dyer@spdcc.UUCP (Steve Dyer) (03/11/86)
I liked it. This was a fine example of a well-made TV movie. It had a rather formulaic plot, and the requisite boy-girl love interest at its center, but within that genre, it was very well executed. Dress Gray was hardly a "gay story"; rather it was about the myth of machismo in the armed forces and its simultaneous attraction to and fear of things homosexual, and the havoc such dissonance wreaks. I thought Gore Vidal's screenplay was wonderfully subtle, and worked well within the confines of network genteelness. Anyone else care to comment? -- Steve Dyer dyer@harvard.HARVARD.EDU {bbncca,bbnccv,harvard}!spdcc!dyer
rrizzo@bbncca.ARPA (Ron Rizzo) (03/11/86)
I'd actually read part of Lucian Truscott's pulpy novel during a lull in my life; I remember the book as somewhat cruder & more sordid than the TV miniseries; on TV, the protagonist seemed very PC, and the dia- logue was better: when I saw that Vidal had written the teleplay, the difference was explained & I decided to watch the whole series. The choice of Vidal was fortunate, as it rescued Dress Gray from the mere trashiness of the book. Casting a Richard Gere clone as the main character was amusing, I thought. Ron Rizzo
dyer@spdcc.UUCP (Steve Dyer) (03/11/86)
Yes, I was struck by the resemblance to Gere, too. An interesting sidenote is that both my lover and I were MUCH more impressed with the female lead! -- Steve Dyer dyer@harvard.HARVARD.EDU {bbncca,bbnccv,harvard}!spdcc!dyer
sandel@milano.UUCP (03/11/86)
I liked it, too. I found the script intelligible (although rushed at the end to tie up all the loose) and the production generally good (except that they hardly tried at all to create a late-60's atmosphere - check for the brand new 1986 Cadillac in one scene!). Most interesting, I thought, was a thread throughout that subtly questioned the traditional military stance on homosexuality by highlighting some cadet's feelings about being with other men. For example, the closing scene has Elizabeth and Ry discussing men's involvement in war. Ry says at one point: "You don't know how it is when men get together." Talk about blunt! I was also pleasantly surprised at the degree of open discussion about "the act" that took place. Perhaps it will help to desensitize people who are squeamish about such things. By the way, I have a friend who worked as a location scout for the show. He tells me that West Point (of course!) absolutely refused to let them film there. It was filmed mostly in New Mexico, with interiors in LA. I'd be interested in the comments of anyone who also read the book as to how the transition from book to TV movie fared. -- Charles Sandel arpa: sandel@mcc.arpa uucp: *!ut-sally!im4u!milano!sandel (or *!ut-sally!charles) An endangered species: native Austinite
dyer@spdcc.UUCP (Steve Dyer) (03/12/86)
In article <1144@milano.UUCP>, sandel@milano.UUCP writes: > Most interesting, I thought, was a thread throughout that > subtly questioned the traditional military stance on homosexuality > by highlighting some cadet's feelings about being with other men. > For example, the closing scene has Elizabeth and Ry discussing > men's involvement in war. Ry says at one point: > "You don't know how it is when men get together." > > Talk about blunt! I really didn't take this as a reference to explictly homosexual feelings or attitudes, so much as an indication of the attraction of traditionally Male sentiments such as Honor, Duty, Fraternity, and all that. I think Vidal was being deliberately allusive and ironic by giving Ry a line with such ambiguous overtones. But the parallelism he draws contrasts the "acceptable" eroticism of military life, and the proscribed eroticism which led, ultimately, to the cadet's death and the superintendent's resignation. -- Steve Dyer dyer@harvard.HARVARD.EDU {bbncca,bbnccv,harvard}!spdcc!dyer