Was it merely chance that the first gay-themed feature film released by a major studio also coincided with the founding of Southern California's largest and longest running film festival? Former DGA President Arthur Hiller directed
Making Love for Twentieth Century Fox in 1982, and 20 years later, Hiller's sensitive portrayal of a man in love with his wife and discovering his homosexuality was among the 250 films and videos screened as part of Outfest's 20th Anniversary Festival.
"I'd like to think things have changed in the last 20 years," Hiller said. "When
Making Love was sold to television the network edited out a scene of the two men in bed, making love. I asked one of the network executives why they even bought the film [from Fox] if they wanted to remove the one scene that epitomized what the story was about. Eventually they left the scene in, but not without a fight on my part, which, of course, was my creative right. Today, there are many more films that show homosexuality as a part of the human story. It is a better industry for directors wanting to tell these stories."
Sex on-screen, straight, homosexual or otherwise, has always been a big part of cinema's story. This year's Outfest (2002) featured a DGA-sponsored panel "I Like It Like That: Directors on Directing Sex Scenes." Panelists Miguel Arteta, Jamie Babbit, Lisa Cholodenko and Don Roos — with director Donna Deitch as moderator — served up valuable insights on what directors fear most.
"I'm often criticized for not having my characters consummate the act — too much verbalizing about their neuroses of making love," Cholodenko said. "But to me, the subtext of the narrative surrounding the sex scene is much more interesting than just having them grope around. Actors have told me they're dismayed when a director just tells them to go ahead, start making love, and there's no emotional content to the act."
Arteta shared a cautionary tale about straying from his intended plan during a sex scene. "I was directing an episode of
Six Feet Under," he said. "Actress Rachel Griffith's character is having anonymous sex with strangers. My idea was to go against the obvious and make the scene very tender and intimate, like having sex with her boyfriend. I even told one of the actors what I was going to do. But when we got to the set, Rachel insisted it should be very rough and from behind, without her ever looking at the guys. So, that's how I shot it. When I saw the scene, I was moved by what Rachel did. But over the course of the entire series, I think my approach would have been more interesting."
Roos recalled his experience on The Opposite of Sex with Martin Donovan. "He had done everything with a man on-screen in Hollow Reed, but he didn't even want to touch the younger guy in my film. I could have forced him, since he knew, in advance, what the script called for. But you can lose a lot of goodwill [with your actors] doing that. So you might back off a little on the sex scenes for the overall good of the movie."
"Actors want directors to be very specific in sex scenes," Arteta said. "They don't want you to think they are showing their real-life moves. Editors are always laughing at my sex- scene dailies, because you can hear me calling out off-screen instructions which are very explicit."
Jamie Babbit thought the hardest part of directing sex scenes was having actors physically reveal themselves. "I had an actress who was a devout Christian and could not do a scene where the script called for her to have an orgasm. It was simply too intimate and revealing. You need to have those conversations with your actors well in advance or else you have real problems on the set."
Talking about "chemistry" between actors, moderator Donna Deitch said, "There are great advantages in scheduling your sex scenes at the end of the shoot. Actors can get to know each other over the course of the film, and can bond as people. Putting them at the end gives the director time to have those important conversations about what the actors are comfortable doing and how far they'll have to go with each other."
The logistics of staging a sex scene elicited differing thoughts from the panel. "I was too embarrassed to choreograph the sex scenes on High Art and that was a mistake," Cholodenko said. "On
Laurel Canyon (her newest film), Frances McDormand insisted we go into a room and work out every single move in advance. I was dreading it, but she was right: it allowed the actors to focus on performance and character, was easier for the editor to cut together, and made everyone more relaxed."
You need to know where the camera will be when someone is being penetrated," Roos added. "In
Bounce, Ben's character penetrates Gwyneth's character, and it was important for the camera to be on her face and she knew that. Rather than say, 'Put your tongue here, or use your pinkie now,' I like to talk in terms of the story rather than just a mechanical discussion of where their body parts go."
At the DGA's Pinot Hollywood luncheon, DGA Third Vice President Paris Barclay introduced Oscar-winning producer Bruce Cohen, a longtime Board Member of Outfest. "My first job was as a DGA trainee on
The Color Purple," Cohen said. "I've been saying for a long time that the DGA gave me my career. It's an organization that embraces diversity, and if you want to tell gay and lesbian stories, get them in your corner."
DGA directors with films at this year's Outfest included Kurt Voss (Down and Out With the Dolls), Michael Shea (Ritchie's Itch), Deborah Dickson (Ruth & Connie: Every Room in the House) and John Henry Davis (Ordinary Sinner).
Outfest executive director Stephen Gutwillig summed up the importance of the afternoon: "I think the 20th anniversary of this event shows how gays and lesbians have weathered a de facto media blackout of our community and come out stronger than ever. We have films this year from countries with virulent, state-sponsored homophobia —
Daughter of the Sun from Iran,
Fish and Elephant from China. What we've proved in the last two decades is that there is a worldwide community of queer directors; and the enduring strength of Outfest has been to give each and every one of those artists a voice."
