Film Review: Blackmail Boys

“I’m not trying to make excuses for myself

But I do think that if I had grown up in a

more supportive environment, I could’ve found

better role models. And made better choices.”

Punctuated throughout the beginning and end of the 2010 independent post-New Queer Cinema (NQC) outing, Blackmail Boys, are typed personal memos written by the main character Sam. Directed by Shumanski Brothers, the film predates the federal legalization of gay marriage in the United States tussling with the displacement endured by openly identifying LGBTQ2S+ young adults of the time.

Taking place in Chicago, Sam has moved to attend Art School despite losing an affordance to do so by his parents who disapprove of his sexual orientation. A film locale of convenience, the reputedly gay friendly city plays venue to the story of a gay escort by necessity. A safe haven of young proprietors for the gay movement, Sam learns that in the shadows of his idealized refuge hides the arc of societal oppression soliciting him for under the table favours.

Leaning into a docudrama format of interview excerpts, shaky cam amateur pornography cinematography, the filmmaker strives to balance a low budget indie flick feel with flourishes of dramatic and occasionally comedic exposition. A continued motif of top-down filmography depicts the characters as being watched from above, foreshadowing the inevitable traumatic endgame.

The acting, which is almost entirely comprised of the two main characters isolated in the bustling metropolis is, well, not particularly noteworthy. The two young lovers seem every bit as coy as stereotypical wallflower twinks would be by reputation. In this sense it is adequate and doesn’t cheapen the parts of the movie that work well such as their honest reflections on young openly gay adult life.

“To the best extortion plan ever” the two characters sillyishly toast to each other popping what is presumably the first bottle of champagne of their lives. Unintentionally yet intentionally hilarious? The scene thereby transitions to an amateur porno soundtracked with throbbing techno. “You know you want it,” the filmmaker’s approach here hints of the guilty pleasure genre: wallflower twinks having amateur sex.

Sam obviously fashions himself as sort of a twink Clark Duke who’d just had his big career break in 2010 with Hot Tub Time Machine. The second lead Aaron is a bit more difficult to draw an obvious comparison. There was some connection I had with the film image displayed on Dekkoo showing the couple naked in the shower with BOYS written below in all capitalized bold font. And then it was obvious, the youngest looking model on a pornography site from my earlier days: Kyler Moss from Boy Crush. The straightened dark hair in the shape of heart, could it be? Yes!

But enough about the amateur pornography as the dramatization centric to the plotline does achieve effect of a pivotal Hollywood gay cinema film from earlier in the 2000s: Elephant by Gus Van Sant. I’d always felt that film was significant in my forming of a gay identity in high school, but never had closure from the tremendous weight of that film’s dire subject matter. Blackmail Boys does have something of a happy ending. It achieves a place of prominence in my film viewing cataloging, something I hadn’t expected impulse watching as my first selection from Dekkoo.

“I just wanted to make things right.”