DVD Review: The Last Straight Man

The Last Straight Man is an unusual film about two close male friends who become intimate the night before one of them is to be married. Though the groom insists it is a one-time thing, the two meet once a year to continue the relationship. The film stars Mark Cirillo as Lewis and Scott Sell as Cooper.

It opens with almost the last image I’d expect from a film about a relationship between two men – a woman’s naked breasts. And it is over that image that the film’s title appears, a delightfully humorous touch. The woman, it turns out, is doing a strip tease for a group of men gathered in a hotel room for a bachelor party. The groom, Cooper, gets special attention from the stripper, while Lewis, seated off in a corner, isn’t as excited as the other guys. Later, after the others have left, Lewis and Cooper continue drinking. It doesn’t seem that Lewis is really all that straight, as he rests his head on Cooper’s chest at one point and then asks Lewis about his wildest sexual experiences. Why would he be probing Lewis’ sexual history if he weren’t already interested? Cooper even wants to watch gay porn with him. Clearly he’s curious, and it’s not long before they’re fooling around. But when Lewis goes to kiss him, Cooper backs off. “Because it’s more intimate,” Cooper explains. The next morning Cooper says they can never repeat the previous night’s actions. What I like, however, is that he tells Lewis that he enjoyed it and that, if anything, it has brought them closer. I’m glad the film doesn’t choose the more obvious route of regret and fear.

Interestingly, we do not get the wedding scene. That’s not what the film is about. We are shown the passage of time through a brief series of stills, and then the film returns to the same hotel room four years later, with Lewis and Cooper continuing their relationship. We learn that they celebrate their anniversary by meeting in that same hotel room each year (making The Last Straight Man a relatively cheap film to produce). We also learn little bits about their lives – that Lewis is now a published writer, and Cooper is nervous because he’s about to become a father. Cooper worries, “I just don’t want to fuck him up in the head.” Lewis responds, “Then wait ‘til he’s thirty before you tell him daddy’s a cocksucker.” The film has a good sense of humor like that. The only thing that’s weird about this scene is that part of it is shown through a video camera that Cooper brought. When he puts the camera down, it is on “STANDBY,” not “REC,” and yet we still see the scene through that lens for a little while, which is an odd sensation, and momentarily pulls me out of the action. Another thing in this film that feels odd and doesn’t quite ring true is that Cooper refers to his wife as “the wife” rather than by her name. Something else that is not really addressed is that they celebrate their anniversary each year the night before Cooper’s wedding anniversary, and so it seems his wife would catch on that he keeps spending that same night away and that she might want to plan something for that night, if, say, their wedding anniversary fell on a Sunday. But these are relatively minor points.

The film keeps its focus on just these two characters, with only a few others making minor appearances – or intrusions – into the small, insulated world they’ve created in the hotel room. The story is about the way the relationship changes over the years, and how their perspectives on that change, and the way they choose to define the relationship. At various times, the film is erotic, sweet, humorous, and moving (it is particularly moving in the scene where the two finally kiss). At one point, Cooper says, “I try to do the right thing, but then I talk to you and suddenly you’re the right thing.” That’s my favorite line (though I can’t help but love the comical line, “You’ve got your Freud in my Dr. Ruth”). It’s a movie that grew on me, and I came to really like both characters, in large part because of the actors’ performances. After all, this is a movie that completely rides on its two main characters.

Special Features

The DVD contains a few special features, including interviews with actors Mark Cirillo and Scott Sell about the film. They both talk about getting their roles and about the production, and about their rapport on set. Mark talks specifically about getting the video footage from that one scene. Scott talks about his nude scene and his workout routine. Each interview is approximately eleven minutes. There are also shorter interviews with Victoria DeMare, who plays the stripper in the first scene, and David Alanson Bradberry, who plays the bellhop.

There is an audio commentary with writer/director Mark Bessenger; co-producer Benjamin Lutz; and actors Mark Cirillo, Scott Sell and David Alanson Bradberry. Hmm, it turns out the stripper’s special trick is something that was done at an actual bachelor party. They talk about the hotel where they shot the film, and about the still photographs used between sections of the film. They also talk about the way they shot the video camera footage.

The special features include one deleted scene, which was cut for time, as well as the film’s trailer.

The Last Straight Man was written and directed by Mark Bessenger (who also wrote and directed Confessions), and was released on DVD on February 24, 2015 through TLA Releasing.