Review of But I'm a Cheerleader (2000) by Abigail O — 12 May 2009

This was a strange film. I thought it might be the kind of film to lambast and harpoon the kind of earnest American Christians who would try and force their children to stop being gay. All the hot button issues in one easy concept - you've got homosexuality, religion, sexual morality, and impressionable teenagers, it's the perfect storm of controversy.

But actually it didn't seem to be about Christianity that much. The ideas in this film were a bit like something a space alien might have come up with after watching a few earthling adverts or something.

So, if you're gay you have to be camp and limp wristed or if you're a lesbian you have butch hair and look mannish. And in order to be "cured" the girls have to do some hoovering and think about men? It was so far removed from the subtle nuances of reality that it seemed to be harpooning every single facet of humanity - masculinity, femininity, homosexuals, prim control freak camp leaders, *nobody* got to appear like three dimensional human beings.

And the things that happened in this film were also so far removed from reality as to render the characters cartoonish and irrelevant, it's impossible to care about people who are nothing more than cliches.

The dumb jock boyfriend, the hideously angry-faced Clea DuVall (why is she in Hollywood films, she has a face for radio! She has a face only a mother could love - on payday! Sorry! But she does!!) playing a teen princess whose inheritance is in jeopardy if her parents aren't convinced she is cured and straight.

The main character, the cheerleader who thinks about breasts (so must be gay!) is rejected by her parents and instantly goes to move in with two out gay men. Huh? Does this happen in anyone's reality??? I don't think so.

Perhaps it was trying to be a camp parody, but it was so unrealistic. Space aliens ought not to rush in where angels fear to tread. Human beings and human sexuality is a lot more "shades of grey" than this bizarre parade of cliches.