Like its terrible twin, All Over The Guy, there’s an attempt by The Broken Hearts Club to be conspicuously distant from The Boys In The Band, and show that today’s gay movie people are “just like everyone else” - that is, ingratiating Meg Ryan-style movie characters who are happy, daffy-loveable and not very successful, but hopelessly charming. Why this became such an urgent priority in the late nineties/early millennium is another story, but in The Broken Hearts Club, as always, good drama and storytelling are replaced with earnestness and dopey West Hollywood gay politics, and the result is more gay movie hell.

There may be a craving to show that gay life, dizzy from four decades of stormy weather, has come to rest at a less-intense place, but that display has no place in a movie, as sugary lightweight stories make for boring viewing.

And in any case, it is premature and quite illogical to assume that post-AIDS gay culture is complex and palpable enough to generate a sub-genre of films that are distinct from each other and have something either culture-specific or universal to say and show. As a result, films of this genre are like feature length episodes of TV sitcoms like "Will And Grace" or "Queer As Folk", and they've dated immediately, looking - a couple of years after their release - like worn out stepping stones to commercial gay media grammar, hopped over and left behind by slick and popular entertainment like “Queer Eye”.

Writer and director Greg Berlanti's characters aren’t distinct, interesting, or sympathetic – they’re sexual orientations, rotating gay archetypes seasoned with sharp tongues, warm if slightly troubled hearts, and a sprinkling of HIV. The end result is a unctuous film that works off the presumption that people want to pay for two hours of endorsement (if they’re gay) or re-education (if they’re not gay). There’s simply no depth to the material, no balance or chords. Big Chill and Diner mainlined eternal themes like coming-of-age and awareness of aging, and here we’ve got potential with dating, loneliness, and so on, but the shiny gay veneer is so hard and thick, we can’t access them.

After all those decades of whingeing about Hollywood misrepresentation, gay film makers now have an opportunity to tell their own stories, their own way and all they can up with is this kind of shit. Hopefully, the novelty of seeing gay faces where the straight ones used to be will soon wear off, and we might even get a gay-themed and gay-made film that isn’t so cripplingly self-conscious.

Related Reading:
The Boys in the Band

Review by Mark Adnum