Milk movie review

Many people are reluctant to admit it, but religions are simply great businesses. As we have seen, religions have used principles of business more effectively than corporations do and they do a much better job of keeping their customer base loyal. To do that, they need an issue, and religions have learned that hatred is a better business model than love. No surprise then that homophobia has been a winning strategy for a long time.

Milk follows the life of Harvey Milk, first openly elected gay official in the United States. Undoubtedly gays and lesbians have made remarkable progress in gaining some rights since the 70s, when Milk was campaigning for equal rights for them, but what has not changed is the message of hate coming from homophobes. The logic for discrimination is unchanged and watching this movie is like watching the fight in California today in which Mormons and Evangelicals are making the same arguments for bigotry as they did 30 years ago.

Strongly recommended if you want to understand what is happening in America today.

Boca a Boca movie review

I became a fan of Aitana Sanchez Gijon after watching her in Femme de Chambre du Titanic and that was the sole reason I chose to watch Boca a Boca (Mouth to Mouth). It stars Javier Bardem (who plays the role of Victor Ventura, a struggling actor) who takes a job as a phone sex operator to pay his bills before he appears for a casting call for a Hollywood movie. He ends up answering a phone call from a plastic surgeon (Bill or Ricardo played by Josep Maria Flotats) who is a down-low man (people like Ted Haggard who are supposedly happily married to a woman but are secretly gay) and in his desperate attempt to make as much money as possible, he makes Bill think that they are in love. But Victor is actually in love with Bill's wife Amanda (played by Aitana Sanchez Gijon) who sleeps with him to take revenge on her husband.

The plot gets complicated after that and I will not give you any more details but you have to wait till the end to figure out who was trying to kill who for what reason. All I can say is that it is not what you think. Despite what I have described above, the movie is fairly clean, but be warned that it is rated R due to the nature of the theme. In my opinion it is a beautiful comedy that would remind you of movies like Beverly Hills Cops. Strongly recommended.

Gay rights in Japan

In Japan, if you are different, the best thing is to act as if you don't exist. As a gaijin (or foreigner), I learned this lesson early on and it served me well. Because I chose to not stand out, the Japanese left me alone and I can say that I never faced any overt discrimination in Japan.

Gays in Japan do the same, and so do the handicapped. Things are changing somewhat, though. Kanako Otsuji, a lesbian politician, contested an election and the gays and lesbians actually organized a parade in Tokyo. Despite these small improvements, this group of people has a long way to go before they get any recognition in the country, where things don't change fast.