A Four Letter Word(1)

At a certain point in its history, a movie genre achieves self-reflection, pondering the validity of its conventions before it sets forth toward self-parody. That point in the Gay Romantic Comedy genre may have been reached in Casper Andreas’s raunchy film, the Men’s Opening Night entry at this year’s Boston Gay & Lesbian Film Festival. Would-be pick-up Stephen (Charlie David) accuses Luke (Jess Archer), a swishy, flagrant, hedonistic stereotype who thinks only about sex, of being a gay cliché. Could Stephen be right, Luke asks himself? Of course, Stephen, a macho Tom Cruise look-alike, is himself a gay cliché, and so is every other character in the movie: the self-righteous gay-rights activist; the recovering alcoholic fag hag obsessed with her upcoming marriage; the anal harridan with his easy-going housemate. Just by this act of introspection, however, Luke becomes a funnier, more ironic stereotype, and Andreas’s film, though eventually succumbing to platitudes, also broaches moments of truth. 87 minutes | Kendall Square