Directed by Laurent Cantet

Written by Laurent Cantet and Robin Campilo

Starring: Charlotte Rampling, Karen Young, Ménothy Cesar and Louise Portal

105 minutes

Ellen, Brenda and Sue (Charlotte Rampling, Karen Young and Louise Portal), a trio of simpering, middle-aged single white women all hornier and more superficial than an Animal House frat boy, travel to Haiti in the late 1970s to bang young black guys. If you think there’s more to this story, I dare you to drop $9 and find out.

The object of the women’s desire is teenage cabana boy Legba (Ménothy Cesar), the attractive young muscle mound who takes turns servicing the vacationing spinsters. Veterans Ellen and Sue know to keep their emotional distance, but for second-timer Brenda it’s love at first sight.

The leads are all given solo moments where they directly address the camera, detailing their tales of woe. Ellen is an unhappy, British-born Bostonian who teaches French literature. Brenda, married and miserable, didn’t have an orgasm until she was in her 40s and first visited this Haitian stud farm. Sue is a Canadian factory worker whose excess pounds keep her trapped in a world of sexual frustration.

By their own admission, none of these women would as much as look at an American black man. When Legba comes dressed in a loud shirt and a gold chain gifted to him by one of his “clients,” Ellen accuses him of resembling someone better suited for Harlem than Haiti.

Further attempts to explore racial paradox, as when Brenda invites Legba to dine with her, are downright misdirected. The help is welcome to chow down on club sandwiches with guests on the beach but dining inside the hotel is another matter. Surely Legba’s reprisal for eating with the guests has more to do with class structure than racism, as his boss points out.

There are a few scenes set away from the resort to remind the audience that this tropical getaway is located smack-dab in the middle of poverty and danger. Legba is picked up by a Mercedes containing a local ex-love interest his own age who is jealous of all the attention heaped on him by the older white women. For those looking at their watch and craving something more (like a speedy resolution), there is an unexplained third-act murder thrown in to justify its feature length.

While having never read anything by author Dany Laferriére, it is hard to fathom how a film so bereft of narrative could have been based on one novel and three short stories. His ambition to use “physical desire and sex as a political metaphor” never convincingly finds its voice in Cantet and Campilo’s screenplay.

Crackers are guaranteed to be offended by all the black-on-white sexual activity while cinephiles are certain to be bored by the glut of close-ups and reverse angles. The acting is all first-rate, but so what? Actors don’t make movies, directors do.

The film did manage to win the Cinema of Peace trophy at the Venice film festival. Perhaps there was a language problem and they meant to give it the cinema of piece award. Unless you are turned on by soft-core interracial granny porn, head north.

1 star

Written and directed by Todd Stephens

Starring: Michael Carbonaro, Jonathan Chase, Jonah Blechman and Mitch Morris

92 minutes

Another Gay Movie refers to both the title of this raunchy tuchus-aimed “Gaymerican Pie” takeoff and what most people say when asked what’s playing at Landmark’s Ken Cinema.

After my first viewing of Blazing Saddles back in 1973, if someone would have told me I would ever tire of onscreen fart jokes (and doody humor in general) I’d have pulled their finger off. Blazing Saddles may have broken as much new ground as wind, but it would be years before flatulence went mainstream and began stinking up just about every PG-13-rated film.

Not surprisingly, the first fart I ever remember being cut on TV came from the God of Gastrointestinal Guffaws, Howard Stern. It was on his 1991 WOR show when he embarrassed Denny Terrio by dropping in a rectal trumpet that appeared to be gurgling from the backside of Merv’s former “Dance Fever” host. I rewound that moment so many times that my tape copy has a permanent crease.

Howard paved the Hershey highway for countless lame imitators. We have reached a septic saturation point in our culture where even Disney features frequently include toilet humor. Not terribly surprising when you remember Uncle Walt’s anal fetish. Count the number of times momma’s boy Dumbo takes a board to the bum or pratfalls on his keester, or his pachyderm predecessor Elmer Elephant lands face-first in the ostrich’s rear end.

Now its boy meets butt in this tale of four virgin tops in search of their dream power-bottoms. Another Gay Movie successfully erases the bad taste left by Adam & Steve and The Mostly Unfabulous Social Life of Ethan Greene, supplanting it with even more gross-outs, and this time they’re pretty damn funny.

Before Nancy Sinatra can sing the title theme, we’ve already witnessed hot ’n’ horny Andy (Michael Carbonaro) daydreaming about being bent over a desk by his Teutonic teacher, his cross-dressing mother catching her son using a carrot as a masturbatory aid and an obligatory nod to a dead gerbil. Taking time out from munching her way through the cheerleading squad, class bull dyke Muffler (Ashlie Atkinson) taunts the boys for never having done the “Big A.”

Rounding out the foursome are Griff (Mitch Morris), the well-endowed preppie, adorable jock Jarod (Jonathan Chase) and glitzy Nico (Jonah Blechman) whose bedroom is lit and designed as though Liberace dropped acid and built a full-scale replica of Barbie’s Dream House. It’s here that the recent graduates make a pact to master the art of “anus-cockus” before summer’s end.

Remember Kelp’s class of 30-year-old high schoolers in Jerry Lewis’ The Nutty Professor? (Indulge me.) The student body of San Torum High School doesn’t look much younger. Equally unbelievable is why none of these hot “booty virgins” decides to tap the other’s back door.

The film stays fairly close to the conventions established by its straight forerunners. Instead of defiling one of mom’s hot homemade pies, a quiche is cleverly substituted. Jackass: The Movie had its Rip Taylor moment, and in sticking with the current trend of cramming in unbilled celebrity cameos, we have reality TV has-been Richard Hatch, still surviving his 15 minutes of fame, and his ever-present penis.

Virtually every movie, no matter how good or bad, has at least one new thing to show us. Whether or not you need to see it is another matter. Aside from a bootleg Chuck Berry video, I have never witnessed a Cleveland Steamer (or Pittsburgh Platter, if you’re from back East) attempted on film. Todd Stephen’s parents should be very proud of their boy.

Unlike its mainstream counterparts, Another Gay Movie didn’t even bother with the MPAA and is playing unrated. Contemporary teen sex romps, forged in gratuitous excess, are frequently ordered to trim the scat in order to get a safer R rating. No matter how silly it all becomes, it’s refreshing to see a comedy refuse to buckle under the hands of the censors. Unless you are a card-carrying member of NAMBLA, this is not a film to take kiddies to.

What happens if the dick poking through the public restroom glory hole belongs to your dad? Should Three Stooges sound effects be used to draw attention to ejaculation, fisting and withdrawal? You have another week to catch Another Gay Movie and find out.

2.5 stars