Polyamorous Pictures (Pride pt. XV)

Splendor

Henry & June

Greetings my gays, theys, (and to a much lesser extent, my fellow, insufferable allies), I hope Pride month has been treating you well! As I make my way through the large canon of queer cinema, I try my best to include as many perspectives and voices and existences as possible, to reflect how diverse and nuanced queer films are. One subset of the LGBTQ+ community that is rarely given fair or understanding depictions in media or society are those who identify as polyamorous: the practice of having multiple, intimate, consenting relationships at once. Polyamory is a long-established and complex mode of romantic partnership, where the couplings and groupings can look like just about anything. I’m far from an expert on this topic, and I know that polyamory is not exclusively queer, and may not be considered queer at all by some, but it is—at its essence—a deviation from the heteronormative forms of romantic and sexual experiences, so it is certainly at least adjacent to queerness. It is possible to practice polyamory while still identifying as heterosexual, but it is rare. As one Reddit user remarks: “It's like monkeys and chimps, not the same thing but close enough.” While polycules can be large and ever-expanding, the almighty throuple seems to be the most commonly-known and practiced form—at least according to the movies. Since Luca Guadagnino’s latest film Challengers introduced us to a powerful and compelling love triangle, I find myself spotting throuples in just about every piece of media. On this blog alone there have been a myriad of love triangles and near-throuples represented like in The Handmaiden, Live Flesh, Nekromantik, Making Love, Burning, The Apartment, Y Tu Mamá También, Wild Things, The Red Shoes, Yentl, Hannah Takes the Stairs, A Dangerous Method, Paint Your Wagon, and Crash—though that might just be considered an orgy or swinging. One is the loneliest number, two can be as bad as one, but three is more than just a crowd, it can be a sexy disaster—at least, according to tonight’s two films. I began by giving director Gregg Araki another shot, because even though Smiley Face wasn’t my cup of weed-infused tea, this filmmaker is a trailblazer of queer, transgressive, propulsive cinema worth celebrating. There are many Araki films I still need to see, but I’m very happy that I chose his 1999 romcom Splendor to watch next, because I (somewhat surprisingly) really enjoyed it. Splendor begins as many trippy, free-wheeling films of the 90s/00s do, with an absurd aesthetic, premise, and characters, followed by a voiceover narration that says something to the affect of, “You’re probably wondering how I got here.” In Splendor’s case, we open on young actress named Veronica and her two boyfriends lounging in bed, all cast in a bright, angelic glow, when Veronica’s voice interrupts with, “No, this is not a dream sequence.” We rewind to a boisterous rave of a Halloween party, where good girl Veronica (Kathleen Robertson) vows to ditch her hometown humbleness and hesitancy for a sense of adventure, encouraged by her lesbian bestie, a girl named Mike (Kelly Macdonald [who did the voice of Princess Merida in Brave, randomly enough.]) Mike has her eyes on a girl in the band, and Veronica has her eyes on no one in particular, that is, until she spots Abel (Johnathan Scheach), who spots her right back. Though he is dressed in a ridiculous knight in shining armor costume that comes with an oddly-Joan of Arc-ish wig, Veronica can tell how hot, sweet, and sensitive he is as they begin to dance together. But amidst Abel and Veronica’s moment of connection, Veronica also spots Zed (Matt Keeslar [who, along with Kathleen Robertson, star in Psycho Beach Party.]), the drummer in the band that’s performing. Even though Mike is acting like a bit of a cockblock, Veronica gives Abel her number just as he’s about to leave. Back at the party, Mike is discouraged to realize that the lead singer of this band is not actually a lesbian, but Veronica is delighted to realize that Zed is just as sexy up close as he looked on stage. Veronica and Zed approach each other, and before they know it, they’re making out on the bathroom floor of this club. Veronica is astonished at her own wild behavior when she wakes up next to Zed the next morning, stating in a fairly timeless way, “I’d been wanting to break free, but I was thinking in terms of not paying off my student loans.” Zed awakes and the two have more insane sex, as Abel calls and leaves a very sweet and cute voicemail for Veronica. Veronica is completely caught up in her lust for Zed, but feels bad for Abel, so she goes out with him anyway. Abel and Veronica end up having a lot in common, and he scratches an entirely different kind of itch of a male fantasy for Veronica. This leaves Veronica utterly confused and panicked—how could she possibly choose between a rock n roll sex god and a tender, thoughtful writer? She tries her best to date the two men separately for awhile, but becomes so overwhelmed that she eventually decides to finally tell Zed and