There's something almost humourous about two heterosexual actors playing gay for pay on the screen in that moment just before they kiss. They're never believable and I'll tell you why. In that half second before their lips are to meet, they inevitably part and this most false action completely betrays their pussy-loving ways. Go back and look at the great straight embraces of the celluloid; a straight man would never dream of opening his mouth before his lips touched his lover because that would completely foul that sublime moment when the lips touch for the first time. Do they part afterwards? Well, of course they do. This is not a Disney film, my dear; some friction is necessary. However, that first moment is to be preserved. It's as though these two sweetly delusional thespians believe that the only intimacy that can occur between two men calls for the lips to be parted, which is unfortunately homophobic as they probably think of themselves as allies. Now that our esteemed government has given us the right to marry, this does not mean that weddings will end with the phrase, "You may now fellate the bridegroom!"
It's so disappointing, isn't it? We expected so much more. I can recall sitting through a screening of Making Love in 1982 at the Metro 8. One would have thought that the release of the film was messianic, such were the palpitations in my chest. In the scene where Harry Hamlin and the cute but ultimately forgotten other guy are bare chested, hands tracing backs, lips inching closer, the pulsations moved somewhat more southernly. And then at that moment, that moment for which I braved slurs from the pock-marked box office employee and the disappointment of realizing I was one of seven people in the theatre, each sitting by themselves, their lips finally touched, but not before that asshole Hamlin opens his goddamn lips. Suddenly, it was false. It wasn't the apocalypse but rather some pre-Melrose demi-hunk serving my life up on spray painted silver platter. I walked out in disgust, just like all those that had walked out for the exact opposite reason.
There is nothing more thrilling than that moment, you see. An amazing kiss is about contact, to be sure, but when they disappoint you so 90% of the time, one can't help but live for that second before it all goes wrong. My greatest pleasure on this earth is lingering on his bottom lip the moment we touch. I am convinced that the Song of Songs was written about his bottom lip. I would call it manna had I not been heckled as an old dramatic by some of my ever aging girls. The comments of our 25 year age difference are near constant from them and I take every loving barb with reverie, so happy am I with that bottom lip. That bottom lip is the one vice on this earth that I have maintained in this, the golden years of life for a gay man not yet 50. The previous ones always needed a balance to keep them from oscillating out of control. The promiscuity of my thirties was tempered by the fact that I only slept with unattractive men as to not indulge too frequently or risk contracting some dreadful ailment by one to ugly too bear a repeat performance. In my twenties, my lust for food, thinness and my poverty resulted in a cycle of spending far too much on fancy meals after which I would promptly induce vomiting as a chastisement on behalf of my wallet as well as my waistline. Now in my forties, I only have his bottom lip and fuck, if I don't make up for Harry Hamlin's mistakes.
