The Year in Gay Movies

On the Sixth Day of Christmas my true love gave to me...

Six Comedies a-Camping (Zack & Miri, Baby Mama, Tropic Thunder, Fool's Gold, Over Her Dead Body, Meet the Spartans)

Of course gay characters don't only show up in gay movies, for better or for worse. And this year was no exception, with gay characters and themes being used for (mostly) harmless comedic effect in mainstream fare, occasionally even contributing to a bump for gay visibility.

In Kevin Smith's raunchy-but-lovable Zack & Miri Make a Porno, Justin Long (the Mac guy) and Brandon Routh (Superman Returns) played a bickering but loving gay couple who were friends to the lead characters (Long's character actually inspires the porno of the title). Smith's gay track record is solid (it's not just any straight guy from Jersey who would appear on the cover of Bear's Life magazine and brag about it on talk shows) and his handling of the gay characters was, too.

In Baby Mama, a gay couple popped up in Tina Fey's surrogate support group and did little but whine about some supposedly typically gay things such as worrying that their baby would be too fat (um ... okay). And the Kate Hudson/Matthew McConaughey comedy Fool's Gold added a gay couple to the supporting cast ... who didn't have much to do other than be sassy and cook the other characters dinner.

300 parody Meet the Spartans actually managed to be less homophobic and gay-panicky than the movie it was mimicking, but the underlying "isn't a bunch of guys in skimpy armor just GAAAY?" sentiment was still there. And in this list's most bizarre entry, ghost comedy Over Her Dead Body had Jason Biggs playing a gay character who turns out to just be faking it in order to get closer to the leading lady. Um, we left that kind of twist back in the Rock Hudson/Doris Day era for a reason, folks...

The best entry in this section is definitely the Hollywood satire Tropic Thunder, which dared to have a gay character (albeit a closeted one, for the first half of the movie) who was heroic, assertive, masculine, and of color. I know, fan yourself over that one. The character in question is even shown at the end of the film in the audience at the Academy Awards with Lance Bass as a date, so he even gets his own happy ending.

Funny, AND respectful? Yeah, this is definitely a satire.

On the Fifth Day of Christmas my true love gave to me...

Five ... Gooooo-old ... Rings (ba-dum bum bum) (Noah's Arc, Sex and the City, Mamma Mia!, Kiss the Bride, Tru Loved)

Gay marriage was clearly a hot-button issue this year, and the zeitgeist didn't let it go unnoticed, placing gay folk and weddings on a collision course in five movies. Three were actually about straight weddings but involved gay supporting characters, and two were about gay folks getting hitched (one legally) or committed. Call it "Four Weddings and a Lesbian Commitment Ceremony".

First and foremost was Noah's Arc: Jumping the Broom, which caught up with the characters from the popular television show on the occasion of Noah and Wade's wedding. The film's focus on gay relationships (committed or otherwise) and on gay men of color was groundbreaking, and was a charming diversion even for those not familiar with the show.

Another gay union capped off the scrappy family indie Tru Loved, which centered on a straight girl with two moms and a closeted boyfriend. The well-intentioned flick culminated at the ladies' commitment ceremony, where the closeted character finally comes out and everyone has a gay old time. Even the straight guys!