CRUISING FOR A BRUISING
A review of William Friedkin’s Cruising in the form of three attempted synopses.
Bruno Kirby fisting and Al Pacino dancing.
1. Cruising is an overwrought and poorly plotted murder mystery that takes place in the seedy gay underbelly of 1970′s New York, and you can bet that belly is furry! Al Pacino plays rookie cop Steve Burns, a young detective who goes undercover in the underground leather bar scene to catch a serial killer preying on gay men. Burns becomes familiar with the rules of the subculture; “cruising” the gay scene while his superiors do all the real police work. As he gets deeper into the lifestyle and closer to the killer, his regular life and relationship with his girlfriend slowly become unhinged. Yup, you guessed it. He catches a bad case of “the gay”.
New forms of police interrogation.
2. William Friedkin’s Cruising is a confusing allegory set in the S&M dungeons of New York City’s West Village. Al Pacino stars as a young rookie cop, and maybe half the gay men in New York, who really knows? He’s on the fence about his sexuality and trying to get ahead in life, so he accepts an assignment to go undercover in an attempt to catch the dreaded “Homo killer.”(This was back in the day when you could actually use the term “homo killer” on the cover of a national newspaper.) Cruising is set in a world of interchangeable leather boys where all gay men are Al Pacino and Al Pacino is all gay men. All gay men work in Steakhouses or brandish steak knives, transferring their need to kill via a messy exchange of hot seed and cold steel. The closer Burns comes to catching the killer, the closer he comes to becoming the killer.
Exactly my reaction.
3. Cruising, directed by William Friedkin, is a perpetuation of the stereotype that all gay men are mustachioed bikers and an offensive allegory for AIDS. Al Pacino plays Steve Burns (it burns, get it?), a rookie cop looking to rise through the ranks of the police department faster than Edmund Exley in short pants. He goes gay for pay as an undercover officer in an attempt to solve a cross section of unrelated murders in the underground leather scene. Friedkin uses the cyclical structure of passing on the need to kill through sex as a metaphor for the spread of AIDS in the gay community. He even goes as far as using the same actor in multiple roles, to further the idea of the facelessness of the gay man, implying any one of them could be a killer (IE: have AIDS.) And what does any of this have to do with the dismembered body parts found floating in the river? Absolutely nothing.
Powers Booth!
I just watched the movie and I saw no relation to the gay culture and AIDS. The killed had a knife, why would that reference AIDS? I can see the negotiation of the poor portrayal of homosexuality, however my real question is Pachino the killer in the movie? I called it from the first scene when he was first introduced in his cop uniform and then there were many scenes that could support this theory. There is a representation of the killer after the scene where the guy was murdered in the woods and the killer went back to his apartment-or at least they made you think it was-wearing the sunglasses, having a minor freak out session and then leaving his apartment. Later in the movie, the show the shadowed face in the apartment and leaving with Pachino on the other side of the door. And then he puts the glasses on again in the police station and of course the finale where he looks deep in the mirror while shaving while his girlfriend tries on the ‘killer’ uniform. One can say that it was just a poor portrayal of him being influenced by the gay culture that surrounded him, but I think it was him, and I wonder if anyone else has an opinion on it.
At least one of my synopses agree with you.
This has nothing to do with AIDS…this movie was released in 1980, most people had never heard about AIDS that far back. Certainly not enough to be woven into a plot in the way you describe.
Yes finally someone who agrees with me. Like you I believe Al pacino was the killer which is why it was such an awesome film. The few people I know who have seen the film don’t agree with me. In my opinion the films ending was comfirmation that steve burns was was the killer.
If you go back and look at one of the scenes of the actual killer, it is clearly not Al. I thought the real killer looked like Al’s neighbor’s boyfriend. Who by the way brandished a knife at Al. Then Al’s neighbor turns up dead at the end after the supposed killer was in custody. Al really liked and identified with his neighbor, why would he kill him? I think the scene at the end of the movie with Allen trying on Al’s leather garb, was just indicative of the explaining Al was going to have to do with his girlfriend.
It does give you that feeling that Al was the killer, but i don’t think that is the case.
The killer is the tall thin leather fag. In the end the question is whether or not Pacino himself has become a homo killer OR if he has become a killer who is a homo that likes killing other homos. You made me do that!