Those who saw last year’s The Help may be wondering if it showed the full picture of the racism of the Southern states before equal rights for blacks. One incident stands out as being  the most unimaginably extreme example of the racist attitudes towards blacks in the fifties.

A young man named Emmet Till was travelling from Chicago to visit his cousin. It was a long drive and when he got there he went  to a local store and bought some bubblegum. At this point Till joined some local boys and approached the white female shopkeeper and may have propositioned her (he suggested he had had sex with white women before). Sensing the situation could get out of hand, the boys told him to leave the town immediately.

It seems that someone told the men at the store where Hill lived. That night Bryant’s husband Roy and his half brother arrived at Till’s house, dragged him out of his bed, and drove him to a barn.Till’s body was badly beaten, his left eye gouged out, they shot him in the head and the next morning his body was found in the Tallahachie river. 

Hill’s body face was so smashed in, that it was hard to identify him, and inspite of the terrible injuries his mother insisted that he have an open casket, so that the world could see what happened. Pictures of Hill’s pummelled face went around the world. 

As for the men who murdered Hill, there was a trial but they were acquitted after three months. Only a few months after the horrendous crime, Rosa Parks refused to sit at the back of an Alabama bus, a sign that things were slowly starting to get better.

You have to hand it to the Academy of Motion Pictures. When it comes to self-aggrandisement they are world leaders.

Among the options available for best picture in what was the most varied list in years, they went for a film that was about a film, albeit one that was only a front for a covert security operation. It seems that even when the options include 3-D fantasy (The Life of Pi), screwball rom-com (brilliant Silver Linings Playbook), a musical, even a western (Django Unchained) and a Spielberg biopic (Lincoln), the Academy’s will always prefer films about themselves. The really disappointing part is that the Oscars now seem to follow all the preceeding award ceremonies (Argo won best film at the Baftas earlier this month).

Generally it was hard to find much fault with the rest of their decisions, especially with so many films to choose from. Christoph Waltz took best-supporting actor for his second Tarantino film, in which his character was the moral center in a film of sickening violence and cynicism, the film was also given Best Original Screenplay.

Just as they had at the Baftas, Anne Hathaway and Daniel Day Lewis won for Les Mis and Lincoln respectively. Amour took Best Foreign film, but that was all. Jennifer Lawrence made good, winning Best Actress for SLP. I have no fault with the Academy’s vote, except that the film was really an ensemble piece in which she was merely a part, but her performance deserves all the plaudits, and really acknowledges a genuine talent. On the film, it proves that the Oscars rarely goes for comedies, even when they are as brilliantly written and photographed as Silver Linings Playbook

The Academy’s were hosted by Seth Mcfarlane, who means very little to me. There was also a completly redundant tribute to the Bond films, which to my knowledge have never been big Oscar winners. Adele sang, as did Shirley Bassey. There was a musical theme to the evening, with performances from Dreamgirls, Chicago and Les Miserables. No problem there , even if the singing was sometimes harsh and discordant.

Charlize Theron (not an actress I can warm to) showed off a very short new haircut. Reese Witherspoon looked properly sexy in a nice blue dress. Somebody was pregnant, this was on the Red Carpet. The speeches were kept under two minutes, sometimes being drowned out by music, the Jaws theme at one point. Catherine Zeta Jones looked like she had come as an Oscar, wearing a gold dress down to the floor. I’ll leave the clothes analysis to the fashionistas. Jennifer Lawrence pleased everyone in Dior, see picture below:

Actor Charles McGraw (1914-1980) has one of the most bizarre and unusual deaths of any actor I have come across, slipping and falling through a glass shower door.

The accident occurred at his home in Studio City, California. He was 66. McGraw became famous after starring in the noir film ‘The Narrow Margin‘ – playing a detective escorting a woman testifying against her mafia husband. His vocal tones were described as sounding like someone being strangled.

