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Gay Sex In the 70s

2004, Movie, NR, 72 mins

Gay Sex In the 70s: Review

GAY SEX IN THE 70S
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Some four decades after the birth of the gay-rights movement, the excess and sexual abandon of gay life in the '70s seems more an aberration than an accurate picture of out-and-about gay life at the end of the 20th century. After the centuries of sexual repression that characterized the pre-1969/pre-Stonewall years but before the AIDS crisis cut a huge swath through the gay community and forced many men to rethink the wisdom of certain sexual behaviors, there was a brief decade in San Francisco and New York City when it seemed that anything went. At least that's how it looks to filmmaker Joseph Lovett. Focusing specifically on gay life in the Big Apple during this period, Lovett and the men he interviews affectionately recall a time that Lovett himself succinctly describes as "the most libertine period since ancient Rome." Lovett re-creates this long-gone era by focusing on the locales where all this sex took place: the abandoned West Side piers; the empty trucks of the Meatpacking District; leather bars; bathhouses; the Central Park Ramble; Fire Island beaches; and the very streets of New York City. Though lacking a critical perspective and refusing to consider any attitude that's not somehow empowering — the awesome horror of AIDS is quickly turned into a proud, life-affirming celebration of gay, grassroots health care — it's very entertaining, and also cleverly illustrated with photos and clips from such period porn films as DRIVE, FIRE ISLAND FEVER and THE BOYS FROM RIVERSIDE DRIVE. The pumping disco soundtrack, meanwhile, perfectly captures the mood. Not all of the information offered here is essential — do we really need to know how photographer Tom Bianchi learned to stop worrying and love anal sex? — but all the interviewees are terrific, battle-hardened storytellers whose experiences have made them wise and very funny. It's also fascinating to see the extent to which Lovett's film — and the archaeology of gay life in general — is dependent upon porn. (The same can be said of today's entirely gentrified Manhattan; the sites of all this clandestine sexual activity are now long gone.) And lest you think that our present-day impressions of the past are being defined by pornographic fictions, one man interviewed assures us that it's entirely accurate: Gay life in the '70s was like a porn movie, he says. Only more so. leave a comment --Ken Fox
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