James Narvey

I’m a queer millennial movie lover, for years I’ve been warned about The Crying Game and how it does not fit into our modern sensibilities for queer art. Having seen this movie recently for the first time I’m wondering if all the criticism is deserved? It certainly does not hold up to our contemporary sensibilities where transness is hidden and treated as a reveal. Like the cis-male characters in the film the audience is “duped.” The reveal is just the beginning as the character goes on to accept the characters’ transness. To dismiss the film as not being currently valid because of its early 90’s sensibilities I think erases some of the important lessons we can learn about this time period. We should use this film as a snapshot of how the world saw queerness in this moment in time. Instead we should focus on the truly terrible parts of this movie: Forest Whitaker’s inaccurate and inconsistent British accent.