Product: Jeffrey [VHS] (1995)
Rating: 5.0
Captain Picard Decorates
A friend recommended this film. "It's very funny," he said. He neglected to mention it's a film about a gay waiter learning about commitment and life in the age of Aids. It stars Steven Weber and Patrick Stewart. Well, I would watch Stewart read the phone book, and I've always liked Weber ever since "Wings".This film is hilarious, poignant, and triumphant all at the same time. Stewart, as a waspish interior decorator with snappy observations, is perfection. Weber holds his own as Jeffrey, a more-or-less straight-acting young gay man looking for love on what had become the sexual minefield of the '90's. He vows abstinence, but then he meets Michael T. Weiss, a masculine bartender for catered events, who has Aids. How their relationship, and how the subplot of Stewart and his lover, who has Aids, play out, caroms from wry to heart-tugging to very witty to sad to uplift. All the performances are first class, and there are also many cameos that add to the humor.Profound observations might be made about living and surviving in what some have called "the gay holocaust", but I think this film uses the device of high contrast to great effectiveness. Tell a somewhat frothy story set in what we know to be a milieu of tragedy. We feel the pain of what Aids has done to so many: gays and straights indiscriminately, but we are left with an ultimately positive and fulfilling experience.Anyone can enjoy this film, gay, straight or somewhere between. It's a very human story told with great trenchant humor and leaves you feeling good. What more can you ask from a film?