A Single Man--from a Single Woman!

One of the functions of this blog is to ruminate about the Male Problem. Although I do not have any problems with gay men in general, I really did not like the film A Single Man--primarily because of its sentimentality. I would like to hear what others thought.

A Single Man: He shoulda been left alone

I have never read Christopher Isherwood, and now I never will. He may be an excellent writer, but his story “A Single Man” as translated into film by professional fashion designer and amateur director Tom Ford is the most blatantly sentimental and cliché-ridden filmic effort I have seen in years. Why would such a simplistic—nay pathetic—film receive such rave reviews? I will try to answer that question after venting.

The narrative is about as predictable as that of Cinderella, without the drama of the wicked stepsisters. An English professor has lost his lover to an automobile accident. In the opening scenes, we are treated to Colin Firth’s naked body swimming underwater in a meaningless shot designed to be arty and set the ‘poetic’ mood of someone drowning in sorrow. Then we see a pair of $1000 dress shoes approaching the bloodied body of an artfully posed young male corpse aligned with an overturned car. In close up, the profile of our sensitive male gently kisses the lips of the corpse. Ah, a deathless love—clearly this will be a tragic tale. I am already riveted.

When the linear narrative begins, we first see him getting out of bed, very slowly, so you can see how depressed he is and how well dressed and housed, too. The shot of his lining up his shirt and tie is straight out of American Gigolo. (Did Ford serve as an advisor on that film? I forget). Of course, all English professors in the early 60s wore Saville Row suits, owned the most upscale of contemporary furnishings and drove a Mercedes sports car with a sun roof. I lived on a professor’s salary for 35 years, and it would take 10 years of my salary to drive that car. So much for realism. Oh, pardon me, this is art.

Professor Falconer arrives at school, parks his car in the university lot, and heads to class. On arriving at his office, he is told by the blonde secretary that one of his students has requested his home address. Barely listening, he nods his assent, muttering “Arpege” under his breath. (As we know, only a gay guy would recognize the perfume the secretary is wearing.)

And so it goes. In class, he begins to discuss Aldus Huxley and then, putting the book aside, delivers a ‘profound’ mini-sermon on marginalization—about as pedantic an effort to ‘educate’ the trapped movie audience as one could imagine. Of course, the ‘students’ are enraptured.

Too bad for the audience. All of this pap is delivered to us with the most unimaginative cinematography possible. (Maybe Ford just hired his favorite fashion photographer, because the camera barely moves in this film; instead, the screen space is filled with giant close ups of Firth’s suffering face, or shot/reverse shots of his looking deeply and soulfully into his former or new lover’s eyes). If there is any way to depict love and loss in a more clichéd manner, I am not sure what it would be. Of course, when Firth/Falconer learns of his lover’s accidental death, he runs out into the pouring rain, a la Henry in A Farewell to Arms. Except Henry is alone, whereas F/F runs into the Hospitable Arms of his friend Charley, an attractive woman friend, who comforts him. (Note the clever male nickname). Her doomed love for him is supposed to be a sub-plot, but Julianne Moore doesn’t have enough screen time to flesh that one out. So there are no tedious flashbacks of their tender moments together, gazing soulfully, etc.

And on and on. F/F pulls a gun from his bedside table, and we know he is going try to do himself in—but it will not come until two hours later, of course. Still, it’s pretty obvious that he is going to die somehow—the ultra-handsome F/F is repeatedly told that he looks awful, so we know for certain he will die one way or the other. But do we have to suffer through very dull, pedestrian scenes win which he buys bullets, and cleans out his bank security box (with the treasured nude portrait of his lover tucked in at the bottom)? As he comes and goes in these tracking shots, we are shown his ‘justifiable’ distain for the nuclear family next door--the couple clearly lacks the great love he has shared…but then, they don’t have a Mercedes either, just three obnoxious kids.

While waiting in joyful anticipation for F/F’s demise, we are treated to bar scenes with lots of sailors, a ‘romantic,’ laughter-filled moonlight swim, a slow striptease by the young student/seducer, soft focus images of red roses, and other searching investigations of homosexual courtship. The only mildly engaging scene in the film is his failed suicide attempt, when F/F can’t pull the trigger because his pillow is not adjusted properly.

If this film were about a heterosexual couple, it would have been even worse than Titanic, surely one of the most awful films of all time. So, why the four stars? Because gay marriage is a very contested political issue right now. As a certified liberal, I of course support gay marriage, if only as a simple civil right for those who want it. So this is a propaganda piece—and that’s okay, I guess. But as a dime-store romance it has nothing to do with real relationships, and I hope to heck nothing to do with Christopher Isherwood’s writing. I also pray that Tom Ford never makes another film.

reply from Susan Platt, art historian, seattle

[Susan replied on email, as apparently my blog is not user-friendly!]

Hi Pam. This is a thoughtful and provocative discussion. It can go on. I am thinking about the same thing, as I observe so many multi racial couples. What do we have now to identify even ethnicity, other than skin color, which is getting whiter and whiter. Is ethnicity even the point, is it food, is it social structures, is there anything? church??
In art, the ethnic or national markers have become signfiers of a touch of difference, just enough to get accepted.

[I would argue that skin colour is not getting whiter and whiter, but more neutral beige---skin tone seems to be one way of increasingly demonstrating that we are all one! Natch, the current would-be terrorist was a dark-skinned African, so we still have that trope of 'evil' going strong, despite its irrelevance. Pam]