The Year in Movies

If movies really are a popcorn-littered reflection of our times, then 2011 was THE year for bisexual hackers, Muppets, superheroes (just Marvel, though - sorry, D.C.!), sex addicts, houskeepers of color in the 1960's, closeted G-Men, swashbuckling Spanish cats, and whatever the hell Tree of Life was about.

We'd like to take this opportunity to discuss the year in movies, including major trends, high- and lowlights, and LGBT representation. I'll also include my personal top ten films of the year and invite you to do the same. And be sure to check back later this week for our look down the red carpet with a gay awards season expert who actually knows what he's talking about - unlike me, who has lost every Oscar pool since my conception in 1974, when I voted for The Towering Inferno for Best Picture. Even in the womb, I knew good camp when I saw it!

So settle in, buckle up and grab your motion-sickness bag - because half of this is in really bad 3D.

Jean Dujardin in The Artist

Trend of the Year: Nostalgia

If I had to pin the tail on the biggest trend of the year, I'd have to go with good old-fashioned nostalgia. Lots of movies - some of them good! - banked on the audience's apparent collective desire to either recapture a more innocent time or to simply leave the 21st century in the rearview.

I'm not just talking about period pictures. Sure, movies like Jane Eyre, Cowboys & Aliens, Albert Nobbs, War Horse, W.E. and A Dangerous Method satisfied our persistent appetite for movies set in eras when people wore very large hats. But this year delivered a bumper crop of movies evocative of a decidedly more recent past. First, we have the movies aimed at taking Gen Xers back to their youths - The Muppets, Transformers: Dark of the Moon, and The Smurfs mined eighties crazes for big box office, while Take Me Home Tonight, Super 8, The Iron Lady and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy actually took place IN the 1970s and 80s.

Michelle Williams and Eddie Redmayne in My Week With Marilyn

Even modern-day films like Drive and Ides of March were widely hailed as being evocative of classic American movies of the seventies. Remakes of Don't Be Afraid of the Dark, Fright Night, Footloose, The Thing, Arthur and Straw Dogs were clearly aimed at the same demo. And according to some sources, this year marked the record for the number of sequels released in the United States: 28 (I would double-check but I really don't like to cry in the middle of articles). Scream 4 may have been the most obvious attempt to bank on a bygone franchise, but let's face it - the earliest films in series like Harry Potter, Twilight, The Fast and the Furious, X-Men, Spy Kids and Final Destination (all of whom had new entries this year) seem like they were decades ago as well.

And finally, a genuine longing for a time of simpler movies and purer cinematic intentions carried through some of the most celebrated films of the year, including Midnight in Paris, My Week with Marilyn, The Artist, Super 8, and Hugo. All that was missing from 2001 was big, glossy Norman Rockwell biopic and a sequel to Chaplin.

Interestingly, one of the biggest breakout hits of the year - The Help - operated on reverse nostalgia, effectively reminding us that just 50 years go, this country was still an extremely messed-up place when it comes to social equality.

Christopher Plummer and Ewan McGregor in Beginners

The Year in Queer Film

While it may not have boasted a gay-themed movie worthy of Brokeback Mountain or Milk-level buzz, this was nonetheless a year that offered a decent number and variety of gay characters and stories.

Most notable is Beginners, a touching and wonderfully humane portrait of a man coming to terms with his own father's coming out (at age 75) while he navigates a new relationship with a beautiful young woman. Based largely on writer/director Mike Mills' relationship with his own father, the film put a face to a large but largely unrecognized population of gay men: those who come out late in life, often after having led straight lives and having had families. Actors Ewan McGregor and Christopher Plummer (in a highly-praised supporting performance) brough incredible depth and sensitivity to their roles.

The counterpoint to Beginners might well be J. Edgar, Clint Eastwood's earnest but unfortunately flawed biopic of the notorious poster-boy for the FBI. The film (with a screenplay by Milk scribe Dustin Lance Black) did not shy away from Edgar's relationship with longtime companion Clyde Tolson - and in fact this relationship (portrayed with admirable sincerity by Leonardo Di Caprio and Armie Hammer) was the film's emotional core. The complications of being a gay "intelligence man" also factored into the 2011 adaptation of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, which featured among its ensemble several gay characters who chose to live their lives in secret or forego romantic relationships in the name of their careers.

Tom Cullen and Chris New in Weekend

2011 also brought us Weekend, an excellent independent film from the UK about a gay one-night stand that won considerable acclaim for its naturalistic approach and complex characters (not to mention some pretty explicit sex scenes). You can learn more about it later on in my Top Ten. Another gay-themed indie, Dirty Girl, paralleled a young gay man's coming-of-age with his classmate's search for her birth father, while Gregg Araki's patented ambisexual nihilism was diverting enough in Kaboom. While Albert Nobbs focused on a female cross-dresser and a lesbian relationship, it offered unconventional couples of all types, including Jonathan Rhys Meyers and John Light as a gay couple in a mutually beneficial arrangement with a few good-time gals.