Abel about one another. It doesn’t go well. Though both men like Veronica enough to keep dating her respectively, they both talk incessant shit about the other man, without knowing each other. That is, until the fateful day comes that this love triangle finally meets, totally by accident, in a mushroom-fueled delirium that results in Veronica having visions that Abel and Zed are fighting in a Raging Bull-esque black and white boxing sequence. These men hate each other, but Veronica is determined to make this work somehow. So she invites them both to dinner at her place, they drink copious amounts of alcohol, and one game of truth or dare later, this unintentional throuple begins to take the shape of something very intentional. I shan’t give away all of the freaky and fabulous details of this complicated love story, but Splendor manages to craft a perfectly sexy, unexpectedly adorable, totally outrageous, and yet ultimately viable three-way relationship where every partner gets what they desire. Veronica’s friend Mike asks her, “Does it bother you at all that your life is turning into an episode of Three’s Company?” to which Veronica says, “I always thought that show was pretty progressive.” Plenty of polyamorous hijinks ensue, all varying in levels of believability and absurdity, but it was all very sexy and very funny. Gregg Araki didn’t need to do much to get me interested in this film other than casting two hot dudes to play Veronica’s boyfriends, but his writing is just so unique and hilarious, it becomes addicting. Araki’s writing style is infused with equal amounts of cynicism and whimsy, it’s flamboyant and frantic but also entirely self-contained and inspiring, made all the more memorable by his delectably-funky neon aesthetic. While its premise is one of the most ludicrous hetero-flexible female fantasies I’ve ever seen, Splendor also has a fair amount of insight into and commentary on the brutal binary world we live in. This throuple faces a lot of judgment from outsiders, which felt believable, but less painful through Araki’s ostentatious and optimistic lens. Splendor is often cited as Araki fans’ least favorite of his works, but I really appreciated it—for its heart, its humor, and its messy but meaningful displays of desire, love, and the complexities of navigating one’s 20s. It all culminates into a wild, weird, but thoroughly enjoyable romantic comedy that features a mostly-untold side of dating, that ends with a needle drop of New Order’s “Bizarre Love Triangle”—just as it should’ve. Moving on to tonight’s next bizarre love triangle, I wanted to explore a real-life throuple that really existed, just as the one depicted in Cronenberg’s A Dangerous Method—I just didn’t know how connected these two stories would actually be. Philip Kaufman’s (who also directed the 1978 Invasion of the Body Snatchers) 1990 film Henry & June is based off of erotic novelist Anaïs Nin’s posthumously-published book of the same name, which depicts Nin’s unique relationship with author Henry Miller and his wife, June. Henry & June was the first NC-17 film to be released in the United States (though many X-rated movies came before it and were later given the rating of NC-17) and this story could only be told with the same unabashed horniness by which Nin wrote all of her works. I could write an entire blog post about Anaïs Nin and her legendarily candid literature, that really birthed the entire genre of erotica. I could also write an entire blog post about Anaïs Nin’s trilingual writing style, her brief acting career, and her iconic (known) affairs with men throughout her life, which included (but I’m sure was not limited to) John Steinbeck, Antonin Artaud, Edmund Wilson, Gore Vidal, James Agee, James Leo Herlihy, Lawrence Durrell, Rupert Pole, and psychoanalyst Otto Rank (played by Vincent Cassel in A Dangerous Method.) But tonight I’ll be focusing solely on Anaïs Nin’s transformative affair with author Henry Miller and his wife, June, which greatly inspired Anaïs’ eventually-published diaries and Miller’s most famous work: Tropic of Cancer. The film transports us to 1931 Paris, a time and place in which many of artists, performers, and sexual deviants called home. Nin (played by Maria de Medeiros) and her husband Hugo (Richard E. Grant, in a rare, heterosexual role) live in a quaint country home in Paris, where Hugo works as a banker and Nin journals profusely. While the couple seems to love each other and support each other’s endeavors, it is clear that Hugo is far too uptight and milquetoast for Anaïs. She is a polyglot, a flamenco dancer, someone who can write about sex and sensuality in a deeply poetic way, though the world does not know it yet. Anaïs is also clearly a magnetic personality who embodies just enough mystique to garner the attraction of several men in Paris, even her own cousin, Eduardo. One day, Hugo introduces Anaïs to his visiting friend, Henry Miller (Fred Ward), who we are introduced to as he sparks a match against his shoe to light a cigarette. He immediately exudes a ruggedly-masculine form of erotic energy, and while a bit