Before Ennis and Jack discovered their true sexual selves on Brokeback Mountain, Making Love opened up a lot of eyes in presenting the gay male culture right before the beginning of the AIDs plague. We learned that gay males indeed come in all shapes and sizes and libidos.
I have to say I really identified with Michael Ontkean's character here, more than with the two in Brokeback Mountain. Stripped of the cowboy mythology, Ennis and Jack are a pair of blue collar working stiffs who live in that part of society. It's just that a film about a pair of gay plumbers wouldn't have really done all that well.
Ontkean's character had my middle class upbringing. He's a doctor, happily married to the beautiful Kate Jackson and they are happy. But Mike's got those feelings that society has told him are wrong. If you're suppressing them, I'm here to tell you that just like in the film, sooner or later they surface and explode under any kind of stress.
He strikes up an acquaintance with one of his new patients, writer Harry Hamlin, after making a few false starts into the gay world. That was roughly paralleling my experience, I wanted the first to be special, especially since my best youthful years were behind me. It was as special to me as Harry Hamlin was to Michael Ontkean.
One of the things I liked best about Making Love is that it made no judgments about either of these guys. Ontkean wants a relationship and I'm betting if he were alive today, he'd be breaking down the doors of his legislature in California and working real hard to overturn Proposition 8.
That's not what Hamlin wants and he had a good chance of ending up with AIDs. But even as the plague was on the horizon and not a factor in gay life yet, Making Love makes no condemnation of Hamlin at all. It's just the randy way he is, like so many straight men looking to score with all kinds of women.
Kate Jackson is the tragic figure here as well. But tragic in the sense that she's a victim of Ontkean's internalized homophobia which caused him to marry and seek society's approval rather than follow his own nature. So many marriages went south because of that, but Making Love affixes the blame on our attitudes, not on either of the men. It is fortunate that no kids were yet involved.
Making Love was a reunion film of sorts as both Ontkean and Jackson were regulars on the Seventies police drama, The Rookies. They weren't paired together however, Ontkean was one of the three rookie cops the series concentrated on and Jackson was married to Sam Melville who was another one. Ontkean left the series midway in its run to pursue a film career.
Director Arthur Hiller includes a stylish cast to support Ontkean, Hamlin, and Jackson. Arthur Hiller and Nancy Olson are Ontkean's parents and Dame Wendy Hiller plays Ontkean and Jackson's lovable, but slightly dotty neighbor. Look fast and you'll see Eighties action star Michael Dudikoff as one of the delightful items to be found in the cruising bar.
In its time Making Love was as groundbreaking a drama as Brokeback Mountain is in the new century. And this review is dedicated to my personal Harry Hamlin, USMC private Donald Buchecker of Consohocken, Pennsylvania. I hope you made it through the plague.
I have to say I really identified with Michael Ontkean's character here, more than with the two in Brokeback Mountain. Stripped of the cowboy mythology, Ennis and Jack are a pair of blue collar working stiffs who live in that part of society. It's just that a film about a pair of gay plumbers wouldn't have really done all that well.
Ontkean's character had my middle class upbringing. He's a doctor, happily married to the beautiful Kate Jackson and they are happy. But Mike's got those feelings that society has told him are wrong. If you're suppressing them, I'm here to tell you that just like in the film, sooner or later they surface and explode under any kind of stress.
He strikes up an acquaintance with one of his new patients, writer Harry Hamlin, after making a few false starts into the gay world. That was roughly paralleling my experience, I wanted the first to be special, especially since my best youthful years were behind me. It was as special to me as Harry Hamlin was to Michael Ontkean.
One of the things I liked best about Making Love is that it made no judgments about either of these guys. Ontkean wants a relationship and I'm betting if he were alive today, he'd be breaking down the doors of his legislature in California and working real hard to overturn Proposition 8.
That's not what Hamlin wants and he had a good chance of ending up with AIDs. But even as the plague was on the horizon and not a factor in gay life yet, Making Love makes no condemnation of Hamlin at all. It's just the randy way he is, like so many straight men looking to score with all kinds of women.
Kate Jackson is the tragic figure here as well. But tragic in the sense that she's a victim of Ontkean's internalized homophobia which caused him to marry and seek society's approval rather than follow his own nature. So many marriages went south because of that, but Making Love affixes the blame on our attitudes, not on either of the men. It is fortunate that no kids were yet involved.
Making Love was a reunion film of sorts as both Ontkean and Jackson were regulars on the Seventies police drama, The Rookies. They weren't paired together however, Ontkean was one of the three rookie cops the series concentrated on and Jackson was married to Sam Melville who was another one. Ontkean left the series midway in its run to pursue a film career.
Director Arthur Hiller includes a stylish cast to support Ontkean, Hamlin, and Jackson. Arthur Hiller and Nancy Olson are Ontkean's parents and Dame Wendy Hiller plays Ontkean and Jackson's lovable, but slightly dotty neighbor. Look fast and you'll see Eighties action star Michael Dudikoff as one of the delightful items to be found in the cruising bar.
In its time Making Love was as groundbreaking a drama as Brokeback Mountain is in the new century. And this review is dedicated to my personal Harry Hamlin, USMC private Donald Buchecker of Consohocken, Pennsylvania. I hope you made it through the plague.