Retro '80s: Playgirls and Lover Boys, Part II

[scienceguy]

FADE IN: Pet Shop Boys, "Love Is a Bourgeois Construct" - third single from Electric released on 1 SEP 2013. [Genre Hi-NRG/songwriters Tennant/Lowe/Purcell] (not '80s, but fits the script)

"Love is a bourgeois construct
So I've given up on the bourgeoisie
Like all their aspirations, it's a fantasy

When you walked out you did me a favor
You made me see reality
This love is a bourgeois construct
It's a blame turn to fallacy
You won't see me with a bunch of losers
Promising fatality..."

Live at the Royal Opera House 2018

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34elnj1IplI

This is Adrian Lyne's 1986 "9½ Weeks" starring Mickey Rourke as John and Kim Basinger as Elizabeth. According to IMDb, this is an "erotic story about a woman, the assistant of an art gallery, who gets involved in an impersonal affair with a man. She barely knows about his life, only about the sex games they play, so the relationship begins to get complicated." Taglines: "When Something's This HOT... Let it BURN, They Broke Every Rule, Desire. Infatuation. Obsession."

(Finger Food)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2E9aknVGp6g

'"Physical' is a song by British-born Australian singer Olivia Newton-John for her twelfth studio album Physical. It was released in September 1981 by MCA Records as the lead single from the album." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_ ... John_song)

"You know how at the end of the movie Grease Olivia Newton-John transforms from a chaste good girl into a leather-clad vixen? She was definitely in vixen mode for this song, which if you are at all paying attention to the lyrics, is blatantly about sex: 'There's nothin' left to talk about unless it's horizontally."'
https://www.songfacts.com/facts/olivia- ... n/physical

"I'm sayin' all the things that I know you'll like
Making good conversation I gotta handle you just right, you know what I mean
I took you to an intimate restaurant, then to a suggestive movie
There's nothing left to talk about 'less it's horizontally

Let's get physical, physical, I wanna get physical, let's get into physical
Let me hear your body talk, your body talk, let me hear your body talk
Let's get physical, physical, I wanna get physical, let's get into physical
Let me hear your body talk, your body talk, let me hear your body talk"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FDt592Xy-Io

Mickey Rourke (James Wheeler) strikes again in Zalman King's 1989 "Wild Orchid" in "a series of erotic encounters" with Carré Otis (Emily). Here is a sampling of the fireworks in Rio.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6FeH3JhpJs

The ever-controversial "Relax" was first released in the UK in 1983 by Frankie Goes To Hollywood (Holly Johnson) and later added to the album Welcome to the Pleasuredome. Here is the live "laser version" of "Relax."

"But shoot it in the right direction
Make making it your intention-ooh yeah
Live those dreams
Scheme those schemes
Got to hit me
Hit me
Hit me with those laser beams

I'm coming
I'm coming-yeah"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCp2h5jslKY

"That boy never cast a look in your direction
never tried to hook for your affection
dresses like the mod of your invention, tall and proud
He is the head boy of a school of thought
that plays in your intentions, night and day"
("Later Tonight", Lowe/Tennant, 1986, Please)

Wayne Studer writes the following: "The predominant metaphor is that of an English boys' school, with its concomitant homoerotic undertones. But it probably is indeed just a metaphor for what's going on in the mind of the person Neil is addressing—most likely the narrator talking to himself: "He is the head boy of a school of thought that plays in your intentions…." The object of this person's affections isn't interested in him ("That boy never cast a look in your direction"), so from that perspective he's just a fantasy. As Neil would put it many years later, it's "about fancying a boy … and thinking how you'll never get to meet him." So what does one wait for "later tonight"? Masturbation, in all likelihood. The final words, after all, are "tonight always comes." It works either way." And so we see again the crafty ambiguity of the Lowe/Tennant writing team. http://www.geowayne.com/newDesign/pleas ... night.htm

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sk40vUaJS60

Much of the action in James Ivory's 1987 "Maurice" takes place in a boys' school and stars James Wilby (Maurice Hall), Rupert Graves (Alec Scudder), and a very young Hugh Grant (Clive Durham). IMDb describes the plot as follows: "After his lover rejects him, a young man trapped by the oppressiveness of Edwardian society tries to come to terms with and accept his sexuality." (Brief nudity)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOofTnROGRc

"Contempt in your eyes when I turned to kiss his lips

Broken I lie all my feelings denied - blood on your fist.