McGraw went on to take small roles in A films; Spartacus, The Birds and The Defiant Ones.

His last film was Twilight’s Last Gleaming.

Pistorious is currently on bail, charged with murder of his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp.

What actually happened?

Here is what we know: shots were fired at his home, at 3am, Steenkamp was dead when the ambulance arrived after Pistorious had unsuccessfully tried to revive her.

He made a call saying he had shot his girlfriend.

witnesses have said they heard arguing between a man and woman that evening. His account is that he had been spending a quiet night in, to be woken up by a loud noise. At this point, events seem to support Pistorious, supposing his statements are correct. He hadn’t checked to see if his girlfriend was sleeping beside him. She was in the bathroom when he fired the shots that killed her. If he thought there was a burglar, why not call the police? And why would a burglar lock themselves into a bathroom, rather than attempt to escape? as far I can tell, Oscar had enough time to get up, attach his prosthetics, but not enough time to establish that there was no burglar, just his girlfriend in the bathroom? Quite why he needed to shoot first remains to be known.

Testimony from the prosecution seems to be flawed, and it now looks as though they will have to call a new witness after the police officer has been revealed to be guilty of violent crimes himself. Whatever the consequences, a young woman is tragically dead, which seems to be the most upsetting aspect of this case. 

Right, its confession time. I didn’t have sex in college. Or at university. I’m not proud of the fact. After all that was a big part of me going there in the first place. I hate to think of all the sex I missed by not being at the right parties or hanging with the right crowd. Its nuts when I think about it. all that free time and spare cash hanging around. I did go to parties though, and I was a regular at the student bar. Hardly a social wallflower. And it wasn’t like I didn’t approach women. 

funnily enough when the time came that I actually did get the opportunity to have sex with someone I ignored the signals, we slept in the same bed but didn’t actually do anything, we just got undressed and put the lights out. I’m kicking myself now though. Sorry this isn’t going anywhere. The girl was called Sophie, we actually hung out with each other quite a bit. I was completely stuck on someone else who couldn’t care less about me. Sorry Sophie for not going further with you. It really wasn’t anything you did. I just wish my younger self could have been more proactive.

When I was nineteen I spent a summer working at a warehouse. I was a student and away from home for the first time, and I needed money. The guy said I could start the next evening, i was to be stacking the shelves, taking deliveries and looking at the security cameras. It was a large warehouse containing all kinds of stuff, I think they shipped construction materials. I did the night shift. I got in to start at 10pm. I took a coffee with me and somehow managed to stay awake until the next morning. Most of the time it was just me. The time I want to tell you about comes after I’d been working there for a few weeks. I was really getting the hang of the job by that point. the nights had stopped bothering me. that summer the heat was stifling. If I was at home I’d have been turning around all night trying to sleep. The warehouse was cool and they had air-conditioning so it never got uncomfortable,

So i want you to picture the scene. I was in my first year at film school. I decided that was something I had to do based on some stories I’d heard and films I’d watched. You can tell I hadn’t given it much thought. I kept a notebook where I’d sketch down ideas, fragments of stories that I’d hope to one day be able to develop. You could tell though even then that they weren’t going anywhere. They were too raw, too rough. I’d have an idea I really liked, then realise quickly that i’d stolen the idea from a film i’d seen only recently. I’d tries to write about my own experiences but that got tiresome really quickly. The one thing that I didn’t want was to write about the dull mundane reality I already lived in.

