Walk a Mile in My Pradas

Hey! Looking for a new holiday movie? Looking for a *gay* holiday movie? I mean they're a rare treat to find.

Well if you are, then PLEASE do NOT see-for your own sake-"Walk a Mile in My Pradas."

Oh, dear what a horrible film, and on so many levels. I can forgive the low budget. So many "gay" movies have a low budget. But this movie? Well, it bordered on downright offensive.

I mean the acting-and it really can't be called acting-was terrible. But I will get back to that....

So let's skip the acting. Let's say the writer was helping his friends and wanted to make this film and they all stepped in and did the job for free, including Dee Wallace and Tom Arnold (both who are very competent actors and who sucked in this movie). Let's go on to that script.

OFFENSIVE!

Here is the plot line. A magical Christmas ornament has the power to grant wishes. There is an obnoxious homophobic straight man who makes the wish that the gay guy was straight so he wouldn't be so disgusting and the gay guy wishes the straight guy was gay so he would know what it was like to be gay. Good premise? I thought so.

But it isn't that they change their sexual attractions. It's that they suddenly become hideously stereotypically "gay" and "straight." The gay guy stops on a walk and helps a man fix his car, picks up a board and pretends to play the guitar, hates his clothes, calls his lover "queenie," orders large meat lover's pizzas with pepperoni and meatballs (as if those don't come with meat lover's pizzas-and as if such pizzas are more "manly") puts on boxing gloves and shadow boxes, and shouts at TV screens showing sports. And the straight guy stops to smell roses, gets a manicure, acts prissy, holds out his pinkie while drinking cocktails, can no longer play sports, and decides Martha Stewart is wonderful and begins cooking souffles. And both make rude comments to people they're attracted to. As if what makes these men gay or straight is being stereotypical ("I'd like to bang her like a screen door in a hurricane.").

Now back to the "acting." I see movies with acting this bad and I just can't understand how these people got jobs. Here in Kansas City where I live, I go to local plays at such places as The Unicorn and the Living Room, and I am blown away by the local talent. So, if there are actors this good in the mid-west, surely there is some downright awesome talent in Hollywood where many films are made, right? And we all know there are tons of out of work actors waiting tables (and waiting for a job) and many would be *happy* to work for equity. So HOW are these simply HORRIBLE actors getting jobs? Would I offend you, the reader, by saying that I think there was some sleeping around going on?

Both the main actors (Nathaniel Marston as Tony and Tom Archdeacon as Steve) are beyond terrible. I had to check and see if they wrote and/or directed the film in order to get their parts. And yes, Tom Archdeacon was co-writer-he was willing to admit it! Mr. Archdeacon had about as much chemistry with his boyfriend (Emrhys Cooper) as a rock does with a tennis shoe. I would say Mr. Cooper is the worst actor I've ever seen, except there's their gay best friends (Eric Casaccio and Jabari Jones) who are so bad it actually hurts. I can only assume they aren't actors at all, and just stepped in to help out a friend (Mr. Archdeacon?). Tony's girlfriend Sarah (Kirsten Lea) is pretty horrible as well. Everyone was bad.

This movie could have been so clever! And instead it instantly degraded into offensive stereotypes. Mr. Archdeacon? For shame! For shame!

Even the music was bad, especially the songs. I mean I had to mute the movie while the songs played.

At least the ending sort of shapes up. It's almost as if someone else stepped in and rewrote the ending. But it's not worth it. Don't see this film. Save your time. And save your sanity.

UPDATE!: I said I could forgive this movie's low budget...but then I checked. It was TWO MILLION dollars? Where they spent it I can NOT imagine!

So terribly offensive to the LGBTQ community. I feel victimized watching this. Dee Wallace, what were you thinking?

There are some genuinely funny parts to the movie, but the over-the- top stereotypes, clichéd situations and uneven acting make the overall result pretty poor.

We begin with the two central characters, Tony and Steve, portrayed as heavy-handed caricatures of the macho homophobe and the irritatingly in-your-face cringe-worthy gay man. Then, with the help of a magical Christmas tree ornament, the homophobe becomes gay and the gay character becomes hetero. To ensure we understand what the change has wrought, the newly transformed characters become equally cringe- worthy examples of a straight slob and an effeminate, silly gay who suddenly loves flowers, fashion and cooking.

Had they toned down the characterizations following the transformation to demonstrate that "becoming" gay or straight didn't turn someone into such unpleasant personalities, it might have been a bit more acceptable … but not by much. Some of the more seasoned actors, including Tom Arnold, Mike Starr and Dee Wallace, as well as some of the supporting cast, turned in decent performances. Even Nathianel Marston as Tony, when he refrained from over-acting, was reasonably good. Tom Archdeacon as Steve was definitely not a success and made the production seem more amateurish than it might otherwise have been.

Unfortunately the negatives overwhelmed the positives in this film. The humor was generally lame and, if there was meant to be a message in the idea of switching circumstances in order to see the world through the eyes of the other, it was lost by making the characters, both before and after the change, rather ridiculous.

I noticed that a few reviewers claimed it was a good movie for all the family to watch. It's sad to think that some people thought that the characterizations were fair & realistic and that the portrayals of both the straight and gay actors would do anything other than reinforce prejudices.

Once again we have a movie for straight people classified as "gay" because it has a gay character in it. This one even has a gay/straight theme, but if it was made by or for gay people they must be self-loathing gay people.

Who thinks it's funny to see a straight man turn gay? straight women. Who thinks it's funny to see a gay man turn straight? straight men. I guess there are also people who think magical role-reversal movies like Freaky Friday are hilarious and don't care what roles are being exchanged; and people who guffaw at extremely obvious lowbrow sitcom humor no matter what the subject is. As a gay man who outgrew adolescent squirming a long time ago, I find this kind of garbage annoying.

(I don't see how even straight people can find this relentlessly offensive and mean-spirited "humor" entertaining. The vicious treatment of a straight fat girl is especially appalling; she's completely irrelevant to the story and is stuck in only so her desperation can be savagely ridiculed.)

Being gay is wonderful. I love it. If changing sexual orientation were possible (and it's not), I wouldn't turn straight if you gave me a billion dollars, and I really mean it. Any gay man who thinks being gay is something that should make a straight man squirm and pee in his pants - who thinks switching sexual orientation is funny - either is an idiot or secretly (or not so secretly) wishes he weren't gay.

This movie is pretty well done for its inherently offensive kind, but if a single cent of gay money went into making it, the ones who invested that money should rethink their priorities.

The movie is so bad on every level, I am embarrassed just by having seen it. Acting was the worst of all. The cheapest soap opera is played better. Do not watch it.