Can you tell me why? Can you tell me why?
Can you tell me why? Can you tell me why?
You in your false securities tear up my life condemning me.
Name me an illness
you call me a sin - never feel guilty
never give in. "

Bronski Beat, "Tell Me Why", 1984, on the Age of Consent album, 12'' Remix (EqHQ)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=doHaqqAEB90

Or, deeper dive, boys and girls, speaking more directly to the theme of this post: sexual ambiguity (contrast with "Coming Out", 1989. Set in East Berlin, we see Dirk Kummer as Matthias in this tense hospital scene. "Retro '80s, Part I)

"You leave in the morning with everything you own in a little black case
Alone on a platform, the wind and the rain on a sad and lonely face

Mother will never understand why you had to leave
But the answers you seek will never be found at home
The love that you need will never be found at home

Run away, turn away, run away, turn away, run away
Run away, turn away, run away, turn away, run away"

Bronski Beat (Jimmy Somerville, lead vocal) "Smalltown Boy" The Age of Consent, MCA Records:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7-q1WRaKNg

It's time to take a walk on the dark side of the street. These guys wanna play hardball. So, to set the mood, here is Duran Duran, "A View To A Kill", released as a single in May, 1985, and topping the UK charts.[Songwriters: ANDREW TAYLOR, JOHN NIGEL TAYLOR, NICHOLAS JAMES BATES, ROGER ANDREW TAYLOR, SIMON JOHN LEBON © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC]

"Meeting you with a view to a kill
Face to face in secret places, feel the chill"

"A week is why, until we

Dance into the fire
That fatal kiss is all we need
Dance into the fire
To fatal sounds of broken dreams
Dance into the fire
That fatal kiss is all we need
Dance into the fire"

"A View To a Kill" (That Fatal Extended Kiss)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pCfRPT904uE

"Whenever Richard Cory went down town,
We people on the pavement looked at him:
He was a gentleman from sole to crown,
Clean favored, and imperially slim.

And he was always quietly arrayed,
And he was always human when he talked;
But still he fluttered pulses when he said,
"Good-morning," and he glittered when he walked.

And he was rich—yes, richer than a king—
And admirably schooled in every grace:
In fine, we thought that he was everything
To make us wish that we were in his place.

So on we worked, and waited for the light,
And went without the meat, and cursed the bread;
And Richard Cory, one calm summer night,
Went home and put a bullet through his head."

"Richard Corey" Edwin Arlington Robinson

"Evil Senses" (Sensi). Gabriele Lavia directs this 1986 story in which "a professional hit man kills the hit man sent to kill him and steals his briefcase, only to find that it contains documents concerning a blackmail operation. He then travels to Italy, seeks refuge in a bordello and falls for the lovely Vittoria." In the first clip, we get an erotic first glimpse of the burgeoning romance (brief nudity):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dLWfLPEPuTc

And then this happens:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P8c19-VH5NQ

"L'homme blessé " is a 1983 French film directed by Patrice Chéreau and starring Jean-Hugues Anglade, Vittorio Mezzogiorno, and Roland Bertin. The synopsis reads as follows: "A young man discovers his homosexuality and begins a relationship with a manipulative hustler/petty criminal that he meets at a train station."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2L1ooVmp75k

"Mala Noche [1985, Gus Van Sant], which translates as Bad Night, is a tale of unrequited love (or lust) that was pretty daring, to say the least, on its first release. Amazing, for its time, is how unapologetic Mala Noche is concerning its queer subject. Completely devoid of political statements, Mala Noche is simply the story of a young gay man on the make. Van Sant isn't coy about it; we know Walt's bent immediately when his thoughts reveal his unabashed longing for Johnny. His "Mexican Boy" is the forbidden fruit beyond both gender and class lines." "Tim Streeter plays Walt, a lusty and overly romantic liquor store clerk. He is unable to take his eyes off of Johnny (Doug Cooeyate), a young immigrant who hopped a train to Portland with some friends. "I want to drink this Mexican boy," his thoughts trumpet to the audience, "He makes my heart throb when I see him. Thumpitty bump bump bump."'

https://www.cinemaqueer.com/review%20pa ... noche.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxW_MtcT_Tw

"Hey, ey, ey, ey
Like a girl gone wild
A good girl gone wild
I'm like, hey, ey, ey, ey
Like a girl gone wild
A good girl gone wild

Girls they just wanna have some fun
Get fired up like a smokin' gun
On the floor til the daylight comes
Girls they just wanna have some fun...

The room is spinning
It must be the Tanqueray
I'm about to go astray
My inhibition's gone away
I feel like sinning
You got me in the zone
DJ play my favorite song
Turn me on"

"Girl Gone Wild" Madonna, 2012, but this composition came way before:

"Dress You Up" from Like a Virgin, 1984, Madonna, Extended Fan Version:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mWtpd8mS5jw

FADE OUT (Promises kept; see Retro '80s: Playgirls and Lover Boys, Part I):

"A windy day, the cars in slow formation
Not far away a final destination
One mother's son
his father's distant gaze regretting
where they went wrong
He always found it too upsetting"

Pet Shop Boys' "Your Funny Uncle", Introspective, 1989

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pn_uWqlbdOM

"Parting Glances", 1986, directed by Bill Sherwood and starring Richard Ganoung (Michael), John Bolger (Robert) and Steve Buscemi (Nick). This needs no further introduction:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_yvP0Jkhpc

"And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.
- Revelation 21:4, King James Version"

From Wayne Studer:

http://www.geowayne.com/newDesign/alternative/uncle.htm

[retrofuturist]

Greetings,

Best wishes in finding a diagnosis and/or cure.

Kind regards.

Retro.

[ArtHist]

I have never heard of the Steve Buscemi film. Definitely going to check that out, seems weird casting of Buscemi but according to wiki his first major role.