Queer Beacon

American Dreamz (2006) - LightShed 8

What was I thinking? American Dreamz is unwatchable.  It's got a big cast: Hugh Grant, Marcia Gay Harden, Willem Dafoe, Mandy Moore, and Seth Myers.  Marcia, Hugh and Mandy have performed well before, but they all sucked here.

In American Dreamz, Hugh Grant is both Simon Cowell and Ryan Seacrest, he hosts, produces and is the judge on an American Idol type show. One of the contestants, played by Sam Golzari, is involved in a plot to blow up the American President (played by Dennis Quaid), who will be a guest judge in the show finale.

Seriously. Don't see it. The contestants are painful to watch.  I guess the movie tried to show contestants that looked like and sounded like the rejects from American Idol, except for Mandy of course, bitch can sing.  The American Idol rejects are usually pretty funny, but the contestants in the movie just sucked, they were not funny at all.

At least we got gay content.  The dad of one of the contestants, played by Mandy Moore, is gay and is living in another city with another man.  She mentions it to her manager, played by Seth Myers, who is devising publicity strategies for her, something that would show her as personable, but Seth dismisses the gay dad thing, like that's something that needs to be hidden.  Not too nice.

In one of the rounds, after Omer, the character played by Sam Golzari, performs Hugh Grant says he liked the performance and that he just became omer-sexual. Neutral, I guess it was supposed to be a play with "metrosexual," I guess it was also supposed to be funny.

We have one gay character pretty much throughout the movie, which here on the Queer Beacon would usually mean a LightShed 10, but the light for our gay is not all positive.  Our gay is played by Tony Yalda, seen below on the right, holding the sign.

Our gay is super shallow, but so is his straight sister, and our gay is a little jealous of his cousin Omer.  But it is nice to see that his family loves him and apparently has no problem with his being gay, they really love him.  Anyway, he comes out as an annoying queen.  Queens are nice.  I love queens, but not annoying queens.  Still, positive light overall.

American Dreamz - Trailer - I think we have a gay

This is the flick where Hugh Grant plays Ryan Seacrest, Dennis Quaid plays George W. Bush and Mandy Moore plays an American Idol type contestant.  Here's the trailer:

It looks like Mandy Moore will pull out some nice acting in the movie.  Could she become one of my girls? 

Anyway, she was interviewed by David Letterman the other day and she was sweet.  Letterman mentioned that in the movie, Mandy's father goes to live with another man.  I wasn't really too excited about seeing this movie, but with the possible gay content, maybe I will.  We'll see how the gay is portrayed.  The movie opens this Friday, are you in?

In Good Company (2004) - Shipwreck 4

Mediocre movie.  I think the casting was off a bit.  I think Dennis Quaid was ok, and Marg Helgenberger was fine too, but they either needed to downgrade Scarlett Johansson or upgrade Topher Grace.  Scarlett becomes Topher's love interest, but she is so out of his league it's like another game. 

In the movie, because of this crazy corporate world, 26 year old Topher Grace becomes the boss of 52 year old Dennis Quaid.  You can kinda see Dennis' booty in the movie.  Topher develops an interest for Dennis Quaid's daughter, played by Scarlett.

The decision on the gay content was a close call here, but I think it falls more on the negative side.  In one scene, Scarlett is playing Foosball with Topher Grace and she mentions she is leaving this athletic tennis thing, is going to college at NYU, and she kinda complains about a 'rumor' about her being a lesbian.  She says it like it is not really something good.  Topher was better about it, he is all confused/embarrassed and says it is a pity, that she is not a lesbian.  Confusing. 

The following scenes also involved a bit of questionable content, but I'll leave them out of the scoring.  There is this one guy who is a sexist.  He is quoted as having called a co-worker 'sugar tits' -- nice huh?  But he is portrayed in a good light, which is not good.  At least he gets fired (for reasons other than being a sexist), so I guess that could help teach him a lesson.  In another scene, this jerk suggests Dennis Quaid and Topher Grace should get a room when Topher and Dennis mention their good work together.  Calls them pussies in a basketball game.  Not nice.  But the guy is portrayed as a jerk, so I'm living that out too.  I'm also leaving out the time when lucky Topher Grace sort of cleans a spilled over drink off of Dennis Quaid's crotch area, Dennis Quaid pushes Topher away saying that only his wife is allowed to do that.  That's ok, of course.

Good tunes though, worthy of note: jazzy Besame Mucho by Diana Krall.  You can rent the movie I guess, but don't expect much.

Yours, Mine and Ours (2005) - LightShed 6

Mediocre movie.  You can rent it, it is upbeat, but the movie doesn't go very far. 

Here, Dennis Quaid is an admiral with 8 kids.  Rene Russo is a purse designer with 10 kids.  They were high school sweethearts, they meet again and get married.  For a total of 18 kids.  The movie is about bringing a large and diverse group of people under one roof.  One group is all about love, the other group is all about rules.

We have a very important type of gay content here.  One of the kids, who is around 8 I would guess, played by Andrew Vo, displays some very characteristic traits, easily associated with the gays.  Check out the description of his character on the movie's official website:

Do we need more evidence?  The movie never mentions whether he is indeed gay or not, but come on. 

I thought it was great.  Even greater because of the stereotypical gay manners.  Visibility is key people.  Without the queens, we'd be nothing.  Seriously.  Oh, and I have seen kids like that.  If that's not gay gene, I don't know what is.

In the first scene with Andrew Vo, right in the beginning of the movie, Rene Russo asks his opinion on a purse she designed.  Of course he has a witty homo remark.  Something about Gucci and better in gold.  His mom says something like: "Oh, how can someone say he is not my son?"  You tell them Rene. 

Later on our little Ryan Seacrest gets all tough to protect his even smaller brothers.  Super cute.  100% queen.  100% attitude.

There were a few negative episodes but I think they were countered by the great portrayal of the gay son.  In one bad scene, one of the 18 kids is plotting an end to their parents relationship so that the kids can go back to separate, less crowded and less diverse, houses.  In his plot, he says they should do something really gross, like have some sibling make out session (that would be Sean Faris with a girl).  They go "ew."  Then the same kid keeps on elaborating on his plot and says they should actually do something even grosser, have two sisters make out.  Not nice.  It should have been just as gross as the straight brotherly love.  Not sicker. 

Also, when going through a laundry basket, a kid finds some sexy panties and asks a brother whether the panties were something he (the other brother) forgot in the basket.  That was not nice either. 

Finally, in one scene, two little brothers drag together and parade in front of daddy Dennis Quaid, and he looks a little riled up.  This was also part of the plot to get Rene Russo to fight with Dennis Quaid and split.  But come on Dennis, let your boys dress the way they want too.  So that was not so bad, but it was bad. 

Again, I'm sticking to the positive light from Andrew Vo, but reducing the LightShed score, which would have been higher without the negative remarks. 

A few more pics after the jump (yes, shirtless Dennis Quaid).