Longhorns

So it's not an epic or a piece of art or even fandabbydozy.

But it's good. And if you are gay, this is for you.

Every main character is fully naked. There is a story. Cant rate it higher as it's very much made for people like us and nobody else. If the site was just for gay movies, then 10 out of 10. But it's not and cant give higher than a 6 for that reason. But 6 is still good. And man alive, if you are gay, like me, you will enjoy this. Maybe too much.

It gives, in nice manner, the atmosphere of "80 -s. It has not bad humor, decent performances and easy story. And, more important, it gives the flavor of college life , without high ambitions but in reasonable manner. And, sure, it is a low budget film who has not as purpose to impress but to offer a not so bad fun.

Considering the kind of movie this is, it is actually not that bad. Nothing great or meaningful here, but nothing overly cheezy either. The gratuitous nudity was a nice touch.

Overall, a fun and enjoyable escape from reality.

This could have been a really good movie, but it wore out its one-joke theme - straight guys who love nothing better than masturbating together while watching porn - about the third time it played out. That may be a powerful and persistent fantasy and an infallible source of amusement for lots of gay men, but it's not for me, and watching it in a movie gets old very fast. It wasn't even remotely believable the first time it happened, and it got less believable every time.

The second recurring theme has one man stripping completely naked and standing still for another, fully clothed man to ogle. Each of the five main characters did it once each, with another of the five (two, in one instance) as the clothed ogler. Was that supposed to be funny too, or was it just an extremely clumsy way to get as much full frontal (but as sterile as a nun) nudity as possible into the movie? So the movie is almost unbearably contrived, stupid and unfunny. It has two redeeming strengths, though.

Three of the main cast members are genuine Southerners who talk with real Southern accents, not the Hollywood fake-Southern accents non-Southern actors always affect (even Meryl Streep can't get it right) in movies. Non-Southerners must not be able to tell the difference, but I can, and as a long-time transplant to the North, hearing people who talk like me on screen warms my heart and points out how very, very rarely it happens. Even Southern actors almost never use their native accents in movies, which is sad.

The movie's other strength is the cast, particularly Derek Villanueva and Dylan Vox, who shine (Jacob Newton, though sort of cute, is a little weak as the lead). I wish someone would remake Longhorns with the same cast but as a serious movie, not a very lame, very unfunny comedy.

Before the end of Longhorns all four of the macho frat guys from the University of Texas get down and naked and show their gay side. The only one comfortable in his sexuality is the Latino student Derek Efrain Villanueva who is out and heads the campus gay organization. But he's also the happiest of the lot.

Longhorns begins with a sex scene as Jacob Newton is getting ridden hard by some coed and we see he's fantasizing about being a mechanical bull being ridden by some fellow Longhorn. Doing some tutoring is Villanueva and I have to say he is one seductive young man. Believe me seeing Newton and Villanueva took me back a few decades and I know exactly how Newton felt fulfilling what he really wanted.

It doesn't happen all at once though and Newton is still trying to keep up his good old boy image. Turns out that his friends Dylan Vox and Stephen Matzke are also doing a little sexual exploring when some promised females don't arrive.

And big man on campus Kevin Held might be homophobic, but he does need a passing grade in English.

Longhorns is a gay youthful romp through the Reagan years in that bluest of states Texas. You could probably make the same film now and date it as contemporary, attitudes have changed a bit, but it's slow.

And this review is dedicated to the late Donald 'Butch' Buchecker of Consohocken, Pennsylvania who made it right for me.