OUTRAGE
Written & Directed by Kirby Dick
Produced by Amy Ziering
Released by Magnolia Pictures
USA. 90 min. Not Rated   
 

Director Andy Dick kicks in the gay Republican closet, naming names and holding nothing back. Even to the preached-to choir, there will likely be squirms of discomfort from his hard-hitting approach since the targets are being outed against their volition. His goal: to expose the hypocrisy of politicians who lead a gay (though clandestine) private life while endorsing their party’s virulently anti-gay agenda. He methodically accomplishes his mission, with a dose of shaming—the film begins with the audio tape of Senator Larry Craig’s interrogation by Minneapolis police after his arrest for soliciting sex in an airport bathroom, and replays an outgoing message allegedly made by Virginia Representative Ed Schrock for a gay sex line. (He retired from Congress shortly after he was outed by activist/blogger Mike Rogers of BlogActive.com.)

Why Republicans? Dick argues that the politicos are fair game for trying to maintain their cover by voting against pro-gay legislation. (In contrast, the Democrats’ 2008 platform opposed the Defense of Marriage Act and the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” military policy.) However, the film fails to mention that President Clinton signed into law the DOMA, banning the Federal government from recognizing gay marriages, after accepting millions of dollars from the gay and lesbian community for his two campaigns.

Dick doesn’t convincingly uncover the “brilliantly orchestrated conspiracy to keep politicians in the closet,” which he initially sets out to do. By all accounts here, from New Jersey Governor James McGreevy to Rep. Jim Kolbe (AZ), the men (no women) scrutinized in the film remained in the closet for their own very personal reasons. And in many cases, their homosexuality, though not confirmed, was a badly kept secret. As far back as 1982, Senator Craig’s name was mentioned in connection with the congressional sex scandal involving teenage pages. According to the film, the sexually active senator’s cover was bound to be, ahem, blown, sooner or later. In fact, Rogers had outed Craig months before the senator’s bathroom brouhaha; his story was ignored by the mainstream media.

This is gotcha journalism at its most insistent—the more firsthand the sources at his disposal, the stronger Dick’s case. His main target is Florida Governor Charlie Crist. Journalist Bob Norman of The Broward-Palm Beach New Times found two separate sources who have heard men bragging of their sexual relationship with the governor. They appear on camera, though anonymously, somewhat weakening the circumstantial evidence.

New York Mayor Ed Koch, severely criticized for his slow response to the AIDS epidemic (a subject which could easily be its own separate film), also comes out bloody and bruised. And Fox News is not spared. Kevin Naff, editor of The Washington Blade, kisses and tells of his hook-up with a certain news anchor. (If that’s old news for those in the know, much of the film will still be revealing.)

After nearly 90 minutes of sounding an urgent alarm, Dick relents. He tempers his blistering investigation with many interviews of life after the closet, ending with a hopeful rallying cry. No Advise & Consent-type suicides or downfalls here. Both McGreevy and Kolbe, to name two, speak of the huge weight that was removed once they admitted they were gay, the governor proving that his eloquent 2004 resignation speech was no fluke. Kent Turner
May 8 2009