Rating: NR
Genres:
Comedy Drama
Romance
Release Date: 10/26/1999
Dubbed: English
Flags: Adult Situations, Strong Sexual Content, Not For Children
Distributor/Studio: Wolfe Video
This story chronicles the history of a gay relationship that is torn asunder by death. In the late '70s, Philip (
Gregory Phelan) meets Guy (
Kevin Spirtas) at a yard sale where they were both eyeing the same green plaid shirt. Shortly after that, they become lovers. In that heyday of the sexual revolution (before AIDS), "open" relationships in which one or both partners have outside sexual contacts were not uncommon, and that is what they try to have. Philip finds that he is not nearly as "open" as Guy, but they only cease to be lovers when Guy charmingly informs him that he's moving in with another man. Their friendship continues, however, until Guy's death of AIDS in 1988. Even though the film's focus is on a relationship, it handles this subject unsentimentally. The brash wit of the characters is one of the film's highlights.
~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
A miniscule budget should not detract from a small character study about gay couples. In fact, it could lend greater authenticity. But when the budget is so strapped that the sound warbles between indistinct and tinny, and the camerawork and music compete for the honor of most haphazard, it can be distracting. Such is the case with
Green Plaid Shirt, an earnest but ultimately unmemorable portrait of characters living in and around the beginnings of the AIDS crisis. While it's not necessary to have a hook in movies about homosexuals -- say, that they're cowboys, or one of them is a high-powered attorney --
Richard Natale's film does struggle to justify why it's telling this particular story, about these fairly unremarkable people. The actors acquit themselves well, becoming the film's most quality production element, but even they cannot imbue these characters with more than average sympathy levels. Making things more problematic, the scenes are presented in a disorienting sequence.
Green Plaid Shirt is told mostly in flashback, but even within that structure, events are occasionally and inconsistently shown out of chronological order, for reasons that never become thematically evident. What's more, the titular garment is worn in almost every scene, present for all the vicissitudes of these characters' relationships, as some kind of symbolic constant. This becomes gimmicky and strained in no time flat. Noble yet fatally flawed,
Green Plaid Shirt is what results when neophyte filmmakers have a passionate and clear-eyed message, but not the storytelling skills to effectively dramatize it.
~ Derek Armstrong, All Movie Guide
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