brash (and balding), he is still the most attractive man in Anaïs’ life (especially because Kev*n Sp*cey is in this film, and the role of Henry was originally supposed to be played by Alec Baldwin…) Henry speaks a bit like Columbo, and has the abrasive charm of a friendly New Yorker, eager to get his career started. Someone mentions that Henry “writes about fucking”, which prompts Henry to say how the French have already written enough about sex, but they take it too seriously, they make it gospel. To Henry, sex is more natural, “like birth or death” and Anaïs is completely fascinated and captivated by him. Her fascination only grows when she is introduced to his wife, June Miller (Uma Thurman), a wannabe film star who enters every room with intimidating ease, and was described by both Henry and Anaïs as a “femme fatale”, which Uma Thurman plays well. June is the one who convinced Henry to quit his job and write full time, though his friends doubt his ruthlessly crude writing will ever get published. Hugo, Anaïs, Henry, and June, are all a swell foursome who regularly engage in double dates, though Hugo is a bit uncomfortable to see how openly-affectionate Henry and June are with each other in public. Anaïs, on the other hand, is beyond captivated and curious, unsure of whom she is more attracted to. After Henry and June get into a fight about Henry’s writing, June makes plans to leave Paris early and go to an audition back in New York, pleading with Anaïs that she look after Henry. Thus begins a tumultuous, tension-filled, but passionate love affair between Anaïs and Henry, where the two learn from one another—about sex, about writing, about reaching the human spirit and articulating intangible ideas. Set against the backdrop of Europe on the brink of war and creative explosion, Henry & June carefully catalogues a tangled web of emotion and desire, and how effective and inspiring a good fantasy can be. Anaïs and Henry both talk about each other as much as they talk about June, even when she is not there, her presence can be felt in both of their writing. The film is not just about the intimacy and intensity of love-making, it is also about the intimacy and intensity of sharing your writing and innermost thoughts with someone else. Before Henry, Anaïs never let anyone read what she’d written, and if these two had never met, there’s a chance that neither of their writing would’ve ever been published. Henry & June documents some of the most perplexing dynamics between lovers, colleagues, and friends ever presented on screen, and expertly reveals how sensitive and combustive writers can be when faced with a bit of constructive criticism (feelings I found too relatable…) This film is as clever and dreamy as the subjects that it is depicting, I only wish that we knew more about this throuple beyond what was written by Anaïs and Henry. Even still, June’s perspective and complex emotions are not left out. Similar to A Dangerous Method’s trio of scientific lovers, these literary lovers could’ve had a much more open dialogue throughout their experience, but it makes sense that things became rather messy and complicated between these three, especially when June returns to Paris. Also similarly to A Dangerous Method, I felt that while Henry & June is all about sex, it could’ve been far sexier. Something is invariably lost when translating the written word to the silver screen, and while Henry & June didn’t turn me on, it did intrigue the hell out of me—enough to make me spend all week intensely researching this throuple. There’s so much more I could say about these three and their riveting, chaotic lives (including the fact that Anaïs was an accidental bigamist, getting married to Rupert Pole and never annulling her previous marriage to Hugo until both men tried to claim her as dependents on their taxes and she was forced to) but I encourage you to look into these horny pioneers yourself. Hugo requested he be left out of Anaïs’ published writing, and this chapter of their lives wasn’t released until after Hugo died, so we’ll never know exactly what their relationship was like. But from what I can glean, he was happy for his wife to be happy, and for her to sew her wild oats and gain inspiration—by any means or man necessary (which is goals.) Despite being described as a “loose adaptation” of Nin’s book, this film seemed to accurately capture every detail and ambiguity of this chapter that Anaïs wrote. Much like the real figures this was based on, Henry & June was a bizarre but enchanting film, one that I won’t forget anytime soon. I love an intellectual awakening that is brought upon by a sexual awakening, and both of tonight’s films somewhat satisfied that desire. Thank you for reading along this week, dear readers! And to my poly friends, I hope these wild films and my attempt at explaining them did this lifestyle justice, or, at least captured the lovely articulation of Henry Miller when he began writing Tropic of Cancer:

“I start tomorrow on the Paris book: First person, uncensored, formless – fuck everything!”

Until next week, I bid you adieu!