About this time I was starting to discover Hitchcock. We’d already watched Psycho and the professor had linked it with some theories of psycho-analysis that were big at the time. I thought it was just a great film. The deeper meanings didn’t occur to me as i watched it, though they are somewhat more obvious now. Rear Window was another favourite. Watching James Stewart cower defensively in a wheelchair was more frightening than any horror movie I had seen, precisely because what Hitchcock showed could realistically have taken place. I don’t want you to think I was someone scared easily. Sometimes I’d get a chill on my way to work. The streets were deserted, a seemingly endless network of roads un-peopled and under-lit. That was the worst part of the job. I always carried a backpack and I fancied that if I was attacked I could swing it, taking a shot at any assailant. The bag was usually weighed down with solid hard textbooks that could hurt someone if positioned correctly. That never happened. Sometimes a tramp might ask for a money or a smoke, and i’d usually help the guy. I was a smoker then. Once I came to work I relaxed. I had a security pass to let me in the building. If it didn’t bring it to work I would ring the bell and the security guard came down from his office to let me in. Being impatient I made sure I always carried it with me. I spent most of the time tracking orders in the delivery room. If it was quiet, which it usually was, I’d watch TV. With any luck, they’d be a film on that I hadn’t seen. That night I remember they were showing Hitchcock’s Strangers On A Train. I’d seen it before, but couldn’t resist watching it again. I started to watch and before long I was engrossed. its not often that you can watch a film and become totally absorbed and forget everything around you. I mean you normally get bored or distracted. i got to the scene where Farley Granger strangles the girlfriend at the fairground, a particularly graphic scene at the time. Something was bugging me. I looked around the room. There were the usual piles of supplies, tools and building equipment. I didn’t want to watch the rest of the film. I got up and grabbed my jacket. Actually I wanted to turn the film off. But I couldn’t: for some reason I thought I needed to keep the sound on. I felt as though I was not alone in the room. Looking at the delivery book I saw that there were none expected that evening. I walked out of the room and shut the door. I thought I heard footsteps. You’ve had the same experience I know, when you’re convinced that someone’s there. The thing to do was to find the guard and tell him I thought something was up. I could have taken the lift but that was too claustrophobic at this point. If it was a brake-in, my orders were to press the alarm that went straight to the police station. They would arrive in minutes. It made me feel a little reassured, but not much. I could hear the noises getting gradually louder. If this had been a film I would have called out something or asked if anyone was there, but that seemed particularly pointless. I wanted to get out of the building there and then. But I also wanted to see what was going on, the way we can’t stop watching frightening films. 

I kept walking down the corridor to the security guard’s office, past piles of bin liners, old takeaway boxes and shoes. My face in the mirror showed me covered in sweat, panicked and terrified. I got out then. I didn’t even tell the guard. The nexy day they didn’t want me to come back, not that I wanted to. I admit it seems funny now, watching a not particularly scary film and being convinced that I was not alone. It wasn’t so funny at the time, I can tell you.

During the forties there were clear intimations of it in Rope (1948), Victory and The Maltese Falcon. The fifties brought I Vitelloni, Strangers On a Train, Suddenly Last Summer, Serious Charge, and the decade was rounded off with two productions of the life of Oscar Wilde. Cat On A Hot Tin Roof and Spartacus were probably the last two Hollywood movies to have homosexual  inferences deliberately removed from the original. The character of Brick, played by Paul Newman in the film is unable to make Love to Elizabeth Taylor, but the film ignores the playwright Tennesee Williams’ reasons for this, i.e latent homosexuality, and replaces it with a drinking problem.

In 1962 the subject was bought right out into the open with Victim. In it servant Dirk Bogarde blackmails his master whom he knows to be gay. A Taste of Honey featured a sympathetic homosexual, ie, not a criminal, pyschopath or murderer; and Advise and Consent and The Best Man concerned allegations against American politicians. On the other hand Lawrence of Arabia was so shy in showing any signs of  its hero’s sexual make-up that it was difficult to know what estimate was being made (T.E. Lawrence was known to have had many gay relationships), but for good measure Peter O’Toole (what a  great name for a porn-star) was raped in Lord Jim.

By now universal romantic comedies were starting to make fun of the subject: in That Touch of Mink Gig Young’s psychiatrist thought he was in love with Cary Grant, and in A Very Special Favour Rock Hudson deliberately acted effeminately so that Leslie Caron would feel inclined to ‘rescue’ him.

