Wtf is up with killing off the fags? I know, Glenn Close was portraying a transman, not a fag, but it's still a case of smear the queer ain't it? I'm sick of queer flicks that focus on the otherness of the minority. Albert Nobbs is another tragic homo story that fails. fails. fails.
I'm gonna spoil the fuck out of it so fair warning eh? Also I'm gonna use words like fag and queer and homo, so don't get your panties in a bunch about that, because I like reclaiming slurs in the context of writing about queer bashing, and I think this movie is a queer bashing queer basher, a basher of oddness, and not just the homosexual kind.
It's written by István Szabó the same guy who directed Sunshine, and he's a rich guy so he's got the knowledge of how high society operates, with the help churning away beneath the surface maintaining the facade of invisibility for the folk that makes their existences so comfortably liveable. Servants should be unseen and unheard and their needs and desires inconsequential, of course, yes sir, yes ma'am.
The doctor, (Brendan Gleeson), was a man who worked, so he was a go between to the world of the servants and the ruling classes. He ran off with his lover, because he was tired of secrets, and this was about the only point in the film that I liked. Yes, we should all shrug of the expectations of others that impede our own paths to true happiness. This is a message worth making a movie about, but what was the impetus for his upending the facade of his life to pursue his dream? The death of Albert. What kinda message is that? Yeah, you go for that glory, chase down your dream, but if you're an odd duck queer, well you'll just have to die so we can cherish that notion of LGBT being sooo soo sad, and geez but they're strange too right? I wish the movie had been different. I wish it had a happy ending for Albert. I wish he had been written more charming and less othered and odd. "He's a dear sweet man" says the woman he's in love with, (Mia Wasikowska), but she's got her own agenda and manipulates that sweetness for her own gain.
And what is up with making Albert be so strange and socially awkward? Was it a function of class? I liked the class issues the movie raised, the degradation, exploitation and desperation of the working stiffs was spot on, especially contrasted with how the asshole rich folk were so comfortable treating poorer folk as less than, and less than human even. Disrespecting sons a bitches!!
Why was Albert was such a clueless sheltered sort? He wants to move in with Mr. Page, (Janet McTeer), and he doesn't even know him, the man just lost his wife, (Bronagh Gallagher), and Nobbs is completely tone deaf to that. Why oh why do I have to keep seeing queers on film being born SO different. Queers are NOT so different, except that they're queer ya know? There's a whole rainbow of variety in land of the queer, just like there is in the rest of society, and constantly creating work about how DIFFERENT homo folk are is just so fucking trite and boring.
Jaysus, as Mr. Page would say.
I wish I'd seen a romantic tale of the transman painter Mr. Page and the story of how he got together with his wife, (Bronagh Gallagher). Or even better, Mr. Nobbs successfully romancing the maid, charming her, and settling down with her happily ever after in the tobacco shop. What's wrong with a happy story anyhow?
I was expecting the wastrel Joe, (Aaron Johnson), to rob Mr. Nobbs and run off to America, ditching the pregnant maid Mr. Nobbs was courting. Nobbs could still have saved the day, but Nooo!!! He had to be killed off, by off all things, a bump to his head?!! The bit about his life's wages getting scooped up by that bitch of a boss just added to the bitter fail. Sure Mr. Page came to the rescue of the maid and her little Albert Joseph, but fuck that! That was Albert's dream. He deserved better than the legacy of a name to a baby he never got to meet. I know it was an adaptation of a play, but keyword here -- ADAPTATION. Glenn Close, you did a good job being him, but you could have written him the hero of his own story. You coulda written him a little better ending, a little better life, but I guess it gets better just doesn't apply to Mr. Nobbs.
I'm leery of proposing the idea of an authentic voice in the creation of fictional stories, but in this case I think the lack of respect shown for the character of Mr. Nobbs is one born of that disconnect of experience in creation. Somebody was imagining what it's like to be trans, and made this mishmashness of queertransphobia. Do we really need more bullshit fiction that perpetuates the casual homophobia of the other and the idea that a queer's destiny is bound to be tragic? I doubt that a transgendered person would have made a flick this heterosexist, but I guess we'll have to wait and see what the formerly known as the Wachowski Bros. come up with next. I but they'd do a stellar job with a transgender character study.
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