Urbania (2000)

alright, i'm a straight male so if you need an arbitrary reason to discount my criticism, there you are. there are a few clever moments. like when charlie goes up to some stranger's second floor apartment only to find that neither wants to be butt boy (or perhaps charlie's just mimicking for effect, not sure. that bit had a subtlety that i was impressed with). a funny and insightful scene that has no 'straight' analogue. i also liked the scene where charlie strings along his upstairs neighbor and girlfriend with a story that ends with him thanking them for being part of his private fantasy. the 'keep your lifestyle choice out of my face' or whatever was trite, but oh well, i guess it might become a good joke if i had to hear it thrown at *me* all of the time.but apart from these few things, the movie was badly written and acted. dan futterman's acting was so unbelievable it was sometimes funny and made me think, right from the start, about soap opera actors. not to single him out, as most of the cast were at the same level of ineptitude. they were of course not helped by the clunky script and unrealistic dialogue. instead of being the surrealistic, edgy urban drama it feels like it wants to be, this movie is a deception. it keeps you in the dark to make its trite story seem more interesting. granted, i am not generally as interested in stories that are about gay love, but i feel that this movie insults the intelligence of those who are.

This is a poignant and provocative story that is lost in choppy cutting, poor dialogue, bad acting and a meandering story.The main story itself is worthwhile on its own: a guy's male partner/lover is murdered (you find this out at the end); he tracks down the murderer. Great idea, great potential.But there's a theme of urban legends woven in - reenactments of the kidney thief, "welcome to the world of aids", others. These stories were worn out in the 1980s.It's a real shame that the director couldn't just slowly tell the story: focus on characters, cut out some of the nastiness, get to the point.Instead it's some combo of "After Hours" and a gay "Sex in the City" (or whatever that TV show is).

Just caught up with this film on DVD from my local video store. For the first two thirds of this tale I was engaged but not attached to this story, but something made me want to keep watching and I'm glad I did. As I started to get what this story was about i grew more and more engrossed in it, the final scenes were masterful and moving. For those of us who attend to rage and hate, this movie takes us to the heart of the experience. Without surrender to sentimentality it exposes human frailty, sadism, rage and connection and salutes complexity rather telling us how to feel. Rare to find this depth of story (and execution of story) within gay genre movies. Congratulations to the writer and director, you guys are heroes

URBANIA (2000) *** Dan Futterman, Alan Cumming, Matt Keeslar, Josh Hamilton, Lothaire Bluteau, Bill Sage, Barbara Sukowa, Paige Turco. Futterman gives a strong performance as an insomniatic homosexual man trying to come to grips with the loss of a lover during one stressed out evening in New York City with the novelty of daylight savings time giving him an extra hour of redemption as he seeks retribution and only adding fuel to the fire by striking up conversations with urban legends mixed with anomie and angst. Original script by director Jon Shear and Daniel Reitz is crafty in its depiction of the darker side of one's mind and the lengths one can go to in a downward spiral with reminiscent tones to Scorsese's `After Hours' of Gotham as a limbo to hell.