Is Hollywood Quitting Gay Movies?
Adam B. Vary of Entertainment Weekly asks why Hollywood hasn't put out a gay-themed film since the commercially and critically acclaimed "Brokeback Mountain."
Brokeback was more than a movie. It was a phenomenon that commanded the cultural conversation for months, from Jay Leno to YouTube to the cover of The New Yorker. More important, it proved that straight audiences would snap up tickets to a same-sex romance. Since then, a few gay-themed films have been released (e.g., Notes on a Scandal). But seemingly no studio — nor any studio art-house division — has greenlit a film with a gay lead character. ''I don't think any studio responded by saying, 'Quick, dust off whatever gay dramas we have!''' says one former studio head. As surprising as it seemed that Brokeback could lose the Oscar to Crash, the real shock is just now setting in: Brokeback may have changed nothing.
I think it has to do more with audience demographics. When stats show that less than 10% of the population is gay, that leaves you with a pretty small share of the market.
BROKEBACK was an anomaly in that it introduced us to gay characters who "looked like us." (i.e. they weren't limp-wristed and swishy)
It was more like MOULIN ROUGE than JAWS: a one-time thing that flew on its unique presentation, not something to inspire sequels, or copycat films.