The Men Who Melted Me: Queer Movie Crushes, Then And Now
Learning how to look at men
A dear friend has an email address that includes “iamvisual.” The moniker always intrigued me because it is one of the ways I think of myself. I might have chosen an address like that if I had her imagination and creativity. In her case, it perhaps refers to her love of interiors and career in merchandising.
For me, it refers to looking at and relishing men.
I did not come to looking at men easily. I came of age in the sixties when men simply did not… could not look at other men, at least not if they expected to participate fully and respectably in American society and culture. I dated girls in high school and college and eventually married my high school sweetheart and became a “family man” who ruthlessly policed his deviant sexuality in order to conform. This made everyone in my life happy except me. I grew into a stunted, anxious, fearful man who instead of enjoying his attraction to men, fled the very idea in panic.
When I hit puberty I began to look at boys, particularly their burgeoning crotches, telling myself I just wanted to be hung as well as those who displayed themselves in tight pants or in the locker room. It never occurred to me I would one day want to have sex with them. I failed to even realize I wanted to touch them. I was “just lookin,” which could be dismissed.
Other boys were openly leering at girls. My older brother covered the inside of his bedroom door with pin-ups he cut from girlie magazines. I missed their allure entirely and instead thought them sleazy.
I looked at some men without realizing I was doing it that way. I remember entering the delightfully air-conditioned Lowe’s State Theater on Canal Street in New Orleans in the early sixties. There on the big screen miraculously appeared Troy Donahue, a blond, bronzed, blue-eyed heartthrob of the day. Something about the lock of hair tumbling down his forehead over his square jaw and piercing eyes captivated me as if melting something inside.
This was so unsettling I tried instead to focus on seductive Suzanne Pleshette playing opposite, but it was him who haunted me. Afterward, I made sure to see every Troy Donahue movie released. I liked the preppy way he dressed in khakis and polo shirts with a sweater casually draped over his shoulders, the sleeves tied loosely in front. Sometimes when he leaned into someone, I could catch a glimpse of a tantalizing glistening clavicle. His was a look I would aspire to along with millions of other teenagers. Thinking it was about appearances and clothes made it easier.
In that same way, I was also taken with Steve McQueen, Gregory Peck, Henry Fonda, and even Charleton Heston with his sweaty chest barred so often in The Ten Commandments as the hottest Moses the world has ever imagined. Lantern jaws, heavy-blue beard shadows, sharp Adam’s apples, cleft chins, and lean hard hairiness entranced me. I told myself I just wanted to look like them. I suppose I also wanted to be admired and respected like they were. I certainly did not respect my defective insufficiently manly self.
Later on in the seventies, while married, I focused on Mash’s B.J. Hunnicutt played by Mike Farrel whose soulful eyes, carved jaw, gentle smile, and thick stubble carried me away. By that time I thought I was bisexual but unable to attach emotionally to men. Thus I was fully invested in my marriage. A little looking did no harm as long as I hid it. Still, I melted a little each time he was on screen; a small constrained swoon.
Soon after I belatedly came out in 1991, my first boyfriend, whom I later married, schooled me on how to look at men. His interest wasn’t limited to celebrities but went beyond to working men and those on the streets. One afternoon he was looking out of my apartment window at construction workers on the roof of a building across the street. He pointed and asked what I thought.
I replied, “About what?” He explained with surprise, “The men on the roof of course!” Then he singled out those he thought sexy and explained the attributes of each that intrigued him. I realized I had never looked at men in that way, likely because I had assiduously trained myself not to.
I was, however, a quick study. I began to watch men on my own, and with him. There was no jealousy as we exchanged our latest finds and obsessions. We understood one another perfectly.
I also lusted after movie stars, finally understanding my previous crushes. Liam Neeson, Kevin Bacon, Ryan Gosling, and computer generated Dr. Manhattan of Watchmen who hypnotized me with his giant blue swinging genitals were favorites.
I became better acquainted with handsome gay luminaries like Peter O'Toole, Montgomery Clift, Tony Perkins, and Brad Davis, each of whom could stun me into inhaling sharply. Beyond their looks, I wondered what their lives had been like in the fifties and sixties. Had they been open to some? Had they enjoyed life? Had they too learned to gaze longingly at men?
Some of the men I lusted after eventually fell out of favor. I dropped Charleton Heston cold when I realized he was a right winger and an idol of the gun crowd. Although I was once stricken with Jason Statham of Transporter fame, and never missed his movies, my adoration evaporated when my husband and I walked past him in the New Orleans Ritz Carlton lobby only to realize he was tiny and shorter than most jockeys, a reality carefully obscured by skillful cinematography and close-ups. Confronted with his corporeal body, I could no longer enjoy imagining sex with him….well, not quite as wantonly.
At 73, I still love man-watching, ever on the lookout for the qualities, I find particularly mesmerizing. I remain as visual and voracious as ever. During my daily workouts at the gym, the men I watch aren’t movie stars except in the small movie clips of my imagination. It's the men who are the attraction, not their celebrity. All my men are stars streaking across the ceaseless scan of my vision. They melt my once frozen heart with longing, lust, and love. Such is the endlessly captivating beauty of men.
This story is a response to the Prism & Pen writing prompt, My Queer Movie Crush, Then and Now.