During a segment on screen representation that aired as part
of this year’s Academy Awards, comedian Kumail Nanjiani talked about what Hollywood’s newfound (and
frankly long overdue) commitment to diversity means for viewers used to the
status quo. “Some of my favorite movies are by straight, white dudes, about
straight white dudes,” he said. “Now straight, white dudes can watch movies
starring me, and you relate to that. It’s not that hard. I’ve done it my whole
life.”
The idea of
mentally translating the stories we see on screen to make them more relevant to
our own experience is surely familiar to anyone who’s spent a lifetime watching
movies about straight, white, cisgender men, while themselves not fitting into
any one (or any at all) of those categories.
I’ve already
seen articles popping up asking whether the current generation of young people
“need” a movie like “Love, Simon,” an immensely likeable John Hughes-style teen
comedy about a high school senior dealing with coming out and experiencing the
pangs of first love. These articles argue that, being more open-minded about
such things, today’s youth see a gay teen love story as nothing special. But
it’s funny: no one asks if we “need” any of the literally hundreds of films
released every year that are aimed at those same straight, white dudes.
The story
“Love, Simon” tells isn’t a new one. If you’ve attended ImageOut,
Rochester’s LGBT Film Festival, at any point over the course of its 26 year
existence, you’ve seen innumerable coming out narratives very much like this
one.
But this
feels different.
Somehow
“Love, Simon” is the first film getting a wide release from a major studio
(20th Century Fox) to center on the story of a gay teen. Typically such
films are limited to festivals or arthouse theaters, and I felt the difference
each time I saw the film’s trailer play before a major release during any of my
trips to the multiplex over the past few months.
It happened
when I heard Simon, the film’s teen protagonist (played by the effortlessly
charming Nick Robinson) utter the words “I’m gay” out loud. And this was in the
film’s marketing no less, an area where studios are most likely to play coy
about any gay content, lest they scare away potential ticket buyers.
Queer
characters in mainstream movies are often relegated to the role of best friend,
offering quippy support to the film’s true
protagonist. Likely they never state their sexuality outright, forcing
representation-starved viewers to read between the lines. But Simon gets to be
the center of this story.
And sure,
the film makes pains to stress how “normal” he is. He’s white and traditionally
masculine, from an upper-middle class family with liberal-minded parents — sensitively
played by Jennifer Garner and Josh Duhamel. But there’s something powerful even
in the film’s ordinariness. Adapting a popular YA novel by Becky Albertalli, director Greg Berlanti
serves us something familiar, presented with the high gloss of a studio
picture.
We often say
that representation matters, and we’ve been privileged to see that idea put
into action with recent films like “Black Panther” and “A Wrinkle in Time”
bringing diverse faces to the world of blockbuster filmmaking. And it’s pretty
damn great.
But at this
point, films like these shouldn’t be the outliers; going to the movies should
always be like this. Everyone deserves the opportunity to see themselves
reflected on screen, and not just in angsty, fraught
tales that deal exclusively with characters grappling with those identities. It
should be in action movies, mysteries, horror films, sci-fi,
and yes, glossy rom-coms. This isn’t “caving” to the demands of “social justice
warriors,” it’s a necessary corrective, making the world on screen look more
like the one outside your front door.
Any story
that allows audiences to share the aspirations, hopes, and fears of someone
outside their own realm of existence is useful and yes, even necessary. I can’t
imagine what the world might be like if we’d had movies like this all along,
where LGBT or black or Asian or disabled kids had always been told that they
were worthy of being the star of their own stories.
Hell,
Keiynan Lonsdale, one of the young actors who stars in “Love, Simon,” has said
in interviews that working on the film provided him with the courage to come
out. If that alone doesn’t speak to whether a movie like this fills a need, I
don’t know what does.
When I think
about how it felt to sit in a Regal theater and hear the young, mostly straight
(to my eye, at least) audience cheer and applaud when two male characters share
a kiss for the first time, I desperately want to feel that more often.
Especially as I weigh that experience against the countless times I’ve been
that same theater watching a film and, when even the slightest hint of gayness
appears, steeling myself as I wait for snickers or crude comments — and far too
often, actually hearing them.
And maybe
today’s teens don’t really need a movie like “Love, Simon.” I’d love nothing
more than for its warm-hearted inclusivity to feel old hat to them. But the
young viewers sitting in that theater seemed to appreciate at least having the
option, and I suspect there are plenty of grown-ups who will too.
This article appears in Mar 14-20, 2018.
