers a more thoughtful and, well, "progressive" kind of preaching. You can imagine how well that goes down with his congregation.

As adapted (from his own stage play) by Samuel Brett Williams, shown below, and directed with intelligent, straight-ahead force by Jennifer Gerber (shown at left: This is her first full-length work), THE REVIVAL proves to be one of the better gay-themed melodramas we've seen of late. Mr. Williams, with his intelligently withholding writing that does not allow us to understand or fully know most of these characters until the finals scenes (the execution of which Ms Gerber's restraint and skill helps mightily), has concocted a very interesting melodrama

that explores the lengths to which a man will go in using his religion to better hide his sexuality.

Most organized religions, particularly in the Southern USA, do not accept homosexuality as something natural and good, but there are all kinds of ways around this -- as so many of our Southern "preachers" and their past scandals have shown us -- from out-and-out lying and hypocrisy to burying this "sin" so deeply within that even the sinner can sometimes ignore it.

Nothing works forever, of course, and truth, as they say, will out.

When a good-looking young drifter (Zachary Booth, above) appears at church one day -- not for the sermon but for the pot-luck lunch held afterward -- our "kindly" minister (David Rysdahl, below) of course wants to help. First offering that meal and then later a temporary roof over the fellow's head, before you can say, "But I'm not gay," this new twosome is locking lips and then other parts of the anatomy.

Now, if this part of the tale were all that's on offer, we could yawn and say been there/done that. We also meet and spend time with some interesting subsidiary characters, too, such as Trevor (nice job by Raymond McAnally, below), the good-'ol-boy pal who consistently tries to get Eli to preach what the congregation wants. Trevor is , in fact, raising money for a big "revival" style meeting at the church -- which Eli is dead set against.

Eli's put-upon wife -- a low-key but very smart performance from Lucy Faust, below -- comes into her own during the course of the film, as well. It is her character of whom we learn perhaps the most about by film's end.

There is even one member of the congregation -- played with off-key charm by Stephen Ellis, below -- who is desperately in love with his first cousin. While this situation might initially seem merely a bit of comic relief, it serves a deeper purpose in showing us how poor (uncaring, really) a minister our anti-hero actually is.

By the time the "gay love" situation has worked itself out -- and not probably in either of the ways you will expect -- several other situations and characters have come heavily and surprisingly into play. The Revival is a much stronger and more forceful piece of gay-themed film-making than TrustMovies expected. Take a chance on it.

From Breaking Glass Pictures and running just 85 minutes, the movie opens this Friday, January 19, in Los Angeles at Laemmle's Music Hall 3. The DVD will be released the following week on Tuesday, January 23.

New treat from South Korea: Kim Seong-hun's clever, action-packed thriller, A HARD DAY

The continuing parade of Korean movies worth seeing hits a high-point of delight with the new actionful, alternately noirish and highly amusing thriller, A HARD DAY from writer/director Kim Seong-hun. All about the very difficult night, day and continuing span of time that our quite beleaguered hero, a police detective, is having -- the movie offers one thing after another going wildly wrong for this guy. When at last our hero cries, "Gimme a beak!" the phrase will seldom have sounded so plaintive -- nor funny.

This is because filmmaker Kim (shown at right) has found just about the perfect combination of tone and pace for this whirlwind of action, event, chase, and bizarrely unfurling plot that makes up the movie. Full of the kind of coincidence and convolution that keeps things cooking, the story gets better and bolder as it moves along. Coming in just under two hours (relatively short for a Korean film), Mr. Kim leaves his best stuff for the last, while ensuring that what precedes this is plenty good enough to keep us hooked.

His hero, played, with an increasing proclivity to appear unhinged. by a smart and unusually unassuming actor, Lee Sun-kyun (above), is most ably abetted by his co-star and nemesis, played by Cho Jin-woong (below). You could not ask for a better set of leading men than these two, whose crack performances compliment each other beautifully.

These two make up most of the movie all by themselves, with a good supporting cast of characters that includes wife, daughter and various police co-workers and bosses. But it's that delicious plot that hooks you and keeps you hanging on -- from the funeral scene, in which our hero's dead mom gets a bed-mate in her casket via a GI Joe toy, to foot and car chases filled with a rare combination of tension and delight.

Visually, the filmmaker does what he needs to but occasionally also tosses in a technically wondrous long shot to take our breath away. He also has fun with some Korean stereotypes: "Cops aren't gangsters!" notes our hero, with some anger. Really? Let's find out.

Mister Kim's movie is also full of little surprises and a lot of humor -- from a fortune teller's on-the-mark vision to the location of a missing key. And there's one scene in which you just know that a certain car is about to blow up, and the suspense keep building nicely. Then, hmmm... not quite.

The climax is a fine one -- except, there's more. And the rest is even better -- one of the most tactile, visceral, mano a mano combats yet seen, which is, at the same time, wonderfully clever and funny. If you don't yet know about the South Korean movie renaissance of the past decade or two, here's a good place to begin your education. If you're already a fan of this country's cinema, you'll be lining up for more.

A Hard Day -- from Kino Lorber, in Korean with English subtitles and running 112  minutes -- opens this Friday, July 17, in New York City at the Village East Cinema, with a limited national release to follow soon.

Netflix streaming tip: Jessica Biel shines in Pascal Laugier's surprising THE TALL MAN

Something else entirely is THE TALL MAN, the new film from Pascal Laugier, who, a few years back, gave us the ghoulish, grizzly and very dark Martyrs. To talk much at all about his newest work is to spoil the several surprises that turn the movie from one thing into another. As both writer and director of the film M. Laugier is extremely deft in how he handles the progression.

Children are disappearing from the depressed, ex-mining town of Cold Rock, and rumors attribute their disappearance to the work of a frightening figure known as the Tall Man. Jessica Biel, shown at bottom, portrays the town nurse who find herself in the midst of the latest disappearance.

Writer/director Laugier, at left, is adept at building suspense in the early scenes, which work quite wonderfully in their slightly off-kilter way. While we seem to be dealing with a number of cliches of the genre here, even as cliche, these scenes meld together speedily and smartly so that we're not troubled with too much déjà vu. And then, slowly, the very core of what we think we know is shaken, and from there we move onward.

There is at this film's base a strong element of elitism at work, which I can't go into further without spilling too many beans, so I'll just say that when watched by a group of intelligent adults, the post-movie conversation surrounding The Tall Man should be plentiful and keen.

Often, movies of almost any genre seem content to try to give us what is expected in that genre, either as well and as interestingly as possible, or just in standard format that most viewers seem perfectly willing to tolerate. Some of us, of course, keep crying out for something other than the usual cliches. Yet when a movie comes along that upends all these, it is too often under-appreciated in its initial foray. Only later, when enough outliers have been able to see and judge the film, does its reputation begin to rise.

So it will be with The Tall Man, I predict. It opened only a month or so ago, here in New York City, so the fact that you can view it now, in high definition, via Netflix streaming, is in itself reason enough to get that monthly service. (You can also rent or purchase the movie on DVD or Blu-ray.)