Best. Gay. Week. Ever. (February 12, 2010)

IS THE GAY GLASS HALF FULL OR HALF EMPTY?
WARNING: I'm going to be discussing Valentine's Day and its teeny tiny gay subplot. You've been warned!

Let me start off by saying it's been a long time since I've been as conflicted about the gay content in a movie as I am about the new Garry Marshall romcom Valentine's Day.

We've been covering the flick ever since we first learned that the one of its gazillion storylines would feature a gay couple played by Bradley Cooper and Eric Dane. At first we were all excited that such a high profile movie would have such high profile actors playing the parts. But as the trailers for the film rolled out, we started to wonder why we kept seeing Cooper with Julia Roberts (to the point that it made it seem like they were a couple), but nothing about the gay storyline.

I saw the movie on Monday night and I can now tell you the reason is because A) the fact that Bradley and Dane are a couple is supposed to be a surprise "reveal" and B) there isn't enough of a Cooper/Dane storyline to fill up even part of a trailer. They have exactly one scene together that lasts for maybe ... twenty seconds. That's it.

I tried to find a picture of Cooper and Dane together at the premiere, but they didn't have much together time there either. So here is Brad with Patrick Dempsey.

We do see Dane's character, a professional quarterback, come out in a press conference as he realizes he wants to be with Cooper, and we briefly see the two men together at the very end of the movie, but all told, IMHO the Cooper/Dane storyline is one of the least developed and least interesting in Valentine's Day.

In fact, other than Dane's short coming out scene, the most interesting/progressive moment of their storyline actually belongs to a straight man. That happens when Jamie Foxx, playing a sports journalist, reports on Dane's coming out, saying how great it is he did it and that Foxx is so supportive that he'll "... be right behind you all the way. Well, not like that."

So the question is whether or not we should we be grateful that Marshall included a gay storyline at all in this big budget crowd pleaser aimed squarely at Middle America.

My initial reaction is thanks, but no thanks. This is 2010 after all, and ABC has not one, but two gay couples on hit shows (Modern Family, Brothers & Sisters), not to mention a gay couple on daytime in the soap opera One Life to Live. Additionally, SyFy finally introduced a fully realized gay character just this year on Caprica, even Fox has a gay high school student on Glee, and gay and bi folks regularly pop up on reality programs of all sorts. 

Cam and Mitch on Modern Family, Sam Adama on Caprica, Kurt on Glee

So is it really too much to ask that a Hollywood studio movie does more than include a gay couple in a very safe third act reveal that challenges audiences not a whit? Are we really supposed to see Valentine's Day as a step forward?

Again my heart says no, but looking back over the past ten years of Hollywood movies, my brain reluctantly says this is a step forward. Or at least a half-step.

Next page! Not too many others have gone there at all.