It's hard to imagine a gay themed film where the main characters aren't drag queens, don't have AIDS, aren't bitchy, catty, flamboyant, tragic or shallow. As it turns out, gay people, like non-gay people, can be all those things (and aren't we all tired of it) and so much more. In fact, the most distinguishing characteristic of gay people is that, for the most part, they are virtually indistinguishable from non-gay people. Isn't it about time a movie just allowed its central gay characters to be a couple of cute young guys whose casual meeting teeters over the course of a hilariously frustrating evening on the verge of becoming more than a one night stand?
Gabriel, played by Christian Campbell, Neve Campbell's older brother, is a shy, aspiring composer with dimples to die for. Mark, J. P. Pitoc, is an outgoing journalism student who earns money as a go-go boy and has the body to prove it. Pitoc and Campbell, who appear together again in the "Thank You, Good Night", gel beautifully as the put-upon would-be lovers. In a world where meeting and having sex can be a rather common and often all too impersonal event, they meet, and like most people their age, they want to have sex. But the story that gently unfolds is not at all common. It's tender, funny, and much more romantic than it sounds.
Tori Spelling, it hurts me to even write this, is terrific as Gabriel's oh-so theatrical friend. She maintains a drama in her life that can be endearing, but is often times more annoying, the latter which Ms. Spelling portrays with great comic success.
The rest of the cast is fairly unremarkable, with two notable exceptions. Steve Hayes is brilliant as a friend from Gabriel's theatre class whose hilarious "Como te gusta mi pinga" is the funniest cabaret number since Priscilla. Clinton Leupp as drag queen Coco Peru, delivers a delightful bathroom soliloquy that will have you in stitches. Even more amusing is the fact that Miss Coco looks distractingly like Ms. Spelling's character, right down to the overabundance of drama.
Trick is an uplifting and life-affirming look at being young and gay and almost in love. Surely you were at least one of these things once.
