Unfortunately, 'Rhythm & Blues' had more of the latter than the former. Simply, it was still a painful experience. And since I love reviewing or speaking about films, I refuse to do so without having seen the whole picture. So, I continued to the ending. Regret it, I did. I appreciate the fact of the slapstick nature and the whole (attempt at a) mystery of the gay-man killer, the movie works very little magic. In addition, a movie about call-boys, comedy notwithstanding, shows very little sex/nudity, so be warned: don't rent for soft or hard stuff. Basically we have a pick up spot, in this case a cemetery vs. the clichéd park (ha-ha, yeah, I get the pun), where an unusually good looking fellow (for the area) meditating who gets spotted by a spotter for a call-boy agency. Easily he follows and immediately gets sent on his first assignment. Then the movie turns into some kind of gay-'Clue'-like movie. Whereas 'Clue' (the original one, that is, I read they're remaking it. Sigh.) was barely funny, this was far less, even with the million in-jokes. Countless gay stereotypes that depressed me more than make me chuckle. The lighting was bad, cinematography forgotten and direction that had to have come from a film student. All the way through, I suppose, we were to try and pick up on the whodunit subplot on the killer. But, really what happens, is we lose the very little interest as basically it could be just about anyone. And then when revealed by that point, if one makes it that far, it's so pointless. As is the motive surrounding the main character. I can imagine this must've been thought up during an all-nighter, when the bars closed, and the queens had some kind of caffeine rush.
4 Reviews
The pits
ian-payn30 May 2006
Warning: Spoilers
There's only one comment attached to this film so far, and I suspect it's from one of the participants.
Several years ago, a friend and I had a small IT services company. A film company approached us, saying that they had the rights to distribute Rhythm & Blues (in the UK). They wanted us to do a website for the film. So, we bought a domain name, and got to work. A certain amount could be done in isolation - my gay cryptic crossword, for instance - but when push came to shove, my business partner, Mongo, and I, had to sit down and actually watch the film on tape.
Our plan was to note down any witty lines, and make notes of where we'd like stills taken from the master print (or however they do these things). Five minutes in we knew we were in trouble. The dialogue stank. There were no scenes worth recreating. The movie was frighteningly bad. Plot? Ridiculous. Sub-Plot? Derivative. Performances? Poor. To say the least. The photography was no great shakes, and the direction didn't serve the material well, if you catch my drift.
Mongo and I watched the film all the way through, and went to the pub. After the multitude of pints needed to get over the experience of watching this piece of garbage, we decided to return the commission. It wasn't that we didn't need the money. It was that we couldn't bear to be associated with something so awful for the modest reward on offer. Had they quadrupled it, we might have swallowed our principles.
I think I've made my point about the quality of the film (which is, of course, my subjective opinion. And Mongo's). There was no conspiracy to keep this film from the public. No-one would touch it because it's bloody awful. Sorry, I know the truth sometimes hurts, but someone has to tell it.
I write this now, many years after the event, because I found the tape the other day. I'll give it back to the guy who runs the distribution company. I'm sure he'll be thrilled.
Several years ago, a friend and I had a small IT services company. A film company approached us, saying that they had the rights to distribute Rhythm & Blues (in the UK). They wanted us to do a website for the film. So, we bought a domain name, and got to work. A certain amount could be done in isolation - my gay cryptic crossword, for instance - but when push came to shove, my business partner, Mongo, and I, had to sit down and actually watch the film on tape.
Our plan was to note down any witty lines, and make notes of where we'd like stills taken from the master print (or however they do these things). Five minutes in we knew we were in trouble. The dialogue stank. There were no scenes worth recreating. The movie was frighteningly bad. Plot? Ridiculous. Sub-Plot? Derivative. Performances? Poor. To say the least. The photography was no great shakes, and the direction didn't serve the material well, if you catch my drift.
Mongo and I watched the film all the way through, and went to the pub. After the multitude of pints needed to get over the experience of watching this piece of garbage, we decided to return the commission. It wasn't that we didn't need the money. It was that we couldn't bear to be associated with something so awful for the modest reward on offer. Had they quadrupled it, we might have swallowed our principles.
I think I've made my point about the quality of the film (which is, of course, my subjective opinion. And Mongo's). There was no conspiracy to keep this film from the public. No-one would touch it because it's bloody awful. Sorry, I know the truth sometimes hurts, but someone has to tell it.
I write this now, many years after the event, because I found the tape the other day. I'll give it back to the guy who runs the distribution company. I'm sure he'll be thrilled.
as a silly ribald gay comedy I quite liked it. Just don't expect Brokeback Mountain
southlandlover30 December 2006
I don't understand where those other two comments are coming from. This film is neither a challenge to gay political correctness or utterly rubbish. It is just a rather amusing, somewhat ridiculous camp gay farce. I quite liked it. OK it's never gonna be an Oscar contender or even make my top ten films but as a silly ribald gay comedy it is worth watching. Just don't expect the next brokeback mountain. At least it wasn't pious or of the "aren't gays so beautiful" genre. The acting was at times so so but then again all the roles were caricatures and in that way the acting was actually not bad. There were some very witty lines but some of them did take a couple of seconds of thought to get. I can't understand why you would hate this film. What is interesting is how one of the previous comments posted confirmed my suspicion that, with enough money, you can get people in the marketing side of things to agree to support a film even if they didn't like it. I Guess that explains how so many terrible Hollywood movies still manage to get good reviews.
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