Celluloid Confetti

Fans of the great William ‘Exorcist’ Friedkin are in for a treat: on 25 February, not one, but two! of his films are due for release on DVD: Bug (2006) and Cruising (1980).

Bug is about a couple who lock themselves in a motel room, convinced that they have been infested with blood-sucking aphids.

Cruising has Al Pacino as a cop who must go undercover in the New York gay leather scene to act as bait for a serial killer.

Well, if it’s a choice between watching people scratch themselves for two hours, or the chance to see Al Pacino in leather trousers, my money’s on Cruising.

Like Basic Instinct, another serial killer tale which used gay subculture as a backdrop, Cruising was met with controversy on its release.

Gay groups were furious: The Village Voice described it as “the most oppressive, ugly, bigoted look at homosexuality ever presented on the screen”.

For their part, the studio removed 40 minutes of footage and added strategically-placed fog over some of the racier scenes.

Almost three decades later, the fog has dissipated, as has most of the outrage (though, in this DVD release, the 40 minutes are sadly absent)

When it was shown in theatres, Cruising ran a disclaimer saying:

THIS FILM IS NOT INTENDED AS AN INDICTMENT OF THE HOMOSEXUAL WORLD. IT IS SET IN ONE SMALL SEGMENT OF THAT WORLD, WHICH IS NOT MEANT TO BE REPRESENTATIVE OF THE WHOLE”

Back in the dark days of 1980, it’s entirely plausible that Joe and Josephine Public could be fooled into believing that all homosexuals dwelt in a quasi-nocturnal world of subterranean bars, peepshows and railway arches.

In the enlightened Noughties, we have Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, Alan Carr and Brokeback Mountain, and we know that perception is almost certainly not true.

Above all, it was the link between sexuality and violence that caused most offence at the time of the film’s release.

Again, it’s possible that, back in the day, Cruising’s body count might have convinced people that all gays are one bad latte away from becoming crazed psycho-killers.

Today, we know that this is fairly unlikely (though if you’re immediately ahead of me in the line for the tube barrier and fail to get your Oyster Card out in time, I can’t speak for your safety).

Both Al Pacino’s hollow-eyed protagonist - and the killer he is trying to snare - are shot through with self-loathing; both are participating in the S&M scene because they are compelled to, the former by his boss, the latter by his overbearing ‘father’.

By contrast, their fellow revellers in the clubs, bars and bushes (many of whom were played by non-actors going about their normal routine) seem to be having a ball.

And I had a ball watching it - Cruising is challenging, thought provoking, and Friedkin’s take on the serial killer genre is genuinely unsettling. It also has moments of very strange humour - why on earth does Pacino’s character pick a yellow handkerchief to put in his back pocket?

And why do the police keep an enormous black gentleman wearing a cowboy hat in a side room?

Rather than debate the film’s agenda, I think it’s best to sit back and enjoy[!] Cruising for what it is: a bleak, disturbing, misanthropic thriller which gives fascinating glimpses into a subculture few mainstream films have dared - or bothered - to put on screen.