Now the floodgates were opened: in short succession we had A View from the Bridge, with its male kiss; The Servant with its odd relationship between master and Servant (Dirk Bogarde again); The Leather Boys (what a title); Stranger In The House; The Fearless Vampire Killers (the bloodsucking vampire is gay) the miscast and unhappy Staircase, The Detective, which made New York appear to be a very gay city; The Gay deceivers, in which two men avoid the draft by pretending to be queer: Reflections In a Golden Eye; Midnight Cowboy; The Boys In The Band, the first sympathetic homosexual comedy; The Boston Strangler and Funeral In Berlin; If, Young Woodley, Tea and Sympathy, Riot, The Sergeant and Villain which revealed camp goings-on in school, prison and gangland. Girl Stroke Boy revealed the plight of parents unable to tell whether theirson is engaged to a boy or a girl.

In Myra Beckenbridge (adapted from Gore Vidal’s novel) homosexuality was lost in a welter of more spectacular perversions.

Historical figures Richard the Lionheart and Tchaicovsky had their sexual pecadilloes explored in The Lion In Winter and the Music Lovers respectively. Billy Wilder jokingly investigated The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes. There has always been a homoerotic undercurrent to Holmes and Watson hasn’t there?

TV got in on the subject with That Certain Summer in 1973. There wasn’t much further to go as gays had their own porno films. 1978 brought the last curiousity: a Different Story, the love affair between a gay man and a lesbian.

A new era 

Harvey Fierstein’s semi-autobiographical The Torchsong Trilogy had less impact on the screen than on the stage. Fierstein did the voice of Carl on The Simpsons episode Samson and Delilah. ..Trilogy went hand in hand with a new camp sensibility that appeared in La Cage au Folles and its sequels, as well as The Rocky Horror Picture Show, some of Andy Warhol’s films, like Lonesome Cowboys, and the work of John Waters.

Aids

The mood changed in the eighties with AIDS becoming more prevalent and killing many young performers. British director Derek Jarman reacted by making a contemporary film of Christopher Marlowe’s Edward II.

Younger directors

Working outside the mainstream in the early nineties were Greg Araki and Todd Haynes, who proclaimed a new ‘queer cinema’. Tom Kalin’s Swoon (puts the homo back in hiomicide claimed the publicity) looked at the Leopold Loeb murders from a homosexual viewpoint; Todd Haynes’s Poison looked at social and sexual deviance with the equanamity of Jean Genet. The Living End had two homosexuals taking revenge on a straight world; Mark Rappaport looked at Rock Hudson’s performances from a gay perspective.

Two examples of new queer cinema

Gus Van Sant enjoyed success with My Private Idaho, about a narcoleptic hustler, it starred River Pheonix and Keanu Reeves.

Director Isaac Julien’s Young Soul Rebels had a black and white male as its protagonists, unthinkable in mainstream cinema.

Philadelphia won an Oscar for Tom Hanks but upset many AIDS activists.

In 1997 Stephen Fry reminded us of past persecutions with Wilde, a role many would consider him born to play.

Dream casting: Stephen Fry as Oscar Wilde

Meanwhile in the same year Rupert Everett concentrated on present pleasures as Julia Roberts’ gay companion in My Best Friend’s Wedding; Everett’s revelations that he was a rent boy made it difficult for his long term prospects as a film actor.

Most recently same sex love was depicted, albeit very cautiously, in Ang Lee’s Brokeback Mountain 2005. 

When all is considered, this is not a subject mainstream cinema has been keen on investigating. The most groundbreaking productions have been for tv, witness Queer As Folk and Tipping the Velvet.

Sadly, there is still a perception that its more acceptable for a straight actor to play a gay role than vice versa. Indeed, I can think of no known gay actor to have been offered a role as a straight man, but hopefully that will change soon.