Cruising

Wednesday, December 5

MAJOR ULTRA SPOILERS

I had a little trouble with what to make of this film, but I think I might have liked it. It's a thriller about a cop, played by Al Pacino, who goes undercover to a bunch of gay, leather, S&M bars to catch a serial killer who is picking off gay men. It was directed by William Friedkin, who did the undisputed classic The Exorcist amongst other things, and whom I've been slowly seeing more films by. I'm curious to see a bunch of his stuff because he's essentially a genre-film director, yet seems to have a more respected artistic reputation than these guys usually get. I think his results are mixed, but he's clearly talented, and I'm hoping to find another gem or two. In fact, Bug gets a pretty high recommendation from me to you.

OK, this is a great story set-up. We have this straight cop trying to fit in with an extreme subculture within the gay community, and you figure that he will be bothered in some way by this, or his sexuality will come into question, he'll find new things out about himself, etc. Lots of potential for drama.

Except, weirdly enough, it doesn't explore any of those ideas at all. In fact, Pacino plays a lot of his scenes low key and ambiguous. He goes from leather bar to leather bar, witnessing all sorts of lurid sexual practices and possibly engaging in some himself, but the movie is vague on how he feels about it. Disgusted? Turned on? Indifferent? Dunno. He tells his girlfriend at one point that it's wearing on him, but never says how.

The movie, instead, seems content to watch him try to adapt to his surroundings, learn the culture, etc. And, it's actually kind of entertaining, in a police procedural sort of way, watching him do this for a while.

I'm somewhat surprised Pacino was even in this. He doesn't show up until a good 15 minutes into the film, and then occasionally disappears for short stretches. Then, as I've implied, they don't actually build much of a character. We don't learn anything of his past, and not much about his personal life or anything along those lines. So, I thought, maybe he just did it for the money and was only on set for 2 weeks. Except that he's involved in some pretty strange, graphic and extreme scenes, so you have to imagine he felt enthusiastic about the movie in order to agree to be in it. It's a role that could have damaged his image, so it seems unlikely that he did it just for a paycheck.

After a little Internet browsing, I found out that this movie was protested by the gay community, as they perceived that the film made them look like a bunch of degenerates, and perhaps encouraged violence against them. They may have a point, but it's hard to tell. On the one hand, I think the movie tries to present a few positive gay characters, and has Pacino's character express anger that someone would kill the victims just because of their sexuality. On the other hand, the movie does show a lot of sleazy, gay themed stuff, always in dank locations, which gives it all a weird, creepy vibe.

And, man, does this movie wallow in the sex. We get all sorts of gay club orgies, blow jobs and buttfucking, and even some fisting thrown in. I suspect this is done to be shocking, but at the same time, is the audience watching this movie going to be shocked? We know what we're getting into when we watch it, the sort of people who would be bothered by this movie probably know better than to watch it. Speaking personally, this kind of stuff doesn't offend or bother me. So all the long sequences of sadomasochistic homoeroticism get a little boring after a while.

And for whatever reason, Friedkin always makes the clubs dank, ominous, and joyless. I mean, I get that the movie is a thriller and it shouldn't be light hearted, but this approach strikes me as false. Let's say you were doing drugs, dancing to music you loved in a bar full of people that wanted to fuck each other. That'd be fun, right? You'd be having a great time. It wouldn't be all eerie and sinister. So, I can see why the gay community might not like the way this film depicts them.

There is one scene where Pacino is dancing while high and gets really into it, but even then everyone has a really determined look on their face. Too busy concentrating on dancing to enjoy themselves, I guess.

Right, so this post has been mostly complaints so far, but let me explain what started to fascinate me about Cruising. About the time in the movie when we're getting frustrated by it's unwillingness to explain Pacino's sexuality, it throws in some really weird and interesting scenes and ideas. It starts messing with our perception of cops and homosexuals, blending or confusing the two groups and their imagery. Normal movies often present the dichotomy of straight vs. gay; the dichotomy in effect in Cruising is cop vs. gay.

Early in the movie, two cops berate a couple of trannies, but then force them to perform sex acts. And none of the other cops will believe the trannies when they try to report the incident. Later, as Pacino dives deeper into the club scene, he goes to a strange, almost dreamlike cop-themed gay bar. There are kinky uses of handcuffs, guys sucking nightsticks, etc. Everyone is play acting as cops and fucking each other. Then, the bouncers sense him as an impostor and kick him out for not being dressed as a cop. Even though he really is a cop.

Even better, and more bizarre, is a scene where the police are interrogating a possible suspect. Pacino is in the room, and the police are pretending to interrogate him as well, so as to not blow his cover. Then, out of nowhere, a large, muscular black man wearing only a cowboy hat and a jock strap comes into the room and punches Pacino in the face.

WHAT WHAT WHAT?! Do the police typically employ naked gay men to beat up on suspects? Why not just have a regular cop beat him up? What the fuck is going on?

Alright, so weird shit like that is sprinkled in the movie, making it fascinating and borderline surreal. But let's get to my favorite part: the last 15 or 20 minutes.


From what I gathered, the main complaint about Crusing is the stuff I mentioned before about it's seeming unwillingness to deal with the sexual issues raised. Only, the last act of this movie suggests that something altogether different is going on that we weren't thinking of.

Well, it starts earlier. We are shown scenes of the killer doing his dirty work at the beginning of the film, and we briefly see his face a few times. Then, when Pacino is on the case later, the killer is only shown in shadows. I wondered: Why are they hiding his face now, after we saw it? At a later point in the film, a gay man is killed in the park by a man with a biker hat and lather jacket. In the next scene, Pacino is wearing the same outfit. Hmm.

Near the end of the movie, Pacino finds the man who clearly killed the initial victims. He lures him out to the woods with the promise of sex. They are dressed identically. The killer sits on the top of a bench. Pacino does the same. The killer takes out a cigarette. Pacino does the same. He does everything the killer does. Then, the two seem about to make with the loving, when Pacino punches the killer, then pulls out the same knife the killer was shown using earlier and stabs him. Unprompted. And then tells his boss that he was attacked. At the end, Pacino's gay neighbor is mysteriously killed.

Okay, so I looked around online and didn't find a lot of reviewers mentioning this, but here's what I think is going on. The movie never comes out and tells you, but Pacino is also preying on gay men, carving them up with a knife. He's the killer in the shadows. That was his reaction to his assignment, he's going around taking out his pent up aggression or homophobia or sexual desires on the gay men.

But like I said, the movie never states this explicitly. If the idea hadn't popped into my head when I noticed Pacino and the killer had the same clothes, then the thought would never have occurred to me. The ending is so weird, open, and inconclusive that it blew my mind a little.

So, Cruising has a lot of problems, but is fascinating enough that I think it warrants a look by anyone that likes this sort of thing. It is a bizarre, unique and mysterious entry into the serial killer genre. The premise of this movie deserves a remake, where it actual explores all those sexual issues I mentioned before. But as it stands, the final product of Cruising is a one of a kind movie. I still can't even decide if it's a good movie or not, but damn am I glad I saw it.