Poison
- Director: Todd Haynes
- Writer: Jean Genet; Todd Haynes
- Producer: Brian Greenbaum; James Schamus
CGiii Comment
A seminal film of the New Queer Cinema - circa early USA 90s - most of the films from this era are, quite frankly, AWFUL.
Less the angry young man more the homo-hissy-fit.
Poison (Horror, Hero, Homo) relies heavily on the safety of imitation - is it homage or heresy?
It just reeks of the stagnant stench of unoriginality - or, is that post post-modernism - bad photocopies of fine work?
AIDS equated with sex leprosy, Haynes claws at inspiration from D.W. Griffith's Intolerance, and Genet - and, too darkly, transmits it onto the screen.
Watch Genet's incredible Un Chant d'amour - that will shorten this by at least 30 welcome minutes.
On a happier note - it does look good in places, there are some fine performances and it did win a big award at Sundance.
Haynes did go on to do much bigger things - whether they are better is for the audience to decide...not the award givers.
Trailer...
The(ir) Blurb...
Three intercut stories about outsiders, sex and violence. In "Hero," Richie, at age 7, kills his father and flies away. After the event, a documentary in cheesy lurid colors asks what Richie was like and what led up to the shooting. In the black and white "Horror," a scientist isolates the elixir of human sexuality, drinks it, and becomes a festering, contagious murderer; a female colleague who loves him tries to help, to her peril. In "Homo," a prisoner in Fontenal prison is drawn to an inmate whom he knew some years before, at Baton juvenile institute, and whose humiliations he witnessed. This story is told in dim light, except for the bright flashbacks.
Cast & Characters
Edith Meeks as Felicia Beacon;
Millie White as Millie Sklar;
Buck Smith as Gregory Lazar;
Anne Giotta as Evelyn McAlpert;
Lydia Lafleur as Sylvia Manning;
Ian Nemser as Sean White;
Rob LaBelle as Jay Wete;
Evan Dunsky as Dr. MacArthur;
Marina Lutz as Hazel Lamprecht;
Barry Cassidy as Officer Rilt;
Richard Anthony as Edward Comacho;
Angela M. Schreiber as Florence Giddens;
Justin Silverstein as Jake;
Chris Singh as Chris;
Edward Allen as Fred Beacon