But I'm a Cheerleader (85 minutes)
I'm a homosexual! I'm a homosexual! I'm a homosexual! Oh my god... they were right. I'm a homo.
In the US, just 25 states have banned conversion therapy for minors and three of those (North Carolina, Michigan, Wisconsin) have only banned the state and federal funding of it, not the practice itself. Conversion therapy is the practice of attempting to change an individual's sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression to align with heterosexual and cisgender norms. It is not an evidence-based medical treatment and has been elsewhere banned on a national level. It can cause serious psychological harm to individuals who undergo such treatment, which is why 1999’s But I’m a Cheerleader, a rom-com set at a conversion therapy camp, was not only so groundbreaking but also controversial at the time. Today it’s a cult classic.
The movie though brief, clocking in at 85 minutes total, is quite complete. Megan (Natasha Lyonne) is a wholesome “All-American” girl who looks forward to cheerleading practice and football games. She has kind parents and a nice boyfriend and is happy with her life (except for the fact that she hates kissing her boyfriend). That is until she arrives home one day to an intervention led by Mike (RuPaul) who is an “ex-gay” working at True Directions -- a conversion camp for teens. Megan’s parents, friends, and boyfriend believe she is a lesbian and that she needs to get that fixed ASAP. Still in denial, Megan arrives at the camp where she meets other gay teens undergoing treatment, including Graham (Clea Duvall), who is less open to “being normal” than the others. Megan very much wants to be “normal” and to graduate from conversion camp. Ultimately the camp backfires on her mission and helps her to see that she can be happy with who she really is: “I'm a homosexual! I'm a homosexual! I'm a homosexual! Oh my god... they were right. I'm a homo.”
But I’m A Cheerleader is a campy movie. Stylistically it is often compared to John Waters’ movies, but its content is softer and at its core, it’s a rom-com. It really doesn’t take any sort of special education to understand why this movie was poorly received by critics back in 1999. The majority of the movie’s reviewers were old, white men who were uncomfortable with a romantic story between lesbians and didn’t understand its campy humor and style. In fact, before the movie was even released it received an NC-17 rating despite there not being any nudity and very little language. They were uncomfortable with a darkly lit love scene and the mention of “someone going down on someone.” The quippy “She’s just upset cause the fish on her plate is the only kind she can eat” however makes the cut in the R-rated version.
Yes, a movie without much cursing, no violence, and no nudity received an R rating because it showed young people of the same sex loving one another. For reference, The Sixth Sense (with all the dead bodies), Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (with like a 5-minute-long dick joke), and Cider House Rules (with abortion) all had PG-13 ratings. That abortion in Cider House Rules deeply affected me at the time, but hey, at least it wasn’t two women kissing and caring for each other! Nonetheless, the movie was a relative success at the box office making more than twice its budget and did well at a number of festivals.
The majority of the movie is set at True Directions, only deviating a couple of times to Cocksucker, the local gay bar, and to the home of the Ex-ex-gays-- former conversion therapy patients who decided to reject the conversion and open their home to others doing the same. Run by Mary Brown (Cathy Moriarty), True Directions follows a five-step program to ridding oneself of homosexuality. Gender is important at True Directions and a lot of the steps pertain to gendering oneself as if gender dictates our sexuality. For a lot of us now, the conversation about gender and sexuality is almost common (and in conservative circles still debated), but these concepts were relatively untrod in 1999 and it’s extremely interesting and refreshing to witness them in But I’m A Cheerleader.
We spend the majority of our time with Step 2, which really is the backbone of the entire program: Rediscovering Your Gender Identity. In order to rid themselves of homosexuality, the patients must realign with their gender roles. The girls learn to scrub floors, change diapers, and wash dishes while the boys are specifically taken outside the house to chop wood and play football. The idea is that, as Megan says, “Women have roles. After you learn that, you'll stop objectifying them.”
The division between the genders is further enforced by their environment and True Directions provided outfits. The retro-kitsch house has the girls sleeping in bright pink rooms, wearing bright pink dresses, while the boys are in blue. What is so wonderful about But I’m a Cheerleader being a satirical comedy is that it opens us up to laugh at gender norms. By heightening these norms and roles, we laugh at just how ridiculous they really are and the fact that not properly scrubbing the floor could change your sexuality. The inverse is also explored with the “butch” character Jan, who realizes about mid-way through the movie that she isn’t a lesbian. She’s not feminine, but that doesn’t change her sexuality. Jan leaves True Directions with the other patients painfully denying her identity and she doesn’t get an onscreen happy ending like some of the other characters. I was left hoping that she does.
The conversion treatment is also consistently undermined by the fact that Mary Brown’s own son, Rock (Eddie Cibrian) has not yet been “saved” and her male coach, Mike, is clearly struggling with being straight and lusting after Rock. Also, Eddie Cibrian looks so amazing in this movie and I accidentally got off course when I started Googling stories about him and Brandi Glanville again. Perhaps I should start identifying Real Housewives tie-ins when I find them, like the guys at Give It 5 do for Star Trek. I bet there are just as many…
Anyway, the movie wraps up with three high school tropes coming together. The remaining patients at True Directions are attending their graduation while essentially dressed for prom, while Megan (now ex-communicated from the program) arrives in her Cheerleading uniform to save Graham from a terrible fate-- denying her identity publicly and possibly forever. We close on Graham, dressed like a pink prom queen, and Megan, in her cheerleading uniform, kissing. An ending like all great teen romcoms.
Sources:
https://collider.com/underrated-classics-of-camp-cinema/
https://www.nylon.com/fashion/but-im-a-cheerleader-outfits-fashion-costume-design
Loved the movie, loved your critique