Hot Guys With Guns | 2013 Outfest Review

Life of the Sex Party: Spearman’s Debut Features Intriguing but Diluted Premise

The multifaceted Doug Spearman, who many are familiar with as a main player in LOGO’s groundbreaking series “Noah’s Arc,” unveils his feature film debut, Hot Guys With Guns, which tries to be a sassy neo-noir dark comedy riffing on dynamics from a multitude of iconic cinematic elements. Those hoping for a breezy comedy will be sorely disappointed with a surprising amount of sinister elements that are declawed by the film’s attempt to be too many things at one time. That’s not to say there aren’t some redeeming elements of discussion highlighted in Spearman’s scenario, which is initially a daring expose of a seedier, often undisclosed side of a community that often engages in contradictory depictions of transparency and provocation. The base premise has all the fixings of a capitalistically mutated cousin to Cruising, dressed up with a meretricious musical opening that puts one in mind of the comedic tendencies of OSS 117.

In its dimly lit opening sequence, a visually undisclosed duo finishes up what looks to be their latest mass robbery of gay men frequenting sex parties in the Hollywood Hills, an occurrence that has the gay Hollywood elite, referred to as the Velvet Mafia, in a minor panic, though not enough to alert the police or stop having sex parties. Meanwhile, struggling actor Danny Lohman (Marc Anthony Samuel) has been taking a class taught by Jimmy Peppicelli (Alan Blumenfeld) to learn the ins and outs of private investigators as he prepares for an audition in a hot new series, “Intense Crime and Punishment.” Danny hasn’t quite gotten over his breakup with Pip Armstrong (Bryan McArdle), his ex-registered domestic partner, a trust fund baby living off his pill popping hop head of a subconsciously racist mother in the Hills. Pip’s name can be listed to the long line of slutty victims as recently attended a sex party hit by the sticky fingered assailants. Thankfully he escaped mostly unscathed with his new boy toy, Robin (Trey McCurley). Pip decides to join forces with Danny to investigate who exactly is robbing all these gay men and why. Of course, in the interim, they discover there may very well be unfinished business between them as well.

There are some daring areas almost explored in Hot Guys With Guns, but true examination scurries away at flippant tonal shifts with the wayward romantic subplot between Danny and Pip, a relationship that begs for further exploration but lacks too many specific details to remain relevant (not to mention lack of chemistry). While depictions of interracial gay couples are sadly few and far between (even in these marginally more enlightened days of cinema), Danny and Pip have compounded baggage to contend with and it seems Spearman is really criticizing the elitist and classist nature of an industry that has as little room for people of color in its end products as it does in its secret behind- the-scenes orgiastic pleasure domes, where the same racially tinged celebrations of beauty are even more evident.

There are a handful of scenes where Danny is shown to suffer through demeaning or demoralizing situations, such as overhearing Pip’s mother reveal her not so subtle racially motivated dislike for him, or being forced to serve as busboy at a fancy party that Pip attends with his new boyfriend. While meant to highlight very realistic socially sanctioned ills, these only cripple the film’s ability to create empathy for any of the characters outside the main protagonist.

Likewise, once certain identities and motives are revealed, one wishes that those dark and sinister elements that rear their heads (literally) unexpectedly couldn’t have been further developed into a more brazen examination of the insidious self-loathing created in parts of the LGBT community by all this the superficial narcissism. In essence, Spearman has little love for those he is depicting, which is fine, except that everyone’s a bit one dimensional and stereotypical. While Danny manages to elude this disdain, he’s saddled with a narrative set-up that would work better in a lighter, more effervescent scenario, which is how he’s played by Samuel. And even if we may not even gather much empathy for Danny, it’s easy to see that he’s better than the man we’re meant to believe he’s infatuated with, an oblivious and selfish person that engages in the same ignorant and racist behavior by not bothering to address it. Sure, many may be enamored or enthralled with the title’s promise of hot guys with guns, but the sad fact of that matter is, we’re left either wishing they’d use them on each other, or worse, not caring about the terrible things that do indeed happen to them. Spearman’s film attempts a difficult balancing act, and there’s a daring narrative being developed here. There are a lot of terribly nonchalant ways pretty people use each other in Hot Guys With Guns, and, perhaps, in its most realistic flourish of all, none of them are taken to task for their actions.

Reviewed on July 19 at the 2013 Outfest Film Festival.