The other day we sat and watched Test and to be honest we were unprepared for how much it would affect us. Most Queer Cinema that tackles the AIDS epidemic follows a character already affected by the illness, so you generally know where it’s headed. Test however focuses on the time when condoms were just coming into use, when people were going for their first HIV text and some thought you could catch it just through sweat. It seems unimaginable now.

Test follows Frankie, a dancer in a modern dance troupe, as he goes from back up to part of the main act, but we also follow him and his paranoia as he learns more about HIV/AIDS, its affects and how you can get tested for it.
It’s a really moving film and stayed with us for days. It also has a kick-ass soundtrack that we’re listening to right now.
We have three copies of the DVD up for grabs. Find out how you could win a copy after the interview with Test’s director – Chris Mason Johnson.

Was there an ultimate goal to making Test?
I did want to tell a story that hadn’t been told yet. One aspect of this was to show a gay male dancer and take him seriously as a dramatic protagonist, rather than as an object of ridicule (“men in tights,” etc.). The other has to do with representation of the AIDS epidemic. I’d seen a lot of elegies or death bed stories. But I hadn’t seen something about this very brief period of fear and paranoia before you may or may not get sick. TEST is about the fear of getting sick, rather than being sick, and that’s a subtle but big difference. It was another goal of mine to represent the dance world realistically. It’s a world I know well, and it’s not done well on film very often.

80s Cinema has a long history with dance movies. Even though Test is very different, did you have those kind of films in mind when making it?
Not really. Although FLASHDANCE is a guilty pleasure for me, I admit.

 

I feel like Test has conveyed the paranoia of having AIDS better than a lot of films. How did you go about this?
I made it a very internal story without a lot of dialogue, so it didn’t become an “issues” movie where characters talk about what’s happening. There’s a bit of that, just for context, but for most of the film we follow lead character Frankie as he goes about his daily life, and we intuit his paranoia and fear based on what he sees and hears. The idea was to make it very intimate, and through that intimacy we would get a sense of his inner life.

With Test, Looking, Weekend, Interior. Leather Bar it feels like we are going through a new era in queer cinema. Do you agree or do you think it’s always been there, or is it just that it is now getting more recognition?
The label “queer cinema” started in the early/mid ‘90s, if I have my history right, and then, gradually, queer cinema kind of disappeared and it devolved into “gay cinema.” I think the label “gay cinema” is mostly used now as a put-down, as in: this is marginalized cinema that’s not “good enough” to cross over, that has a niche market who will be satisfied with sub-par content because they’re so damn hungry to see themselves represented, and they’re also willing to be titillated by a little cheap skin and sentimental formula.
“Gay cinema” in this connotation is a step down from that “queer cinema” movement of the mid-1990s. But hopefully movies like Weekend and Keep the Lights On and Test on the micro-budget level, and Brokeback Mountain and The Kids Are All Right on the larger budget indie level are shifting that perception and we’re moving into a New Queer Cinema. It’s nice to think so! And then, one day, it won’t matter whether a movie is gay, straight or queer. Just like marriage.

What’s next for you?
I’m working on several things: 1) a dramedy set in San Francisco that takes on our lovely if mockable penchant for self-improvement and mindfulness, aka New Age stuff; 2) another period piece I’m co-writing that’s set in the 70s with a teenage girl protagonist; and 3) a bigger budget piece set in the 1950s that deals with a historical aspect of homophobia within the U.S. government. That’s a lot, I know! But you have to have a lot of irons in the fire to get anything made.

TEST is out on DVD and On-Demand from Peccadillo Pictures. Order now from Amazon and Play.

COMPETITION
To win one of three copies of Test, email Michael@Loverboymagazine.com with the Subject: Test Comp and the answer to the below…

Which decade is Test set in?
A) 70s
B) 80s
C) 90s

Competition closes 07.08.14 and the winners will be notified via email.