Some of My Best Friends Are... (1971)

It's the Blue Jay Bar at Christmas time, and the regular patrons (gay men and a few straight women) gather to swap anecdotes and insults. A.I.P.'s paltry, low-budget answer to "The Boys in the Band", written and directed--both poorly--by Mervyn Nelson, is so wretchedly filmed (with dim lighting and gloppy photography, static staging, flabby editing and amateurish performances) that any document on the rise of gay-themed films in 1970s cinema need not even mention this entry. It has attained some interest in the last two decades for featuring a number of future TV stars (Fannie Flagg, Rue McClanahan, Gary Sandy and Gil Gerard), none of whom kept this title on their resumes for long. There's nothing wrong within this milieu in 'letting it all hang out,' but first Nelson needed something to say. The picture has no enlightening attributes, no insight into why some straight women prefer to hang out with gay men, nor the slightest hint of verisimilitude when it comes to the 'colorful' characters (they seem to exist just to put each other down). Gay audiences who buy into the trap that homosexuals are only happy when they're flocking together--and yet still miserable because they can never attain what they want--have been watching too many melodramas on the late show. * from **** (for Gerard's subtle performance, which looks Oscar-worthy compared to those of his co-stars).

This title is just another of the many gay oriented flicks that needs to be released on disc. (Dinah East and Boys In The Band are two others.) I use to live in Birmingham where Flannie Flagg is from so when this movie first played there, we went to see it, not really knowing what to expect. I was thoroughly entertained, although every time I see Carlton Carpenter, I think of he and Debbie Reynolds doing "Aba Daba Honeymoon" in the 1950 Two Weeks With Love starring Jane Powell. Anyway, getting back to this movie, Rue, of course, went on to be known best for her Golden Girls role and Gary Sandy in WKRP in Cincinnati. Since it has been so many years since Some Of My Best Friends Are, was released, it's hard to remember that much about the movie so hopefully some film distributor can acquire the rights for a DVD release.

I saw this at the London Lesbian and Gay film festival a few years back and it was the highlight of the festival for me. Similar to Boys in the Band, it deals with a large colourful cast of characters who are regulars at a local gay bar. These include Gil Gerard (who went on to be Buck Rogers) as the straight-acting hunk who everyone wants, Rue McClanahan (Blanche from the Golden Girls) as a spiteful fag-hag and Candy Darling (of the Warhol factory), playing a sensitive transvestite, who after being beaten up by a sexually-confused lout asks "Has anyone seen a contact lens?" The title theme "Where do you go" is suitably haunting and there are some excellent funny lines in this movie - I can't understand why it hasn't come out on DVD yet. Well worth seeing if you get the chance.

This film now plays a lot of gay film festivals..billed as.... " The movie you love to hate"! Of course it now looks very politically incorrect. But there was a time that it really was like this. I know..I was there! P.S. It's so much fun to see so many people who went on to greater things. Michael Bluegrass