Introspection Is The Best Feature of Some of My Best Friends Are...

The Stonewall Riots of 1969 were a gamechanger for the LGBTQA+ community in America. Thanks to the actions of people like Marsha P. Johnson, the eternal suffering of members of this community had become visible in a profound way. People had always turned a blind eye to this community but now these marginalized members of American society were making it clear they would make their voices heard. Some of My Best Friends Are... was released two years after the Stonewall Riots and though it only received a moderate theatrical release and remains relatively obscure even to this day, its very existence was another sign of how the queer perspective was making itself heard in an unprecedented manner.


All of Some of My Best Friends Are... takes place in a gay bar known as The Blue Jay. In a society that expresse extreme prejudice and hatred to any member of the LGBTQA+ community, this location serves as an oasis for a variety of New Yorkers looking to be themselves for just a little bit. Some of My Best Friends Are... proceeds to tell an ensemble story focusing on a number of different patrons of this bar over the course of a single night. Among these customers are a young man who has called on a gentleman to meet him at this bar, a priest coming to terms with his homosexuality and a woman named Karen (Candy Darling).

This directorial effort from Mervyn Nelson (who also wrote the screenplay) is at its best when it just focuses on exploring who these people are and what unique experiences they've had in realizing their sexuality. The aforementioned priest, for instance, tells another patron about how, after he accepted his own sexuality, he felt like everyone's eyes, whether they were fellow priests or statues, were on him despite the fact that he wasn't out publically. It's an intriguing scene told through voice-over set over images of the priest trying to go about his day-to-day business in the Church, one that gives the audience a sense of how, even in a more open environment like The Blue Jay, this character is still grappling with his identity.

The harsher editing of this scene paired up with voice-over work that communicates a sense of worldliness make this a fascinating sequence to watch. Similarly working well due to editing are recurring moments of fantasy set inside the mind of Karen imagining all the men in the bar dressed up in dapper gear wanting to dance with her. Already, this serves as an intriguing glimpse into the psyche of one of the best characters in the film but it gets a potent layer of extra poignancy when juxtaposed against footage of her dancing with a toxic heterosexual cis-gendered guy. In these scenes, Some of My Best Friends Are... dances back-and-forth against the present and either the past or fantasy to allow the viewer a greater understanding into who these characters are as people.

They also reinforce the idea that, even though the Blue Jay should be a sanctuary for queer individuals, it isn't a place devoid of conflict, its patrons still have their own internal quarrels to deal with. Within these walls, this priest still struggles with who he is, Karen mostly shies away from extended interactions with others due to her uncertainty of how they'd react to her gender identity while another storyline shows a man trying to convince his lover to abandon his family and run off with him to no avail. However, too many of the characters in Some of My Best Friends Are... don't get this kind of thoughtful exploration, many of them remain one-note stereotypes serving up comedic asides that were hackneyed all the way back in 1971.

The best character-based writing from Mervyn Nelson shows an introspective spirit (which is also seen in an original haunting Gordon Gray song heard in the feature called Where Do I Go) that too much of the cast seems to be lacking. Why is so much screentime devoted to setting up a boring heterosexual guys quest to score the company of a lady inside The Blue Jay? That's screentime that totally could have been spent fleshing out so many of the background queer supporting players in the ensemble cast. Just like how the weaker Godzilla movies have one waiting impatiently for the boring human characters to go away so we can get back to the fun monsters, the extended sequences focused on disposable heterosexual characters in Some of My Best Friends Are... will leave one wishing we could go back to the far more interesting sequences focused on the perspectives of queer characters.

Nelson's direction also leaves much to be desired, though the poor video quality of the Turner Classic Movies broadcast I watched does make it admittedly hard to get a full feel for Some of my Best Friends Are... on a visual, much of the film is still captured in more rote camerawork. There's also an overreliance on pitch-black backgrounds in interior scenes that makes The Blue Jay constantly look like it shares space with The Sunken Place rather than an actual underground Gay Bar.  Some of My Best Friends Are... has an unquestionably important place in the world of American queer cinema, but its flaws render it more as the movie that had to walk so future queer movies could run more than anything else.