The Out Take: A Passionate Defense of Jamie Babbit and Lesbian B-Movies

The Out Take is a bi-weekly column about queer representations in film. It runs on alternating Thursdays.

Jamie Babbit is a good filmmaker. This has always been established fact for me, since the first time I watched “But I’m a Cheerleader.” Yet apparently the critical establishment has a whole different set of opinions. Babbit’s Rotten Tomatoes page is splattered with green vegetables, an average of 31% for the three films she has directed. Her best, “Itty Bitty Titty Committee,” sits with a decidedly rotten 38%. I’d hope for better results for her newest, “Breaking the Girls” (opening July 26th), but I am not optimistic. The critics are just so consistently wrong about Babbit’s work, and it drives me crazy. And so, this week’s column is a passionate defense of her filmography, and a bit of a love letter to the Lesbian B Movie.

It isn’t worth spending a lot of time on the criticisms of her, so I’ll summarize. They boil down to three words: uninspired, adolescent, and lurid. There’s an attitude among critics that comes and goes regarding what LGBT films should be. Often that means serious dramas, usually with an emphasis on “positive representation.” Owen Gleiberman’s response to “But I’m a Cheerleader,” for example, is telling: “Any self-respecting lesbian should rear up in horror at [this movie].”

Now, Gleiberman is not a lesbian. In all fairness, neither am I. The two of us should probably stay out of deciding what self-respecting lesbians should enjoy. What I will say, however, is that self-respect is not something inherently at odds with Babbit’s movies. They are, to an extent, adolescent. The obvious response to this criticism is that they are all about teenagers, but there’s more to it than that. “But I’m a Cheerleader,” still the most famous of the four films, is a romp centered around a high school cheerleader (Natasha Lyonne) whose parents send her to an ex-gay rehabilitation center for teenagers. It is, like Babbit’s other work, made for this younger audience.

Many, if not most of Hollywood’s Grade A and Grade B product is made with teenagers in mind. They’re the most important demographic, which is why every blockbuster wants to be rated PG-13. But what about LGBT teens? There is, arguably as a direct result of discrimination by the MPAA, almost no gay content in films minors are allowed to see in the theater. Watching “It Gets Better” videos on YouTube isn’t going to cut it. The initial rating of “But I’m a Cheerleader” as NC-17 was absurd, as was its final grade of R, but that hardly prevents kids around the country from finding it online and on cable. LGBT youth need brash, obvious comedies that speak directly to them.

Equally important are the fantasies, the symbolic and sublimely ridiculous pleasures. Babbit’s best film is “Itty Bitty Titty Committee,” which chronicles the emotional and political awakenings of Anna (Melonie Diaz, “Fruitvale Station”), a comfortably out lesbian teenager who gets involved with a group of militant feminist activists in Los Angeles. There are the usual romantic entanglements, some of which do seem rote. Yet there’s an awful lot of wit in the activities of the C(i)A (which stands for Clits in Action), including a raid on a local park to erect makeshift statues of Emma Goldman and Angela Davis. There’s also a very honest introduction to the tensions within the radical community around the issue of same-sex marriage, especially for 2007 when things were still very up in the air for the state of California.

And, finally, there’s nothing wrong with a good B-movie. The problem with “The Quiet” was simply that it wasn’t good, which for our purposes is mitigated at least by the fact that it has no explicitly LGBT content. “Breaking the Girls,” on the other hand, is quite the improvement. It’s a hard-boiled crime thriller with an awful lot of racy writhing about, with none of the glacial flatness of Babbit’s earlier attempt at the genre. The clear inspiration is “Strangers on a Train,” with Agnes Bruckner (who just played Anna Nicole Smith for Lifetime) as the innocent and unwilling partner in crime, Sara. The malevolent lunatic part goes to Madeline Zima, whose tortured heiress bent on destruction is by far the most exciting part of the movie. The film’s actual plot is almost immaterial, and twists so many times that it doesn’t really merit description. Atmosphere and acting are at the heart of this bleak B noir.

By way of closing, it’s worth going back to the idea of positive representation. The villain of Babbit’s new film is also its most overtly lesbian character. If one were deeply concerned about what “self-respecting” viewers should care about, one could make the argument that “Breaking the Girls” positions its supposed heroine, Sara, as stuck between a determined murderess and the boy she has a crush on (Shawn Ashmore). Yet that would be far too simplistic an interpretation. LGBT villains are only a problem if they vilify LGBT people by extension. Alex’s hypersexual, gleefully vicious instability places her at the center of the film’s impact. Without Zima, it wouldn’t be fun to watch. Babbit celebrates the lesbian villain as an equal participant in genre movies, rather than shaming her.

Jamie Babbit makes great B-movies. And now, in the 21st century, the distinction between “A” and “B” movies no longer really makes any sense. Some of the best Bs of the past are now regarded as classics, while many prestige works look terrible in hindsight. “But I’m a Cheerleader” and “Itty Bitty Titty Committee” are exciting movies that, frankly, make the world a better place by giving LGBT teens (and adults) something to laugh about. “Breaking the Girls,” meanwhile, is an awful lot of kinda trashy fun. There’s absolutely nothing rotten about that.

“Breaking the Girls” opens in theaters and will be available on VOD on July 26th

Categories: Columns

Tags: Breaking the Girls, But I'm a Cheerleader, Daniel Walber, Jamie Babbit, Lesbian movies, LGBT, Mpaa, The Out Take